Vancouver et al.

In Vancouver, we met up with my uncle. He toured us around Vancouver and showed us Burnaby Mountain, Lynn Canyon, and Stanley Park. He also showed us his place; it's 'huge'. 6,000 sq feet for 3 people. The touring almost made us late for picking up our car. It closes at 1700 and we got out of the car at 16:52. We stayed at a guest house, which wasn't too great, but we were tired and it didn't matter much. Before we walked in Stanley park, and lots of cherry blossoms were still there. But I was tired, and my feet were hurting so there wasn't much walking. Sunday we went around Burnaby. Zoe showed me her old stomping grounds. The area looks nice with very big lots. We went to Deer Park, it was very pretty and nicely groomed. We went to Chilliwack, Bridal falls before the Wedding. The wedding was nice; it was simple and humble/modest. We were lodged at the venue. The next day we drove to Whistler

On the way to Whistler, we stopped by the sea-to-sky gondola. Before then we went to the Arcteryx factory store, which didn't have much on sale other than outlet fare. And before that, we also went to a market place (Grandville island). It's a pretty touristy area, but it's nice and has a farmer's (?) market there similar to the St. Lawrence Market, but smaller. Got a lot of junk food to munch on - it was great. We were at the sea-to-sky and hiked up. We got our asses kicked. It was a straight/continuous climb up. There's about 900m elevation gain in 7.5km. The first part was rough. it had big steps, large rocks/ hills and once you get past that segment, you get to a sign that says only 1/4 of the way there! Similarly, after about 2 hours you get to a small clearing, only to see the gondola house at the top of another peak, and then you realize that's where you're going. We were lucky with the day and got to have a clear view of the mountain range. Part of the climb involved pulling on a rope, it was neat. The hike took ~3hrs. At the top, I got a stupidly expensive beer for $12. But the view was nice and had a long suspension bridge to walk on. We went to whistler and checked into the bear lodge.

We got a day pass for Whistler. The top was completely covered in snow. It was amazing we went on a green to warm up, then the idea was to go down a blue, then maybe a black. But we went on the saddle bowl and it was steep. Zoe freaked, and couldn't go down. In the end, she scooched down to the bottom; I felt bad that we ended up on that piste and that there was no way out really. We'll be back another year and we'll try to tackle it again next time. We roamed around on whistler for the day, but the weather went bad in the afternoon and the top was getting covered in a cloud. We will definitely be back in March/April because their season ends in May!

The next day we drove to Revelstoke. The drive was uneventful; we went through some dry areas of BC that we didn't know existed. In Revelstoke, we had dinner at Old School Bistro. The food was surprisingly good and I think was the best burger I had on the trip. The next day was also uneventful and the National Parks weren't open and in the clouds. We went to the hot spring south of Revelstoke, Halcyon. I had to take a ferry to get there and drive another hour, but it was a nice day trip. There is a cold, hot, and hotter bath pool. It was smaller than the one I went to Jasper, but it was still nice. It was still raining when we got there and I found it refreshing to have raindrops. We ate at Chubby's Funsters and ended up with 3x1/2 pints because we calculated and found 1/2 were more economical than full pints.

We drove into Lake Louise the following day. The weather still wasn't so good, so we decided to go to the canyons. We went to Johnston Canyon and Marble Canyon. Both were nice hikes; the Johnston canyon was quite busy and had to use spikes & crampons due to the ice. We got to the upper canyon falls. As the last thing, we did that day we went to Lake Louise and we saw bears! A mother grizzlies & 2 cubs. We were so close to them. We saw some tourists get charged because they got too close. They crossed the road and was overall adorable looking. It was an enjoyable encounter. We went back 3 times to look at them as they cross the road. We ate at Peyto's cafe that's part of the HI hostels. The waiter there was a guy from Oshawa that made his way to Banff and stayed there for 16 years; a really nice guy.

We woke up the next day before dawn to catch the morning light. The goal was to go up the icefield parkway. Zoe lost her phone, but we went back and found it luckily. We got to Peyto lake and snowshoed around a bit. It looked quite magical with all the power snow glistening in the sun. We drove up to Jasper and back down that day. It was a long day on the road but we got to quickly see the major site and walk around a bit. We saw goats in the middle of the road. They were still there when we were on our way back (4hrs difference. They were still licking the salt on the road). The weather was perfect, but I think it was a bit too much driving in a day. We covered ~700km. We came back to Banff and went up to the viewpoint just outside of the village on Mt Norquay. We saw white-tailed deer at the top of the viewpoint and also learned that the 1a Bow Valley Parkway closes everyday 8pm-8am to help preserve the wildlife.

We drove the next day just past sunrise. We had to go to Calgary as we were flying out of there. We drove down the parkway just past 8 am for another chance at viewing animals but we had no luck. The drive was nice in the morning light. We had the idea of going to Calgary Zoo. The last time I went, it was quite nice with lots of animals. This time we got to see the Pandas that Toronto once had and we missed (they ended up in Calgary). We got to be right beside penguins and see them waddle around. We flew out of Calgary to Edmonton, then Edmonton to Toronto. Ideally, we'd have gone from Banff to Jasper then fly out of Edmonton, but I did not know the risk of getting trapped because of avalanches. It was a lot of driving, but luckily it was split. We drove a total of ~2300km, which is 700km more than I did on a similar trip I did on my own a few years ago. But it was worth it, and we got to see a lot. Next time it doesn't need to be rushed and we can focus on certain areas.