It's been sooooo long....

Hey all you wonderful, warm, beautiful, dry people in Auz!

Ok, well today is Tuesday, it’s 10.55am and I’m bored out of my mind!!! I’m not really working and although now I have a job (see below) no one has contacted me and so I have no idea when I start…..and to be honest, I haven’t exactly been doing a lot – it’s so cold and wet outside most days I usually just sit around and watch TV. Or go out and spend money – which is bad!

Anyway, yesterday Mike had a day off (after working 7 days straight) so we did the Grouse Grind – a walk up the local ski mountain (where I supposedly have a job). Wait, did I say walk, I meant a goddam HIKE and a half! Now apparently it’s supposed to take the average person 1.5 hours, it took us 1.75 hours. Our excuse is that Mike is getting over a cold so we were stopping a fair bit. We also haven’t really done any serious exercise in about 7 months. Still, I’m feeling a little unfit. However, on the plus side, neither of us are sore today so that’s gotta count for something right? I’m clutching at straws I know. Ok, well I’ll put you back to the original blog I started about 2 weeks ago……enjoy!

Some time a few weeks ago……

Today the sun has come out for the first time in about a week. The last 3 days it has pretty much been raining non-stop – not just drizzle, but rain. Oh joy!

We’ve really settled in these last few months – well it’s been about 2 since we wrote a blog and the time is just flying by! We have done heaps of stuff and only have just under 4 months to enjoy Vancouver before we leave. This blog is going to focus solely on Van – no US trip stuff. We will get there eventually, but it’s just soooo long ago and we still have so much to tell you all. So for the sake of my memory, and so that you actually hear from us relatively soon, here is a quick update about our life in Vancouver. So what’s been happening you may ask?

Well of course it was my birthday on Thursday! Thanks for everyone’s well wishes – I had a good day. I got a few CDs, a voucher for a massage and a cashmere scarf. Met Mike for lunch and then we had dinner together at one of our local North Van restaurants. I then headed out with the guys from work for some drinks and dancing. I got home at 4am so I reckon that’s a good job for an old 27 year old!

The other thing that has been dominating our lives is a mixture of job search (me) and overtime (mike). Harbour Cruises’ season is pretty much over in terms of regular cruises, so I had to start looking for a job to get me though to Feb when we leave. I spent the weekend at the three local mountain’s job fairs and now have a choice of jobs, but think I’ll go with Grouse – the most touristy, but closest, mountain. Mike’s EA Games job was extended from Sept to Oct. They then started them doing two nights a week overtime (until 9pm), then they introduced an 8am start every day, and now he’s doing overtime to 8pm every night, with the odd Saturday thrown in. We’re hoping they will renew his contract until Nov at least, but the pressure is now off that I’ve found a job. (Update - ok, well he was renewed to the end of Nov, but the pressure isn’t off cause I still haven’t started working!).

We’ve had a few visitors at our place these last few months. At the moment we have a couple from Auz crashing here for 5 days until their flight tomorrow arvo (they’re going home to Tazzy) and prior to that we had Chris and Alice crash for a month while they settle into Vancouver. It was nice to have roomies! But they have now been gone for a month – found a place and jobs so they’re all set. While they were here we finally cycled around Stanley Park – it was awesome!

What else….ah we went to the first Canucks game of the season. They lost but it was still pretty fun. Friggin expensive! I don’t know if any of you have tried to watch a hockey game at home on TV, but I struggle – I can’t see the puck and don’t know the rules and it all just goes downhill from there! However, being there is great and the atmosphere is pretty impressive. We are going to try and get to a Giants game, which is younger hockey team but still just as good, however, lots more fights (this is good for hockey right?) and most importantly, cheaper! Last Saturday we also went to a BC Lions game – Canadian Football. Like American football but different somehow (don’t ask me how). At first I kept looking away and missing everything, but by the second quarter I’d got the knack of actually paying attention for about 20 seconds and then doing whatever for the next minute while they stuffed around.

I almost forgot, we also went to Victoria, BC’s capital, on Vancouver Island. Wasn’t this a bloody adventure! We took public transport to this place and I think it took about 5 hours to get there, we stayed one night, and then it took about 4 hours to get home! It involved a bus from Nth Van (very early Sat morn), another bus to the airport, another bus to the ferry terminal, a ferry trip, another bus into Victoria. It’s a very cute, quaint, pretty little town. We had dinner at the best Italian restaurant I’ve ever been too! Great food, wine and terrific atmosphere! Apparently it had a very New York feel to it, according to the 2 ladies from Seattle that we waited in line with and sat about 2 mm away from – yeah, it was a little cramped, but that’s kinda what added to it’s charm. While in Victoria we also checked out the government building (daggy, but it was a free tour), went to a dodgy-as aquarium (daggy, but we had to pay for it!), went to a “castle”, which isn’t really a castle, more a mansion of this rich dude and they’ve restored it – pretty cool. Oh, and the main reason we went was for the Titanic display at the Museum of BC. It was great – lots of relics they had found and restored from around the wreckage of the Titanic site, as well as a whole bunch of quirky little stories.

Now, I’ve left the best til last. A few weeks ago we came back from a four day stint in the Rockies! It was soooooo beautiful. We saw big horned sheep, mountain sheep, elk, bears, and a few other unidentifiable fluffy things!

Back to today.....

Ok…..so this is where my last attempt at the blog finished, so I guess it’s back to the Rockies. We left Vancouver in the morning (after one massive domestic, but what's new when we're on the road), heading north east and drove for around 7/8 hours and stayed the night at Valemount. The next morning we drove into Jasper and spent an hour or two there. Lovely little town and it had the best fudge/bakery place – no idea what they were called (probably bear claws or something) but I had this chocolate, caramel, pecan thing……mmm. Then we headed up the gondola and played in the snow – it was sooo exciting! Then we headed from Jasper, south east for 6 or so hours, to Banff along the Icefields Parkway – amazing, this was the middle of the rockies, we were surrounded by snow capped mountains! Banff was great, would have loved to stay there a while. I know now why so many Aussies end up there and why it’s such a big tourist destination. This is where we also tried a some of the local wild animals – a Bison burger and an Elk burger. Not bad.

The next morning we backtracked along the Icefields Parkway to about half way so we could check out the Glacier. Because it was so early in the morning, the parkway was covered in a light dusting of snow – it was sooo pretty! The glacier was pretty funky as well – we got this massive bus/truck thing that drove us up to the glacier and then we played around for 30 minutes or so. We then drove back to Banff (Mike – a lot of dead drives on this trip Dad!) and checked out their Gondola as well – pretty cool, but not as much snow. Oh, and I managed to pay $20 for a cocktail – it was in the really fancy hotel right on the water in Banff (I can’t remember it’s name) (Mike – It was The Fairmont Banff Springs, I will never forget that because of the price of the cocktail) where we went for a drink and some food. Oops! After this we headed to Golden to stay over night.

Day four (Mike - more dead drives) and we drove back to visit Lake Louise. This place is amazing. The lake is actually quite small – about 1-2km long and 500m-1km wide. But it’s absolutely amazing! We went for a walk along the lake to the end and then for lunch we had a meat pie at a bakery just outside Lake Louise. A MEAT PIE!!!! Yum! Ok, so then we drove about 8/9 hours home. All along the way we also saw heaps of waterfalls, lakes, mountains and views…..needless to say we have a million photos! If I don’t get them up today, I will put them up soon - does anyone believe me??? hehe (I promise!!!).

Ok, now I can’t really think of anything else. Oh, except Halloween!!!! This was about a week ago. That night we got dressed up – I was a witch and Mike was a homie (Spelling??) – and met up with Chris and Alice at another couple’s place – Aggie and Lukas. We had big plans to have a few drinks and then go out. Well, thanks to Lukas’ shots (baileys and crème de meth, later to be mixed with vodka) the three girls weren’t well. I was throwing up in their sink, then in the taxi (don’t worry I had a plastic bag) and then again in the morning. I couldn’t make work the next day (my only shift that week!). Seeing the photos still makes me feel ill. I can honestly say this is the sickest I have ever been! However, despite that, the whole dressing up was fun and I look forward to experiencing it in the UK – this time going out! Also, Mike and I plan to have Halloween parties when we get home! It’s soooo much fun dressing up and there were some really inventive costumes (I worked the Sat night before - when there were lots of parties - on the boats at a uni Halloween party and some of the costumes were amazing, in parituclar the guy that went as a Facebook profile).

Ok, so that will do for now…..i’m sure you’re all bored out of your brains. Take care and we miss you all!!!

p.s a big hug to all of you celebrating over the next few weeks – mum’s b’day, anna’s 30th, craig D’s 30th, Sam and Lee’s wedding, and little Luke’s 1st Birthday! Sorry we couldn’t be there, but we will get something to you in the mail – better late than never!

p.p.s we will be leaving Vancouver mid Feb, not sure what date, but it’ll possibly be the 15.

Xoxo
Bec & Mike