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no_fosters_thanks

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No Fosters Thanks
Canada
Aye, a new adventure

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Tick Tick Tick....PART ONE

Sechelt, Canada


A true log fire and all

Well, after the May long weekend, Tom and I are as close to Canadian as we'll ever be. And also very spoilt by our friends.

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.

Incidentally, John has taken to trying to be Australian, and adding an "o" to the end of nearly every word. Consequently a scrabble match was played between Tommo, Saro, Shanno and Johnno. But I'm getting ahead of myself. So after a car, a ferry, more car, we arrive at a small marina where Dale comes an picks us up..by boat. The cabin can only be reached by boat, which is apparently quite a normal occurence. And when a Canadian says Cabin, they actually mean 'Super Awesome Cool Small House with an Awesome View'. When the boat comes to Nelson Island, it's really interesting to look at all the Cabins that have been built on the island and hearing the stories of them being built. One house is being built by hand...out of stone! Shannon's first weekend at the Cabin was when she was two weeks old, so her family really know the history of the island.


The sunset view from the log cabin
Sitting inside the cabin we were able to look out over the small bay, (sitting by the wood fire...of course) and watch the sea and various wildlife. Two geese and their goslings had claimed the front lawn as their territory. And marked it appropriately. In LOTS of small little ways that are unfriendly to shoes.

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

permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on May 23, 2007 from Sechelt, Canada
from the travel blog: Canada
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"It's a treasure hunt, at your local thrift store"

Vancouver, Canada


Kits Beach
**update** So totally nothing interesting has happened. At all. I worked, drank beer, teased Tom, and bought bus tickets. Greyhound 30 DAY DISCOVERY PASS! Thats right North America, you shall suffer my travels for 30 days of invasive discovery. Hahahahaha **update waaaay over**

A real sign, complete with a picture of an old school pirate treasure map. Oh, of all the days to forget my camera. Who knew that a trip to the mall would be so eventful?

Saturday we ventured all the way out to Burnaby, marking Tom's first trip on the skytrain. (incidentally, have you noticed we've run out of lots of free stuff to do in vancouver, we're really stretching our imaginations now). At Burnaby was the rather large, confusing shopping mall of Metrotown. Wow. They even have people on rollerblades 'shopper assistants' to aid you. Which you need, with the most CONFUSING floor plan known to man. I cannot count the times we got lost, and then by the time we were slightly orientated, trying to find an atm..lost again! However, we did find the best store, called 'ages 3 and up' which sold geek toys. They had a person sized statue of Gundam. Now you can see why we needed a camera!

We managed to find a webcam in londondrugs, so we rang all our families, and proved that we're alive and well with video evidence.

Monday afternoon was the most gorgeous day, so we walked down to the beach and played frisbee...which I'm ashamed to say wasn't a success. Well, a success in the regard that Tom got plenty of exercise, and utter failure that my throwing skills are much diminished.

Tonight we're heading to the Vancouver Art Gallery to see some photography exhibits with a girl from work, so that should be great fun.

4 weeks until we leave Vancouver now, off to Banff and Lake Louise first, get in some horse-riding up there! Super excited!

permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on May 8, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: No Fosters Thanks
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Canadian house parties and compulsive fibbers

Vancouver, Canada

The parent creatures seem pretty happy with the once weekly 'I'm alive' phone call, however displeased when it's short due to imminent free beer. Honestly, you would think your parents would want whats best for their children.


Tom's sweet mullet
Basically, I'm pretty gutted, due to my mum preferring Tom's blog to mine, even after I pointed out that very little is related to reality. And apparently I try to kill him every week in a new and creative manner. THE LIES!!!! It's taken a few days to calm down...but my overwhelming jealous moment is well under control. However, Tom's mullet keeps increasing...he says he's going to try and look like Tom cruise ala MI2. Crazy.

So the weekend just gone was a bit of fun...we headed out to the Richmond Ikea, which was pretty awesome. I'm not sure how much Tom enjoyed the experience, but I had a ball. I'll admit, it was very similar to the Ikea at home, and I love both of them equally. Is it lame when tourist attractions include foreign ikeas? It's almost tempting when I go to Sweden to go to ikea there....except I'm sure they won't have the explanation of what something is...and you know what, I need it sometimes. Incidentally, the swedish words for kitchen chairs are apparently all boys names. There you go.


Cultural merger....
Saturday night we were invited to a bbq, hosted by my co-worker Rose. There are pictures of Tom and I with her teenie tiny dog...smaller than the cat. It was a pretty good night, beer and snags...very very tasty.

Other than that, we've just confirmed, we will be leaving Vancouver on June 3rd...and are confirmed to arrive in London on July 7th. Jeez, hope I get my passport back from the UK embassy soon!

So doot crew and mates in the Uk, get your livers ready! Also vancouverites, book in a leaving party, details soon!



permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on April 29, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: No Fosters Thanks
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Ice-hockey, beer and UBC

Vancouver, Canada

Crazy, just looking at the google map above, it's insane to think how far I've come...and also how much of it was overland! You would think after 28 hour bus trips in South America, that I would appreciate plane travel more. But I think people get to caught up in 'losing' time while in transit...one of my favourite views in Bolivia, was while we were on a chicken bus going through a tunnel, while travelling in the Andes. I'm actually looking forward to going across Canada by bus, granted, some of it will be boring (I'm predicting the prairies), going through the rockies by bus, awesome. Not to mention going through USA, where we can see lots of their cool country barns. I find them hillarious.

This week has been a bit social for us, Thursday we headed out with an Aussie contingent to Room 18, our local bar to watch the hockey, the Vancouver Canucks vs. Dallas. Sadly, we lost that game in overtime, but hey, it's best out of 7...so we're still in with a chance. Was a great night, quite amusing when the massive bench 3 of our party was sitting on broke, and consequently propped with with milk crates. Very classy. The poor waitress nearly went out of her mind with this dilemma. We agreed that she had to be new.

Friday night we went over to a house leaving party, for a bloke I used to work with when I first got to Canada. The house was due to be demolished, so we gave it a rousing farewell...actually we drank, played Texas hold'em and other board games.


Pilsner
But it was a good night, our friends Shannon and John picked us up and drove us home, so we got home all safe and sound:)

Saturday we just slept in...had a house day catching up on important business....trying to continue with learning spanish, which is going slowly but steadily.

Today we went for a walk around UBC parklands, which was rather surreal. UBC is like a little town all of it's own, even with it's own MacDonalds. Going from RMIT university, which is just random buildings scattered throughout the CBD, to a well developed region....strange.


UBC parklands
But the parklands were quite nice....and it was a good form of exercise.

Still trying to plan our trip trans canada, but apparently according to Tom, I have a few 'reality' issues in regards to how much time and money we have. But hey, I'll get there in the end:)

permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on April 22, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: No Fosters Thanks
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Keeping it real

Vancouver, Canada

After a slight chastisement regarding my blogging updating and interest level, I will make a half arsed promise to update more...it's not like I haven't got the time at the moment. Unfortunately this weekend doesn't look like it will be decent weather, so all grandiose plans to go hiking are looking dim. Being in spring here, the rains can be fair torrential. Haven't seen anything like the rain we experienced in Peru, on the Inca trail, but that was just stupidly wet.

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.


Tom and I, Sun, sea and mountains

Bye xoxoxox

permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on April 12, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: Canada
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Blading at Stanley Park

Vancouver, Canada


Tom and Erika skating
Not much I can say about this really, Tom, Erika and I hired sweet rollerblades, and skated around part of stanley park. Although, watch out for the salmon crossing, no-one likes roadkill.

Salmon Crossing



permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on April 9, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: No Fosters Thanks
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Happy Easter!

Vancouver, Canada


Picnic at Lynn Canyon Park - Tom, Mark, Simon and Amber
We have had a crazy busy weekend doing touristy things! Due to being a long weekend, we've managed to fit so much in. Friday, our good friends

Amber rock climbing
Amber and Simon, were taking their other aussie friend Mark, out to some park trails, so we hitched a ride with them for the day.
First we heading off to Lighthouse Park, which is located in West Vancouver. To be honest, the lighthouse itself was a little bit of a let down, but we walked (climbed more truthfully) along the rocky beach from the carpark to the lighthouse. I doubt it's the official trail, but the views were amazing.

It was quite a hillarious little trip, we came across an original gun


Lighthouse park - taking the scenically rocky route
battlement, which unfortunately had a pile of empty beer bottles, god knows how someone managed to get a slab of beers out there though! There were quite a few locals out, having picnics on the rocks which was great to see. Canadians are such outdoorsy people, and Friday was the warmest day we've had this year, a cracking 20 degrees! It was such a nice day, we spent the whole day outside.


Tom, Sarah, Amber, Simon and Lighthouse

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!


Twin falls at Lynn Canyon Park


We ended up having a picnic lunch at the base of the twin falls, which was so beautiful. Strange though, a canadian child was in his board shorts, with his boogie board. It was not THAT warm, but hey, good work for giving it a crack. The children there were adorable, one little girl

Lynn Canyon Park
appeared in the middle of a dead tree trunk we were sitting next too....rather strange, this small child playing peekaboo in the middle of a tree. We didn't even see her for ages! It's amazing, you really appreciate how much in Australia can kill you, you would never think about doing something like that in Aus, anything hiding in a dead tree would probably hurt a great deal if it bit.



permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on April 7, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: Canada
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North Vancouver...and learning how to play frisbee

Vancouver, Canada

This weekends trips involved North Vancouver and frisbee action. We headed over to North Van by the sea bus, and walked around the Lonsdale Quay markets.

Vancouver, as seen from North Van

However, the trip was marred by a nasty attack - by a seagull. Tom was viciously attacked by the BIGGEST seagull I've ever seen. While we were walking, Tom had a slice of pizza, heading towards his mouth, and the seagull swooped in a stole the whole piece. No wonder it was so big if it lives off stolen pizza. Stupid fat seagull.

When good seagulls go bad
However, it was a brilliant play on behalf of the seagull, so we commended it for it's efforts.
North Van is a really great place to get a view of all of vancouver, but the weather was a bit shoddy so we didn't do much else there.

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.


Amber and her head muff
We staggered home, tried to get invited to a Canadian party in a garden..but no-one invited us in as we walked past.

On the sunday, Tom accomplished the impossible...teaching me how to throw, and catch a frisbee! We even have photo evidence!


Playing frisbee at our local park

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.

permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on March 26, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: Canada
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Granville Island Brewing Company..and some other stuff

Vancouver, Canada

In a city that rains ALL THE TIME, when the clouds break, you dash outside to play. It's interesting how outdoorsy Canadians are, considering (in my aussie heat prefering way) the weather is awful for a good part of the year. In saying that, if you ever look cold/wet/snowed on, Canadians will always ask you 'have you been here for a summer yet?'. And when the weather lifts, you really understand this place is going to rock in summer.

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


Granville Bridge
company. Sadly, we weren't able to get on the tour (and tasting session) but we still had a good stickybeak. Granville Island is filled with theatre companies, artists and places with great food...a really interesting place to spend an afternoon, when we went, the place was full of locals. It's nice to explore places where locals actually relax, rather than at some overpriced touristy 'cultural Mecca' which invariably looks like that one you went to last month...on a different continent.

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)


View from Kits beach

permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on March 21, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: Canada
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Jesus and airplanes

Vancouver, Canada

I have a theory that when you piss off Jesus, he smites you with terrible air travel. It's just how it is. So, having had a fantastically brilliant and hedonistic time in KL....my flights back were evil.

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).

I'm settled in our flat, and looking for work. Weird stuff though, had an interview, and my interviewer is friends with my bar manager (anna at the Doutta Galla in Australia), as they worked and lived together in Scotland!

The world is small, and don't piss of baby jesus before a flight. Strange times eh?

permalink written by  no_fosters_thanks on March 7, 2007 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: Canada
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