Vancouver

Our hitch from Osoyoos went easily- perhaps a bit too easily given our luck over the next couple of days.  We got a lift along the gorgeous desert valley road to Keremeos at about 8 at night, and our lift showed us where we could stay in a picker's camp (which continues year after year despite the town's complaints).  The next day we got to Vancouver by about lunchtime and attempted to reach a couch surf or one of the contact numbers we had.  No luck was to be had, so we took a (slow, with all the bags) walk through the West End of Vancouver, sitting in a pretty park full of yuppies eating sushi and then walking along to beach wall to Stanley Park, which is 1000 acres of lovely forest.  We pitched our tent in the trees and spent a peaceful night squirreled away.  On sunday we still had all our things and between diving into the library or internet cafes to try and work out where we could stay we found a lovely vegetarian chinese restaurant.

Another park very kindly provided us with a bush to camp in, and on monday we explored the poor/moving into edgy area around Commercial Drive.  Lots of nice food nearer the north end and a cool bookshop.  Even cooler was the second place we stopped, Spartacus Books, full of interesting stuff, including lots of cheap deals, unusual for North America, and even having some computers we could use- which found us our Couch Surfing guardian angel!

So the next few days we stayed at a VERY nice house down in Richmond, where our mucky little paws felt very out of place.  Our host was so friendly though that it worked out fine, and we had a chilled day watching films and eating beans in maple syrup.  Which is apparently normal in Canada!

Tuesday evening we found a comedy club and ate 'Japadogs', hot dogs with Japanese style toppings.  The comedy had its good moments, and it was nice to have a mix of professional and amateur acts, but we didn't see anything amazing.  There was only one woman on stage all night, and some of the male acts seemed to think that talking about porn was just inherently funny.  It isn't.  Doesn't mean it can't be, but you have to actually be funny too, not just mildly sexist and then snigger.

Wednesday we explored Wreck Beach- clothing optional and relaxed attitude to people wandering round vending pot compulsory.  It's a fun place with a nice, chilled atmosphere, lots of a families and stuff.  But it's still pretty much just a beach, and unless you enjoy lying in the sun or paddling (why does no one ever SWIM properly near beaches?  Even I didn't, and I've swum in every lake since Penticton.  It's weird- J) anyway, lying in the sun and paddling on a beach full of naked hippies isn't actually much more interesting.


Our last day in Vancouver was a bit taken up with financial faff (all sorted thanks to the wonderful keeps walking) but we did get a nice walk around Stanley Park- in daylight this time!  Most of the trees there are more recently replanted after it was all logged in the 1800s, but some of them are old and huge.



Also, C had a bit of a run in with some squirrels.  They're pretty cute, and obviously get fed by tourists a lot so come pretty close (they're rats with good PR.  If any other rodent gets that close to you, people don't say 'Aww', but when it's got a brush strapped to it and does cute little human things with it's hands, it's apparently fine.  I can do cute little human things with my hands, but if I invade your personal space and attempted to steal your food/map/dignity right in front of you, I'd be arrested or assaulted.  In short, I don't like squirrels. - C)

In the evening, with everything sorted for leaving tomorrow, we met up with a very lovely friend of a friend who got us quite drunk.  Alcohol of all sorts is expensive in Canada and so a six pack of cheapest beer cost about eight pounds.  But you do get returns on empties (to encourage recycling) and through this we met a nice lady in the park who was collecting empties in part to help pay for vet bills for her dog that she'd had for 15 years and had recently passed away.  We ended up chatting until 2am.  It was really nice (as meeting lots of locals has been through hitching and couch surfing) and we had only been talking earlier that evening about a lot of people never talking to strangers, especially in larger cities.

Then we got a Greyhound to Seattle (enjoying a remarkably easy and rapid border crossing, though C did get asked when he was last arrested, apropos of nothing other than handing over his (Irish) passport).  Our Couch Surfing host took us to a couple of his favourite places in the local area last night and we are now off to explore some more for ourselves.