Day 1 - Summerland to Vancouver
We had decided to leave the Okanagan a day early so that we could meet up with Katie's good friend Marnie as she stopped in Vancouver on her way home to NZ from visiting her family in Manitoba. We packed up early and drove to Peachland where we had breakfast at a little cafe on the waterfront.
Peachland felt very much like a small water- or lake-front town in NZ, maybe Coromandel or Taupo. It was sleepy but nicely maintained with broad walkways along the shore. We had a good view from the cafe over to the fires on the other side of the lake.
We took a quick detour to a larger town nearby called Kelowna, known around the world for the fruit and wine it produces. We didn't really know what we wanted to do here, but by luck stumbled upon a big 'Block Party' market happening downtown. They'd closed several streets, and we walked around the stalls looking at local art and trying not to buy anything from the food trucks.
Back in the car, we drove non-stop to New Westminster in Vancouver where Pania and Erik had very kindly offered us their sofa-bed for two nights. We stopped at a 'Craft Beer Cook-off' at Central City Brewers, where three breweries had set up stalls in their parking lot along with several food trucks and a live band. At the entrance, we paid $5 to get 5 tokens and two tiny plastic mugs. Each token got us a 4oz pour of beer from any of the beers being showcased by the breweries. They also gave us each a bottle cap, which we used to vote for our favourite beer and brewery. We bought some Red Racer beers (Central City Brewer's main brand) to take with us to Vancouver.
We called past Walmart to stock up on travel-sized toiletries and then met Erik at their apartment. Pania was working at another block party style event called Uptown Live!, running a stall for the university she works at. Erik drove us over there, and Katie and I shared a Japadog (a Vancouver institution) while helping them pack up the booth. We walked back to their apartment, as the marquee and displays from the stall had filled all the spare seats in their car. That evening we hung out, drunk some beers, and watched Coco. Apparently, I was misinformed, and the movie isn't actually about a dog. Nevertheless, it was a great movie.
Day 2 - Vancouver
This morning we left the apartment early in the morning and drove out to our old stomping ground in East Van. I got a haircut at Sorento Barbers, Katie bought some snacks at Donald's Market, and then we visited our old landlords to pick up some mail. We chatted with Max for a while, and he gave us a list of his favourite places (and breweries) to visit in Portland.
Katie's friend Marnie had been visiting her family in Manitoba, and by luck (or planning without my knowledge) she was passing through Vancouver on her way back to NZ today! She'd organised to have an 8-hour stopover, so we drove to YVR and picked her up right outside the terminal. As seems to be the case with all airports, YVR is really badly signposted, and the pickup area has about enough space for 6 cars to stop.
We took Marnie to a vegetarian restaurant that Katie had read lots about called Meet on Main. I got some hot wings called "Chiggin' Things", made of some sort of vegetarian chicken substitute which was delicious and indistinguishable from the real thing. Why do we continue to put chicken's through the hell of battery farms when alternatives like this exist? I don't understand.
Marnie is Canadian, and while she's been to Vancouver many times hasn't spent much time exploring it. As we only had a few hours, we took her to the most scenic place we could think of; Stanley Park. It was a beautiful day, so almost everyone else in Vancouver had the same idea as us. We sat in traffic for about 45 minutes getting into the park and slowly made our way through the forest-lined roads up to Prospect Point. We walked around up there for a bit, took some photos at the viewpoint overlooking the Lions Gate Bridge and North Van, and had some Stanley Park beers on the deck. As traffic was so bad we didn't have time for much else, so we headed from there back to the airport, past English Bay which was absolutely packed with people.
At Pania and Eriks' that afternoon we helped Erik build a gravity-powered watering system for their potplant garden on their balcony. Wadn a hose around the edge of the balcony and connected lots of little drippers to it, and stuck them into each plant pot. It took a bit of convincing to get the water to start flowing from the bottle, but after it was running it seemed to work perfectly!
That evening we made pizzas, and Erik cooked them in their gas-powered pizza oven out on the balcony. We were introduced to Erik's collection of hot sauces, and particularly enjoyed one from Portland called Secret Aardvark. We had a barrage of Skype calls with Caroline (Pania's mum), my parents, and my grandparents Robin & Lesley.