2nd May 2025

After waking up throughout the night, and going back to sleep, I was finally up at about at 6.30. Actually, for the whole month I was waking up at 3.30 in the morning, and ensuring R was awake, too. It was a lovely sunny day outside; the forecast had been for another “dreary” day.

We ate breakfast in the hotel. We could not understand the charging mechanism, other than it seemed expensive, especially with the Canadian tax, and state tax all added on after the perfectly rounded dollar price, and finally after a 20% tip was added, it was even more so.

We went for a long walk along the shoreline, ending up walking to Brockton Point lighthouse and back. On the way back we saw two Canada Geese with their goslings on the cycle path.  They took offence at a small handbag dog; knocking a cyclist to the ground. Some signs showing photos of Canada Geese were captioned “Not all Canadians are friendly”.

In the many marinas, there was the odd ‘house boat’, amongst the motorboats. There was one with a very realistic house built on top. We passed the rowing club as we entered Stanley Park, where there were separate tracks for running, cycling, walking and driving. Vancouver is a very friendly cycling and pedestrian city. Most of the roads have these segregated tracks.

There are some totem poles, which we viewed. We eventually made our way to Brockton Point and the lighthouse. Across the water were the container and coal ports. We could see a huge pile of a yellow substance, this turned out to be sulphur, a biproduct from the oil fields in Alberta.

Back at the restaurant area, we stopped for a snack and a pint at the Tap and Barrel at the Convention Centre, accompanied by some good pita and hummus.  Met a few English tourists, who were also here for a cruise.  There seems to be a cruise ship in port every day. Tomorrow there will be two ships. We are heading out tomorrow on a seven-day cruise to Alaska and back on the Koningsdam. The other Brits were there on an eleven-day cruise to Alaska and back on the Coral Princess. They were both due to leave tomorrow at 16.00.

We had a walk around the empty ferry port to get the lay of the land. We also checked we could store our luggage at the hotel after we checked out and before we boarded the ferry.

We again ate supper at Rogue Kitchen and Wet Bar.  Started to rain, so slightly damp on the walk home to the hotel.