ALASKA! (By Way of Vancouver)

I turn 70 this year.  I relate that depressing bit of info only as background for this trip.  The Boyos and Girlos wanted to do something special to celebrate this benchmark, and Meghan came up with an all-family cruise to Alaska.  This was arrived at back in January, or maybe earlier, but that’s when we set about exploring options and finally deciding upon a date and cruise line (Celebrity, based upon our previous South America Cruise with them).  We all made our bookings and made time-off-from-work plans (the B’s & G’s anyway) and such.  Then, Meghan got the delightful news she was again pregnant, and due in October.  No sweat, she said, she’d still be good to go in July.  Well, she was, but Celebrity wasn’t.  We found out sometime in May that Celebrity has a week-of-pregnancy travel limitation, and she was beyond it by several weeks.  No go, no way.  A pregnant woman has to provide a doctor’s certificate as to how far along she is.  Meghan asked, but her doc (probably wisely) nixed the idea of fudging the certificate, and convinced her that these restrictions are there for good reasons.  So, that was a bummer.  Too late for everyone to change plans, so our trip would be minus Meghan and Isla, who would go to her family in Phoenix whilst we were cruising.  Not what we all had planned, and a major bummer, but it is what it is.

Since the cruise left from Vancouver, Loni and I decided to go up early and spend a few days exploring the city, which we hadn’t seen since 1977 on a VW van vacation to Canada.  I did my B&B research, and settled on Ashby House (Loni hiding in the foliage), which had a lot of “quirky” reviews on Tripadvisor.  We’re up for quirky, and this turned out to be a real find.  We flew up on Alaskan Air late on June 30, arriving just before midnight.  During the flight we had a great view of a moonlit and snow-capped Mt. Baker. We had decided to spend that first night at an airport hotel so as not to disturb the B&B with a late night arrival.  A Holiday Inn provided the basics for the night, and after the mediocre included breakfast the next morning we caught a cab (C$34) into the city proper.  From the Sikh driver we learned that we had arrived on Canada Day, the Canuck equivalent of our Fourth of July.  The City was crowded and jumping, including a parade, which we caught in the middle.

 

Allegedly, this was a celebration of the diverse peoples and immigrants that have settled Canada, and there were costumed groups of all sorts.  I’m not sure whom the belly dancers represent, but I’ll take ‘em!

Earlier in the day, we did some walking around the city and stumbled onto Morton Park on English Bay with this weird group of figures.  “A-maze-ing Laughter” consists of 14 enormous bronze statues in different poses of a shirtless guy laughing hysterically.  It was first installed in 2009 as part of the Vancouver Biennale, and all of them depict the sculptor, Chinese artist Yue Minjun.  Ego trip?  He originally wanted $5 million, but settled for $1.5.

The beach on English Bay looked like southern California.  It was packed with sunbathers, and plenty of people in the water.  Note the great weather, which we would continue to enjoy throughout this trip (18 days).

After walking down to Granville Island, we doubled back to the B&B via other streets.  We rested up a while then headed out to find a place for dinner.  We had scoped out a likely block of restaurants on the way over to the beach, so we headed back there and ended up Phin & Pho Café, a no-frills hole-in-the-wall that featured Vietnamese fare.  We had a late lunch/early dinner of wraps and a pork belly/rice combo plate, washed down by fruit freezes.  Absolutely nothing fancy, but very tasty.  Back to the B&B for a bit, then off for the harbor and the evening fireworks.  On the way we passed by a yummy-looking gelato place, so we had to stop and taste.  Then it was down to the harbor and we joined a few tens of thousands of our closest friends to wait for it to get dark.

We got there before most of this mob, and snagged a park bench that had a clear view.  As the sun got lower, the light was great for these shots of the floatplane lineup and the fireboat entertaining the crowd.

We entertained ourselves with selfies and talking to a local resident who ended up telling us way too many details of her life story.  Perched on our bench with backs to the city.

Finally, about 10:30 pm, things got underway.

It was a very nice show.  I was pleasantly surprised how orderly the crowd was.  No boisterous behavior, very little trash left about.  Very Canadian.  We made our way back to the B&B and to bed.  The room was a little warm (no AC), and our street, though narrow and residential, appeared to be a major conduit for people walking from the harbor side to the English Bay side of the city.  Laughing groups kept going by for the next two hours, all quite audible from our front room.  Not a lot of sleep tonight, but a great day.