Vancouver Part 2

Wednesday, July 6th
On Wednesday afternoon, we all drove over to the Vancouver Aquarium. One of the highlights for me was watching a dolphin show. I love dolphins. They are so intelligent and so much fun to watch. A couple of the other animals that I couldn’t get enough of were the sea otters and the beautiful, white belugas. I couldn’t get the one line of a song I know out of my head when looking at the belugas. The chorus goes “Baby Beluga, baby beluga.” And that’s all I remember. The first and only time I had heard the song was in a kindergarten program of Cindy’s that I went to. I wonder if she remembers the song better than I do?

One cool thing about the aquarium was that they actually had a small area designated for nursing mothers. How cool! I wish more places were like this; it would make things a lot easier (and more family friendly) for new mothers. And a whole heck of a lot better than having to duck into a yucky bathroom stall for privacy.

After the aquarium, we all went for tea at Kristy’s friend Joy’s house. It was there that I had some of the best angel food cake of my life. They had a gorgeous backyard, as most people in Vancouver seem to, with lots of flowers and great landscaping all around. That is one thing I like about the Vancouver and Seattle areas – all the flowers and greenery. I really like the large number of hydrangea bushes.

Wednesday evening some of us went to Stanley Park. Grammy, Kristi, and Jess watched Adrianna for us, which was nice. I enjoyed walking around the trail at the water’s edge and watching the sun go down.

Yeah, I know, the horizon isn’t straight. Whoops! The rocks you see in the backgrounds of these pics are actual rocks stacked on top of each other. Pretty cool.

Thursday, July 7th
On Thursday we all boarded a ferry from Tsawwassen to Vancouver Island. Getting off of the ferry was stressful for me. Right before the last call to get back to your car as the ferry was about to unload, I decided I had better change Adrianna’s diaper while I had the chance. Mary Lou came with me, which I was glad for. It was a good thing that I changed her diaper as it was full, but the delay meant that we had to rush back to the van before all the cars drove off of the ferry. We thought we were on the 2nd level, but couldn’t find our van anywhere. Somehow I got parted from Mary Lou (I had Adrianna in a stroller and so I could not easily weave through all the parked cars), but then I spotted Butch who helped me carry the stroller up the stairs to the 4th floor where we were really parked. Here, I met Greg who was also making his way to the van. Butch was able to get into the van to drive off of the ferry, but due to the stroller, Greg and I were unable to weave through the cars fast enough to make it ourselves. We ended up having up having to walk off of the ferry and meet up with everyone out in a parking lot. I was pretty stressed out, especially during the time when I was all by myself with Adrianna and completely lost and not sure what to do, since I was unable to get up the stairs with a baby, stroller, and everything else by myself.

One of our stops once we got to Vancouver Island was Butchart Gardens, which was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to. I think we took more pictures here than any of our other destinations. The gardens and flowers were amazing to behold.

After arriving at our hotel in Victoria, we walked around the streets nearby. We walked to a fish-n-chips place right near the water which Dave had heard of. Awesome food! On the way back, we walked through the courtyard of their legislative building there and stopped quite a bit to watch different street performers. We also visited the Empress Hotel and sat in their tea room which is one of the most elegant rooms I have ever spent time in.