Long story short, what should have been a 36 hour trip got an extra 14 hours smashed in their (cause it wasn't long enough) as my plane from la to Seattle got delayed, I missed the last bus to Vancouver, and the next one was in the morning at 9am. So, trying to find a flight to get home, no luck, so I cried at the United States airlines people (i love being female), and they put me up in a hotel overnight at their expense, so I didn't have to sleep on the floor. Brilliant.
I'm doing a new trip as they other page takes too long to load with my penchant for included MASSIVE photos. No other real news, except for I'm back in Vancouver, Tom gets in on Friday (thankgod, I miss him so much already).
The world is small, and don't piss of baby jesus before a flight. Strange times eh?
So in our grab of sunshine, Tom and I walked down to Kitsilano beach and did some exploring, walking around the boat yard to Granville Island, home of the brilliant Granville Island Brewing
In other news...we got really drunk with our Australian friends Amber and Simon, and will most likely repeat the performance the coming weekend. The aim is to explore Vancouver one weekend at a time...and hopefully branch out a bit further when possible.
So if I'm not too lazy, I'll try and update after each weekend adventure...which might get more interesting than walking down the beach. (I'll admit it, it's 5 blocks from our abode)
Later that night we proceeded to Amber and Simons, where there was an aussie contingent drinking and partying it up, where inhibitions and hats was released.
On the sunday, Tom accomplished the impossible...teaching me how to throw, and catch a frisbee! We even have photo evidence!
The park is a block or two from our house, and so close to the beach, and perfect for some sweet frisbee action. I think we'll be heading down there more often as the weather gets warmer.
It was quite a hillarious little trip, we came across an original gun
After visiting the lighthouse, we headed to the brilliant Lynn Canyon park, which has a suspension bridge, 50 metres above the falls. Unfortunately, most of my photos didn't really work out, as it was dark under the canopy, and rather bright where the light did come through. Shame, I took so many, but I'm glad I did now!
It's come time to apply for my uk visa, and believe it or not, I missed the price change (which I wish I knew was going to occur) in visa fees. My visa is now jumping from 75 pounds to 200! So our nice little comfy budget has gone by the wayside, and we're back to being vegetarians to save money. We've already changed our flights, so there's not much we can do about it except work harder. It's difficult to save money here, with such low wages and the cost of living being about the same as in Australia. I'm earning $16 CAD an hour here, as a part qualified accountant. Which is double the minimum wage. Still, I really appreciate how good it is back in Aus now. So we're still heading trans-canada on July 3rd, and we're slowly working out a rough plan. It'll be hard to be really casual about booking accom as we go, unlike south america, as backpacker hostels aren't that common here, and during summer, beds can be scarce.
So, since march, we've been out once to the pub across the road for dinner, and thats it. We eat in every day, make our own lunches and everything. So sorry if the blog is a bit dull, but there's really not alot to be said about watching csi re-runs. Incidentally, there's about 3 hours every night. Bliss. That and a nerd channel...stargate, yes please. We're even members of the local library, can't afford to be buying books. But on the bright side, things will get really interesting when we get moving, as we'll have money to do things! Current topics for discussion are - horse-riding in the Rockies, up near Banff and Lake Louise (which is n't much of a discussion, I have my heart set on it:), canyoning in Quebec, kicking it around Nova Scotia....Toms' mate Stu is taking us up to his log cabin at Lake Emma in Saskatchewan for a few days while we're there.
The only other news is I've been trying to complete the ipod challenge, listening to all my albums, no skips, just from a-z. I'm only about 230 songs into 850. But I'll get there. Discovered some weird stuff on there.
Anyway, must go, time to cook a vege curry! Love and hugs to everyone! If anyone wants to post me a burnt copy of the hottest 100 cd...i'd be ok with that. honestly, I promise I won't complain too much.
John and Shannon picked us up at an ungodly time of morning, and can you believe, at 6am on the saturday of a long weekend, we couldn't find a single service station open? Made for a rather exciting trip...as we got off the ferry the car had 13kms left...and an extremely long hill between us and the next town with a servo. By the time we made it to the service station, we had a grand total of 5kms left on the clock.
We learnt plenty about general Canadian life, through extended random conversations (they sort of have a prom too) and discovered the the Loon is a bird, that is pictured on the $1 coin. Hence being called a 'Loonie'. And to think, we just thought it was a queer random word. Brilliant.
So much happened, I'll continue on again soon, but for now..PART ONE
The next morning we had to move out of our house, so we went and imposed on the best australian themed b&b in Vancouver, also known as Amber and Simon. And then things went a little weird.
After drinking a bottle of wine down the beach, and having a snack, we headed back to Ambers place (with a very distressed looking Tom). For the evening, being our last in Vancouver, we collected Simon and headed out for all you can eat sushi and korean bbq. YUM. $20, and we stuffed ourselved silly. And I'm now a really big fan of Kimchee, a more avid fan of pork dumplings, and less of a fan of oysters and sqiud. Ugh.
And to think we couldn't leave Vancouver on even more of a high, Sunday, after Amber cooked us bacon and eggs (I love that girl), we headed back down to kits beach, and had a picnic and a game of boce, and coincidentally, a few beers. Unlike me, I know. However, come 5pm, it's time to leave, and we said our final goodbyes, and got on the greyhound.
That was a fairly uneventful night, the bus took 13 hours, from Vancouver to Lake Louise, but being an overnight bus, and having an ability to sleep most places, it wasn't too bad. But wow, when the sunrise came, we were travelling through the snow capped rocky mountains, and it was simply stunning. It actually make me glad we took the bus. No matter how shattered we were. Before we got off the bus however, there was another tourist who was trying to get some help, she was spanish, and had some questions about one of the spots...and gosh, did I realise how shaky my spanish is. It's gone even more downhill (although it was hardly high on the slope), but we eventually got a 'level' of communication, and worked it all out. Such a mental workout for 7am though. WOW!
Last night we managed to get some old people (youth hostel?) in our room, which would be fine, except for the fact they BOTH snored like tractors. There needs to be a rule, if you know you snore, you CAN'T STAY IN DORMS. I was ok, pretty wrecked from the trip so I only woke a few times, but I think Tom was about to go postal. Luckily, we fell asleep at 7pm, and didn't get up until 9am, so we managed to get a few hours in there, but we needed that sleep. It has been calculated, at walking over 15km, both that day AND today, make Sarah one hungry and tired little traveller.
It was a great ride, and Lake Louise has been good, but after two full days, it's time to move on, so we're off to Banff next. We have to be in Saskatoon by friday, so still aways to go!
Once we arrived at Saskatoon, at 5.30 in the morning, we were greeted by a rather surreal experience, of Stu running through the bus station waving a giant aussie flag. Lucky we weren't in Banff, or he would have been mobbed. After a very early morning breakfast out at Denny's, we also made a quick stop at Wal-mart, to pick up the essentials. Oars, charcoal and lifejackets. What else do you need at 7am?
To be honest, we just had four days of good old fashioned fun. There was mini-golf, ice-cream, playing at the beach (ok, lake with sand) canoeing.....It was quite hillarious playing mini-golf, as there was the added challenge of putting your ball in the hole before andrew picked it up, and either gave it to you, or put it straight in the hole! I'm proud to say Andrew and I make a stellar team, one effort I didn't even have to hit the ball before we got it in the hole...
We played in the sand aplenty..got to meet the neighbours and just generally had a great time. By sheer co-incidence, Tom and I had our 1 year anniversary at the cabin, on the same day as Amanda and Stu, so we all went out for dinner to celebrate! Yaay!!! It was a great few days, and wow, when people say saskathewan is flat, they really mean it. I got excited when I next saw a hill. And it was in Manitoba.
The hostel turned out to be more of a house, with the very friendly owner Gail, living in the basement suite, and the rest of the house occupied by travellers. It was actually a great experience, and we met a fantastic Spanish bloke called Carlos. Carlos decided he was over his job, so decided to pack up and cycle across Canada for 5 months, and some of the stories he had, fantastic.
Although the first night in Thunder bay was far from perfect, with half the town losing power (and as a result...tom and I struggling to get a feed anywhere) we were well surprised when everything turned out great.
Thunder bay is most commonly known for the town where you can see the Sleeping Giant, this HUGE island, when viewed from the town, looks like just that, a sleeping giant. It was actually very cool, but for some unknown reason to myself, I failed to take a photograph. Idiot much. But, I did take a photo of the local porn store...just around the corner. Like they always seem to be.
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