Rocky road

Hannah has some meetings in Calgary next week so we took the opportunity to head east and check out our local hills.  Known as "The Rockies" they're quite big - bigger than the Mendips, our mountain range where I grew up.

Our trip began inside a nervous traveler's nightmare.  We stepped into Vancouver airport...and all the lights went out!  There was a terminal-wide powercut, and as the screens everywhere remained dark and the lines grew longer, civilisation itself began to fray.  It was a little bizarre watching security guards cycle around with lights on their bicycles (are bikes part of airport disaster planning?).  Pete thought it was great, of course, and applauded with everyone else when the lights came back on.  Luckily no crazed passengers had turned to cannibalism in the darkness, and amazingly our flight departed only 30 minutes later than it should have.

Having flown east we drove west, over the enormous plain that makes up most of the Canadian interior.  There before us were the Rockies, rising snow-topped on the horizon, just like the Mendips, as we ascended to Canmore.  We left Vancouver in rain, of course, but up here it was hot and sunny, and Canmore is mountainous and laid back, boasting a brewery or two and a coffee shop that made nice strong cappuccinos.  As I'd been up since 5.30am, this was important.

Tomorrow we'll head higher up, but for now we're in our mountain lodge and Hannah has finished the Chevron-branded chocolates while watching "Say Yes To The Dress".  I'm off to read a Stephen King novel in the hot tub.  This is what a rugged family outdoor adventure is all about.

What's missing from this picture?  Electricity!  And therefore civilisation.



Ah, mountains.

No electricity here either.

Rivers and mountains.

Multiple barriers to Pete successfully launching himself into the water.

Rivers, forests, and mountains.

It's a kitchen in our hotel room...without child locks!  Pete's best holiday ever.

Chilling on the porch with mummy.

Corporate sweetener

They're chocolates...



...with Chevron's logo printed on them!!

 

You can imagine what this did to Hannah's brain.

Victoria Day

Hannah let me and Pete have Sunday off - she's religious like that - but today we were back to full-speed-ahead on the Horseshoe Bay Express: 25 minutes from our door to the local ferry terminal.  It's extremely convenient but a little scary when you're sat on a bendy bus doing 90kph on the Trans-Canada Highway.

Hannah's parents always prided themselves on being the last car onto the cross-channel ferry (no queuing) and we continued the tradition; the gangplank had already been raised and we were ushered up the car ramp.  A minute later we pushed off across Howe Sound as bald eagles wheeled overhead.

Today is Victoria Day, a national holiday to celebrate Queen Victoria.  We don't even have one of those in Britain, making Canada more monarchist than the UK!  No wonder they're so suspicious at the US border.  Luckily our destination was only Bowen Island, just off the coast, which is rugged and forested and home to many arty rural people.  There's not even a Starbucks, although we found an artisanal local roastery that won an award for being the third best espresso in North America.

For a bank holiday it was surprisingly uncrowded, possibly because every forecast was for huge rainstorms that thankfully never arrived.  Hannah tricked us into doing not one but two walks!  The first to Dorman Point - a viewpoint disappointingly obscured by many tall trees - and then through Crippen Park, named after the notorious murderer (possibly).

Pete enjoyed it all from the comfort of the backpack, and the sun shone down as it has for some time now in a non-Vancouver manner.  Here's to the next time Hannah has a four day weekend...although maybe I'll suggest something quieter and home-based...



A ferry at the bottom of the garden.

My Dad, a naval architect, always made us find the safety certificates whenever we traveled to France.  So this pic's for him!

Sailing away.  That's actually Bowyer Island up ahead, small and uninhabited.

Should you be flying that on Victoria Day?

The perfect place to take a toddler!

Cut down some of these trees and the views of unspoilt landscape would be impressive.

Hiking in the wilderness.



Bridal Veil Falls, a little smaller than its Yosemite namesake.

Daisy, daisy.

Everyone enjoys Victoria Day.

Bowen Island is also known for its exceptionally fine orchard.

First class travel in the bus on the way back.

The holiday isn't over until the last G&T is finished (i.e. shortly).

Lighthouse Family

For much of the 1980s, when weekend afternoons inside consisted of watching snooker on a black-and-white telly, Hannah's parents insisted on many healthy family walks.  Hannah hated them, of course, but now that she's in the position of power a relaxing day can't go by without her forcing me and Pete away from Disney movies and into the great outdoors.  Your parents always win in the end, I suppose.

This Saturday the destination was Lighthouse Park, a bus ride over the Lionsgate Bridge and into West Vancouver.  It's a beautiful compact green space with water on three sides, but manages to contain precipitous ups-and-downs over granite summits and under towering Douglas firs.  It's a mini Yosemite.

Like Yosemite it contains bears, and we saw lots of destroyed tree trunks and bear-proof bins, but didn't spot anything wilder than a woodpecker.  The lighthouse itself is still in use so you can't actually visit it (although it's been fully automated since 1996) but you can get down to the rugged shoreline where someone told us you can cliff-dive.  Hmm.

It wasn't that bad to be outside, although I'd prefer less bugs and dirt, and more retail opportunities.  Pete didn't originally like the baby backpack but now thoroughly enjoys sitting while daddy huffs and puffs up ridiculously steep inclines.  Does that count as another parental win?

Ready for the off.

Me and my sister used to watch this on TV!

Disappointingly, these turned out to be the giants in question.

Family selfie, not to everyone's amusement.

A fairy house!

This was marked on the map as a nice beach to have lunch, but screamed "parents' nightmare!" within seconds of arrival.  We wandered back to find a picnic table.

Savage - like in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The lighthouse!  Can we turn around and go home?

We've seen the lighthouse, now here's the siren luring men onto the rocks.



I kept expecting a dinosaur to jump out, or at least a kiwi.

What we did find was an old friend from California: a banana slug!  They don't taste much of bananas up here either.

Funny farm

According to Pete, every animal says "rarr-rarr-rarr!" accompanied by a dramatic waving of the arms.  His not-at-all-competitive mother identified this as an educational deficiency and so a remedial trip to a farm was booked.

As luck would have it, Maplewood Farm is a short bus ride from the centre of Vancouver and has more animals than Old McDonald after a long car journey.  You had to pay to get in, which is an idea I'll pass on to my dairy-farming cousin should milk prices drop further.

Alongside the domesticated animals there were herds of vicious wild beasts that roamed free, or school groups as they're otherwise known.  We thought it was a good idea to go on a Friday when things might be quieter, but no: several parties of identically-T-shirted children piled in as we did, teachers beseeching them to "use their inside voices".  Canadian classrooms must be very noisy places.

Pete loved it all, of course, observing animals and humans with equal frowniness.  He continued to greet everything with a "rarr!" but the animals were better trained than the children.  The goats in the petting area were especially saintly.  Hannah spent the trip mentally drawing up the menu for our next fortnight's dinners.

All-you-can-eat buffet.

Roast chicken.

Pulled pork.

Christmas/Thanksgiving dinner.

...?

Look Mum and Dad, I found some dirt!  Woo!

Goat curry.

Glue.

 It was sunny, so the chickens were happy.

Nuggets.

Predator.

Happy Mother's Day

Mother's Day falls on a different day in North America than in the UK, so Hannah gets to celebrate twice!  Or, more accurately, I have twice the chance of forgetting to buy a card.

Pete is on-message.

Hannah - the best mother in the world!  Apart from my mother and her mother, of course.

Banned in the USA

We needed to go to the bank, we'd run out of cheese, and we'd been missing the sweet smell of freedom; it was time to visit the USA again.  Such fun!  We picked up a rental car and nosed into the downtown Vancouver weekend traffic.

Getting to the border was relatively painless and the "30 minutes" wait time on the signs was surprisingly accurate.  Until the immigration officer in his little kiosk uttered those terrifying words: secondary processing.

Yes, next to the border there's a whole other border, a longer, more tedious, traditional border where you park your car and join a massive queue in a grey government building, shuffling forward inches at a time towards the all-powerful stony-faced officials behind the long desk at the front.  "Where's the fast lane for British subjects?" I asked the armed guard at the door.  His silence did not reassure me - the Queen will be hearing about this.

Over an hour later a man stapled additional forms into our passports and charged us $6 each for the privilege.  It seems to be free to fly into the US but you have to pay every 90 days to drive in.  Whether I'll be reimbursed for the lost hours of my life wasn't discussed (and, to be fair, I usually charge less than $6 an hour).  Giving birth to a US citizen was meant to stop this kind of thing happening, but I suppose I have to look forward to the day when Pete says "I'll see you in California" and leaves his struggling parents to fend for themselves.

Amazingly, these border shenanigans made the usual insanity at the bank seem pedestrian ("no, I'd like you to let me send my money to myself!") and although I like to spend longer at a destination than it takes to travel there we turned around quickly in case of more hassles going back.  Thankfully the Queen's authority still carries weight in civilised places, and after a trifling 15 minutes queuing in the car at the Canadian border we were waved through and my worries melted away like the chocolate peanut butter cups from Trader Joe's that I was smuggling in my underwear.

Welcome?  Are you sure?