Our 10th anniversary was in 2011, right after we completed a three-week road trip to move to California. We wanted to go someplace special, where we hadn’t already been – but still in the U.S. and reasonably priced. We decided Vancouver was a good choice, since we were in the same time zone and it would be a quick trip.
Unfortunately, before we really started planning the trip, we discovered that Dave’s passport was expired, and we ended up going to the Magic Kingdom (Anaheim) instead.
So finally we went to Vancouver in May 2014. Not an intentional “babycation”, but certainly sure to be our last major vacation just the two of us, for quite some time.
A brief synopsis of our trip, since there’s no time for real blogging (with all the baby planning, appointments, classes, etc in addition to full time jobs and life):
Wednesday, May 14: fly from SFO to Vancouver. Take the Skytrain to our hotel in the West End.
Thursday, May 15: Rest, get oriented. Eat lunch at a place near our hotel called Apple Deli, located in a tiny mall/food court place. Hit up Safeway to buy a few supplies, as we had a kitchen in our hotel room. Walk along the waterfront a bit. Rest some more. Head to the Alibi Room for dinner.
Friday, May 16: Get up at 5:30 am. Take bus to Skytrain to bus to ferry to bus. Finally arrive at Butchart Gardens. Enjoy the gardens for about 3.5 hours (including our sack lunch + some gelato we bought there. Take bus to ferry to bus to Skytrain. Stop at Granville Island and wander a bit, mostly trying to find a place to eat. Eat at The Keg for dinner
Saturday, May 17: Eat brunch at Joe’s Grill in the West End. Walk around the West End and stop by a salon where we both got our eyebrows threaded (Dave’s first time!) Take the bus to Stanley Park and walk around for quite a while. Take a cab over to The Fish Counter to have extremely informal sustainably sourced fish for dinner.
Sunday, May 18: Take several buses plus the Seabus (highly recommend!) to Lynn Canyon. It was beautiful but SO CROWDED. Did quite a bit of hiking and by the end of the trail we were so tired. We took the bus back to Seabus to the bus. Ate a really yummy dinner at Kingyo in the West End.
Monday, May 19: Get a ZipCar near our hotel. Hit up Tim Horton’s for some Timbits and coffee for breakfast. Drive to Lighthouse Park and hike around some ancient Douglas Firs. (So much more chill than the day before.) Drive over to Larson Bay Park to eat our sack lunch while gazing at the water. We decided to just keep driving north, since we had plenty of time and a car, and no other destinations in mind. We stopped at Shannon Falls and walked a bit. We ended up in Squamish, where there didn’t seem to be much to do. We had passed the Sea to Sky gondola, so we went back to see if we could take the gondola ride up, but it was closed for the day. So we headed back to Squamish and walked the estuary trail. Afterward we made a very unsatisfying stop at the local A&W Root Beer, then we drove back. We stopped for dinner in North Vancouver at a pretty tasty and interesting restaurant called Burgoo. On our way home we drove around the west side of Stanley Park which we hadn’t seen earlier in the trip.
Tuesday, May 20: YVR to SFO! Good trip but good to be home.
nocureforgravity 