We spent Tuesday morning at Stanley Park which is right in Vancouver. It's basically the same idea as Central Park in New York: a big sprawling beautiful park right in the middle of the city. (I just looked it up: Central Park is 843 acres and Stanley Park is 1001 acres.)
Here's part of the Vancouver skyline from Stanley Park.
Canadian geese!
I'm not sure the significance of these totem poles but I think they have something to do with the local Indian tribe (Squamish).
Looking north from Stanley Park you can see North Vancouver, a whole other city, across the harbor. We wondered who these middle Eastern gentlemen were; they arrived in three cars and they had three or four very alert bodyguards with them (so I snuck this picture from inside our car). The bodyguards' alertness was evident when Aaron got out of the car to take some pictures of the city! They didn't say anything but they assumed a protective & more alert stance around their dignitaries, upon the arrival of a stranger.
The famous Hollow Tree in Stanley Park
We saw lots of squirrels there and they were all black!
We drove back to our hotel midday and decided to walk to lunch. Next to our hotel was a new residential highrise under construction, and there were ads on the wall for the different apartments available; pretty pricey but I guess that's what you get if you want to live in downtown Vancouver. This is the mid-priced one, starting at $1500/mo for a 600 sf apartment.
We went to a cute little crepes place for lunch; I ordered a spinach, ricotta, & bechamel crepe which was delicious but a little heavy on the spinach.
Belgian chocolate crepe for dessert; oh my. It absolutely melted in your mouth.
We spent the afternoon in North Vancouver; this is one of the bridges over the harbor. All the lanes are variable depending on which direction rush hour is going.
At a lovely reservoir in North Vancouver.
Lynn Canyon Park, in North Vancouver, is a neat place: dense forest, rivers and waterfalls, and hikes. We spent quite a bit of time there. Here's Aaron on a suspension bridge.
The river below the suspension bridge.
More pretty water.
By late afternoon we were back at our hotel. We had a concert to go to that night (Foo Fighters!), and decided that the best way to get to the arena was to take the city bus. Right across the street from our bus stop was this gym; go Steve Nash! (He grew up in British Columbia.)
The Foo Fighters' three semi trucks, outside the arena.
We had general admission tickets (floor) and were right by the sound/roadie guys' area. Here's the previous bands' roadies (Cage the Elephant) packing up their stuff and the Foo Fighters' roadies setting up in between sets.
We had a great view of the stage; it was an awesome show.
Dave Grohl came out on this mini-stage right next to us several times during the show; that was pretty cool.
The end of the show. The Foo Fighters played for almost 3 hours, and with the two opening bands plus time in between sets the whole show was almost FIVE hours long! But it was so awesome.
By the time we got outside to catch our bus it was midnight (forunately the downtown busses were still running). When we got back to our hotel we decided we wanted some hot chocolate but the nearby Starbucks was already closed (I guess that figures; 12:15am on a Tuesday night!) so we walked to a convenience store to buy some hot chocolate mix and some snacks to have in our hotel room. It was a late night but we had a really fun time.
Here's part of the Vancouver skyline from Stanley Park.
Canadian geese!
I'm not sure the significance of these totem poles but I think they have something to do with the local Indian tribe (Squamish).
Looking north from Stanley Park you can see North Vancouver, a whole other city, across the harbor. We wondered who these middle Eastern gentlemen were; they arrived in three cars and they had three or four very alert bodyguards with them (so I snuck this picture from inside our car). The bodyguards' alertness was evident when Aaron got out of the car to take some pictures of the city! They didn't say anything but they assumed a protective & more alert stance around their dignitaries, upon the arrival of a stranger.
The famous Hollow Tree in Stanley Park
We saw lots of squirrels there and they were all black!
We drove back to our hotel midday and decided to walk to lunch. Next to our hotel was a new residential highrise under construction, and there were ads on the wall for the different apartments available; pretty pricey but I guess that's what you get if you want to live in downtown Vancouver. This is the mid-priced one, starting at $1500/mo for a 600 sf apartment.
We went to a cute little crepes place for lunch; I ordered a spinach, ricotta, & bechamel crepe which was delicious but a little heavy on the spinach.
Belgian chocolate crepe for dessert; oh my. It absolutely melted in your mouth.
We spent the afternoon in North Vancouver; this is one of the bridges over the harbor. All the lanes are variable depending on which direction rush hour is going.
At a lovely reservoir in North Vancouver.
Lynn Canyon Park, in North Vancouver, is a neat place: dense forest, rivers and waterfalls, and hikes. We spent quite a bit of time there. Here's Aaron on a suspension bridge.
The river below the suspension bridge.
More pretty water.
By late afternoon we were back at our hotel. We had a concert to go to that night (Foo Fighters!), and decided that the best way to get to the arena was to take the city bus. Right across the street from our bus stop was this gym; go Steve Nash! (He grew up in British Columbia.)
The Foo Fighters' three semi trucks, outside the arena.
We had general admission tickets (floor) and were right by the sound/roadie guys' area. Here's the previous bands' roadies (Cage the Elephant) packing up their stuff and the Foo Fighters' roadies setting up in between sets.
We had a great view of the stage; it was an awesome show.
Dave Grohl came out on this mini-stage right next to us several times during the show; that was pretty cool.
The end of the show. The Foo Fighters played for almost 3 hours, and with the two opening bands plus time in between sets the whole show was almost FIVE hours long! But it was so awesome.
By the time we got outside to catch our bus it was midnight (forunately the downtown busses were still running). When we got back to our hotel we decided we wanted some hot chocolate but the nearby Starbucks was already closed (I guess that figures; 12:15am on a Tuesday night!) so we walked to a convenience store to buy some hot chocolate mix and some snacks to have in our hotel room. It was a late night but we had a really fun time. 
1 comment:
Were there only 3 semi trucks outside of the arena? We saw 3 in the fenced area, and another 6 or 7 parked on in the parking lot and I thought to myself "there is no way they would take up 10 semi trucks!" But, there was a circus show going on the following night so maybe that is what they were for- but they matched the 3 red ones in the fence. Anyways, it's crazy to me that they can even take up 3 semis!
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