Mark and I (and Sandy and Derek) stayed at the Westin Grand, and because I procrastinated too long to book our room, we had to spring for a suite, which came with a tiny, charming (and completely useless because it was raining that day) balcony. We had great views of the city.
We also got a close-up view of this cute little garden atop the L'Hermitage Hotel across the street, which looked like an adorable boutique hotel, and definitely one I would consider staying at next time.
The rain was not going to stop us from exploring the city, though. So we headed out to Stanley Park, the largest urban park in the United States (that's right, 10% larger than Central Park in NY).
There are some great views of the Vancouver skyline from the park.
Conner discovered umbrellas, and insisted on carrying his own.
There was a gorgeous crane in the water.
Conner generously shielded Sandy from the rain ... for as long as Sandy could walk that low.
Weeeeeee!
Trevor loved the open spaces and having his favorite people around.
My parents are so cute.
There was a floating gas station.
I guess it's where the floatplanes gas up, or maybe our cruise ship refuels?
After our quick jaunt around maybe a fifth of Stanley Park, we were hungry. With so few meals to eat in Vancouver, we wavered between dim sum or handmade noodles. Noodles finally won out, and so we made our way to The Legendary Noodle House, where we got front row seats to watching them pull and cut our noodles by hand. The beef noodle soup was the tastiest and most slurp-worthy of the hand-pulled noodle soups.
The seafood noodle soup was a little bland.
The flavor and texture of the handcut stir-fried noodles were addictive.
Back at the hotel, everyone was ready for an afternoon nap ...
... except Trevor, who enjoyed running around our suite and playing with Uncle Mark.
My parents left around 4pm for the airport, leaving the Nelsons and us to explore more of Vancouver. We headed out to Vancouver's gastown district.
Since we only had one day, I didn't spend a lot of time researching landmarks or other sights, so we passed by them without even knowing what we were passing. I took a picture of this clock because there was steam coming out the top. It turned out to be a famous steam clock, which I later heard passersby looking for.
We caught glimpses of this interesting tall building from various parts of the city. It turned out to be the Vancouver Lookout, a popular Vancouver sight offering 360 degree views of the city.
We passed by lots of interesting restaurants ... or at least restaurants with interesting names ... that I wanted to keep in mind for my next visit.
But we didn't stop to eat at any of these places because I had my mind set on Japadog! After taking a roundabout route back to the hotel thanks to Mark's navigating, which took us past a Costco and the Canucks stadium, GM Place, we finally made it back. But we were hungry after that long walk, so instead of heading into the hotel, we went straight to Japadog, just kitty-corner from the hotel.
They offer hotdogs or sausages with a Japanese twist. There was slow-moving line out the door.
Tonkatsu-dog (fried pork), Oroshi-dog (bratwurst with radish), and Yakiniku Rice (which had a grilled rice "bun").
The bratwurst with radish was scrumdiliumptious, and Trevor loved the grilled rice bun. I had ambitious plans to hit Guu with Garlic (popular, innovative, izakaya restaurant open past midnight) later that night, but after our showers, we got into bed to watch some TV, and it was over.Both mornings, we stopped into Caffe Artigiano for coffee.
The second morning, we also tried their breakfast pastries and sandwiches. Yummm.
Our short jaunt from Vancouver to Seattle was on this adorable little Bombardier Q400. I can't remember the last time I rode such a small plane, if ever, much less a propeller plane!
After nearly two weeks of travel, by boats, trains, planes and automobiles, Mark was a little disoriented, which resulted in this conversation:Alice: "Wow, that's a big bottle of water."
Mark: "It's going to be a long flight, like 4 or 5 hours, right?"
Alice: "No it isn't."
Mark: looks confused
Alice: "In fact, this leg is less than an hour."
Mark: "Oh, I thought we were still in Anchorage, for some reason."
Good thing he's cute.
