Thursday morning we boarded the plane in Atlanta and after a seemingly interminable 5 hour flight landed in Seattle. Picked up a sweet blue Prius and we headed north to our first destination -- a night in Vancouver at the Fairmont Waterfront with beautiful views of the mountains and sound. On the way, we stopped for a snack in Fairhaven, a nice little town south of Bellingham that seems to be enjoying a resurgence from its nineteenth-century heyday. Obviously a college town -- the conversation between waitstaff overheard at the Mexican restaurant involved Ezra Pound and jazz :-) -- Fairhaven also had two really good bookstores. Unbelievably, I pulled myself away relatively quickly and we headed north, only to hit horrible traffic in Vancouver. I guess it was Thursday at 6:30pm but it was pretty bad. Finally, we arrived at the Fairmont where after a quick walk, we settled in for a bowl of soup and then bed.
Up early the next morning for a beautiful view of the sea planes leaving for various destinations and cruise ships loading up their passengers – the majority of hotel guests were departing for or returning from Alaska. This is a very urban area of Vancouver, with tall skyscrapers and a decidedly Asian style. We didn't have time to explore further, however, because more distant destinations awaited -- Vancouver Island here we come!
We had a 1:30pm ferry reservation out of Horseshoe Bay so had time for a brief stroll around Stanley Park, arguably the greatest urban park, where Alan was almost beaned on the head by a gull dropping what appeared to be the largest clam ever. He (the gull, not Alan) was being chased by other birds and he dropped his ample meal to the pavement just in front of us where it landed with a resounding SPLAT! No fears, the gull picked it up and when last seen was attempting to evade his pursuers, clam in beak.
The ferry was pretty cool and afforded beautiful views of the surrounding area from the sun deck on what was a lovely, clear day. After two hours, we landed in Nainamo, only to be met with -- more traffic! About an hour of bumper to bumper nonsense as we attempted to head north and then west. Finally, as we headed to the interior, the traffic died down and we found ourselves heading through passes of two ranges of mountains. The trees were hemlock, cedar, and some deciduous -- lots of which had been logged about 25 years ago. The road followed the path of a river whose name I forget but we scrabbled down to take a look and it definitely looked "fishy."
Finally, finally, after two days of travel, at about 7pm on Friday, we pulled up to our destination, the Wickaninnish Inn.
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