Vancouver: Day 2

The day started out with a workout, although it was a little longer than we first anticipated because we kept seeing places we wanted to go - the beach, the bridge.6.4 kilometers later (4 mi), we had followed the following route:

Later (much later), we got ready and headed to Granville Island for the public market. We had heard that it rivals Seattle's Pike Place Market so we were excited to check it out.

We found mangosteen! It has a history of being banned in the US. After a little internet researching I found that the ban was actually lifted in 2007, so I don't know why I've never seen it in the US.

Mmm. It looks and feels like it's alive, but tastes less scary. Rob, who has eaten mangosteen in Thailand, said that it wasn't as good as the ones he'd had - but I thought it was really delicious.

Monica, this is for you. Remember the dragon fruit we saw at H-Mart? Here's what it looks like on the inside. Has anyone ever had this? It looks like it would be like kiwi fruit.

We also went over to the kid's market, which is a building full of toy stores. Note to my future parent-self: never take my children here.

Granville Island is very small, but it was still worth it to explore it via bike. It really was a neat place, very beautiful.

Then we went to Costco. Rob was planning on getting poutine: french fries covered in cheese curds and french gravy. After a few samples inside he decided against it. The healthy choice, obviously, but he might live to regret it. We love checking out different Costcos, by the way.

In the late afternoon we rode bikes from the hotel down onto the Seawall, a great bike trail that pretty much circles the entire Vancouver West Side. By the time we got to Canada Place, however, my bike was making an awful squeaking/rattling sound when I peddled. We figured it was probably okay, but we ditched the bikes anyway to walk to Gastown, Chinatown, and the Library.

Gastown's steam-powered clock. We waited 5 minutes to hear the chimes that go off at quarter after the hour. 4 short chimes, then it was done.

At a Chinese Garden in Chinatown. This koi was as big as my arm - from my shoulder to my hand, it also had a funny "crook" shape to it's body. It stayed here at this spot for five minutes and Rob wouldn't let me gently toss a small rock at it to see if it would move.

Our route for the late afternoon: (bike update: WD-40. Sounds like new)

It was such a nice evening that we decided to keep on going on the seawall on our bikes. There were so so many people out on bikes, walking, on the beach, and rollerblading. With all the people, it didn't feel too crazy. In Seattle the most popular public places are also a hassle, with parking, etc. We think that because Vancouver is so urban and has so many great paths, people just walk to the beach.

giant bikes

Beautiful evening in Vancouver. This was taken around 9:30 in the evening, when we were riding back to the hotel via the same route on the Seawall. If you could ignore the darkening skies, you'd think it was 1 in the afternoon - still a ton of people out at the beach and riding bikes.

That's it for Vancouver. That's also it for the blog updates of our trip - 4 days of camping and no internet!