Well, Trish and I are getting married this Saturday (6/3) and headed for Anchorage, Alaska to catch a cruise ship down the coast to Vancouver.
We'll be on the Holland America ship "MS VEENDAM", leaving from Seward, cruising Glacier Bay, making stops in Sitka, Juneau, Ketchikan and ending in Vancouver,BC.
We'll be spending an extra day in Vancouver and returning to Austin on
6/13 and I will NOT be checking the NG for those 10 days...I assure you I'll be busy doing OTHER things instead!
Any "must see" sites or tours that I should arrange? We waited until the last minute to get booked, so it was too late to pre-arrange anything but the cruise. Hopefully, we'll still be able to get a couple of decent 'excursions' in...but I'm not getting on any little puddle-jumper planes or helicopters for tours of the icebergs!
I wish we had more time to spend up there. Seven days sounds like a long time but the time in port is actually pretty limited. 10 hours in Sitka and Juneau, 6 hours in Ketchikan.
Trish has been to Vancouver before but surely someone has some MUST SEE site recommendations there, too! They do not HAVE to be car-related...although she certainly loves that kind of thing as much as I do!
Bob (I HATE flying...and it's HOW MANY hours from DFW to Anchorage??)
You may want to contact Judy Sauer and Rob Stokes. They both lurk here on the NG and are in Vancouver or adjacent communities. Also, you may wish to e-mail Dick and Deb Steinkamp. They live in Bellingham, Washington, less than an hour south of Vancouver, and they do visit there on occasion.
Vancouver is my home town. Lots of things to do and see. Traffic there can be a nightmare. Rent a car if you wish, but I'd honestly suggest that you cab it or use the bus system.
Stanley Park is a 1000-acre park right in the city, with old-growth forest trees, garden areas, a miniature railway (if it's still running) and a world-class aquarium. The park is close to being an island, and the seawall around its perimeter makes for a great walk.
South of the downtown core, but still very close in, you have Queen Elizabeth park, which has a sunken garden in an old quarry site. Mega-popular wedding picture site. Not far from that park is Van Dusen botanical gardens.
Vancouver's old Chinatown isn't what it used to be (because Chinese Canadians are now mainstream), but it still has some pretty nifty neon lights. You can find fine Chinese restaurant dining now anywhere in the city or suburbs, no need to go to Chinatown for that.
Granville Island Market is right downtown, and is very pedestrian-friendly, with lots of quaint shops a GOOD micro-brewery, and dining establishments.
Vancouver has a "Sea-Bus" service which is basically a pedestrian ferry which runs from the north foot of Granville Street (one of the major downtown arteries), across the harbour to the south foot of Lonsdale Avenue in North Vancouver, which is a different community, but still a part of the metro Vancouver area. There is a shopping-tourist-dining district called Lonsdale Quay right there. If you were to stay in a downtown hotel, you could walk or bus it to the Seabus, ride to Lonsdale Quay, and have a nice seafood lunch there.
While on the North Shore, a road trip, less than 10 miles easterly, out to Deep Cove would be kind of nice. It's getting very built-up now, but it used to have a sort of summer village-end-of-the-road type of ambience. Travel about the same distance the other way, and you could see Lighthouse Park, Fisherman's Cove ( a huge yacht marina), and Horseshoe Bay, a major ferry terminal, and a tourist magnet in its own right. Lighthouse Park is a large "primitive forest" type place, with a rocky shoreline, and a rather unique sort of microclimate with trees and shrubs not found elsewhere in the area.
Another attraction on the North Shore is the Grouse Mountain Skyride, which is an aerial tramway to the top of Grouse Mountain. Truly awesome view of the entire city on a clear day.
That's given you enough to account for an entire day or more!
It kind of looks like I may be going to points East and South on that weekend, or else I'd be really tempted to go to Vancouver instead and meet up with you. I do have several things that I have to do there, in any case. As of right now, I don't know if I will have any opportunity to travel at all, since I'm at risk of being sent back to work, doggone it!
Have you booked a hotel room for the day you are staying there? If so, drop me an e-mail and let me know which hotel and which date. If a last-minute change of plans allows me to be there, I can call you there.
Deep Cove still has the ambiance (I live there :) )
Congratulations Bob!!
Gord's pretty much got things covered other than you may want to take Trish up and down Robson St. for a day of enjoyable "shopping by foot". And if the weather is nice, I'd for sure do the Grouse skyride. while you're up there have lunch - the view is absolutely incredible! And if Trish likes gardens, you should try to get to the Van Dusen gardens for a nice afternoon.
Oh - and if you don;t make it to Granvill island but do make it to a pub for lunch, you can always order a Granville island pale ale. It's not the same as being there, but it'll do :)
Hope you enjoy the trip!
Rob
Gord>> Well, Trish and I are getting married this Saturday (6/3) and headed
Dang it...we won't be able to spend ANY extra time in Vancover and I have no one to blame but myself !
Wwe waited WAYYYYYYY to late to book the cruise because we were getting her stuff moved over here and with her house on the market, we were hesitant to set a firm date and commit to it. And, since we waited so late to book the cruise, not only were we unable to pre-book any tours or excursions, but we weren't able to make our own air travel arrangements either!
It saved us over $2,000 having the cruise line book our flights but they BARELY got us scheduled at all, so I can't complain about it TOO much. They can't make ANY deviations to the airline flights...but I"m a devious bastid at times, so I'll check with NorthWest Airlinwes myself when I get to the airport and see if THEY will let me arrange for a
2-day layover in Vancouver. I don't mind paying a penalty or slight fare surcharge because Trish has been there before and says it BEAUTIFUL!
We're already rushed for time...the ceremony is at 1pm and our flight leaves Austin at 5:45 to take us to Minneaplois, then on to Seattle where we have to overnight and then catch an Alaskan Air flight from Seattle to Anchorage first thing in the morning. That's the only way we can get to Anchorage before the 4pm shuttle service deadline to make the ship's sailing at 8pm out of Seward. Well, we could have canceled the wedding and left this morning...but even Trish might balk at that!!
Wedding day jitters? What are those? We've been so busy getting all the items we need to party with the hoity-toities on board ship that we haven't hard time to do anything but shop and cross items off the 'to-do' list! I even kept my temper and haven't killed any stupid sales clerks or check-out people (yet)! Wouldn' twant to spend any time in the jail instead of dancing with my new wife on board ship, now would I????
Here we are, just 3 1/2 hours until the ceremony and I'm sitting here on my butt yakking on here instead of finishing my packing and getting the LAST of the last-minute things done. Does this woman have patience or what????
Gord and others: Thanks for all the suggestions...I'll probably end up using them next year when we go back up there on another vacation just so we can see Vancouver. I'm trying to think positive...but it's hard to do when you're such a pessimistic person as I am!
All together now: The airline will cooperate... The airline will cooperate... The airline will cooperate... The airline will cooperate...
You guys all be kind to each other. And yes, JT....Barry's turd-mobile van is still sitting out back, at least until I get back from my honeymoon and call the salvage guy to come start hauling off scrap metal!
Bob (North to Alaska!)
Gord> >Well, Trish and I are getting married this Saturday (6/3) and headed
Anyone know if Bob has a cell phone (and the number)? I'd like to see if I can buy them a drink and, if they want, give them a short tour of Seattle. I'm about 10 minutes from Sea-Tac airport. Since they'll be spending the night here, it would be great to meet the newly weds in person.
Too bad I didn't check this thread yesterday.....:-(
Richard Morris Cell: 425-417-5556 Email: RichardMorataoldotcom
Didn't make it to Three Hills. Coulda, shoulda, woulda.
I left Friday afternoon to drive down to Kelowna to attend a big birthday party for a friend who has terminal cancer. It was going to be a birthday party, and a kind of farewell party rolled into one. Well, the party got cancelled, Bill had a seizure and slipped into a coma, and they toted him from home into the hospice unit at Kelowna General Hospital, where he remains as of now.
I was at Revelstoke when i got the news. I went on to Vernon, and had a long overdue visit with my cousin there, and then piddled around and did touristy things on my way home yesterday, getting in the door here about 1:15 A.M. today.
On our recent cruise, we played bridge with a pair of brothers, Randy and Chris - one from NoCal and the other from the midwest. Their wives were there but didn't play bridge, so we filled in. All of us enjoyed it as we were pretty evenly matched and were able yo help them a bit in bidding. It was an enjoyable two days - we took the third off to go touring and couldn't find them thereafter.
Just as we were leaving the ship at the end of the voyage, one of them came up and told us that the other had died of a massive heart attack the evening that we were touring.
It was a shock to us, but we are glad that they had that time togetherand and if we made it anymore enjoyable, as seems likely, we are thankful.
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