What I did on my summer vacation - part the one

My wall, Railway Street, Vancouver BC

As it turned out, and in spite of what I have written as the title of this entry, I was unable to take any vacation this year during the summer (the vagaries of seniority and working in the transit industry). Not only that but, and again largely because of scheduling, I missed the opportunity to travel to Europe with my good friend Sid. Zut alors! I admit to being a bit despondent about this and so I had to live vicariously through Sid’s travels and photographs. He has some great photographs of a cemetery in England by the way.

Upon his return from his trip Sid did a most remarkable thing for me and is thereby deserving of much kudos (I’ve been reading a book by the author Iain M. Banks, ‘The Algebraist’, which was given to me by Sid ostensibly for reading on my return trip to Toronto. This book uses the term ‘kudos’ quite a bit. By the way, according to my dictionary the word ‘kudos’ doesn’t have a plural form so that if you say “many kudos” it is in fact the wrong usage, it’s much or nothing.). Sid paid for my airfare to Vancouver from Toronto and back again. Not only that but he also rented us a car to bop around in for the duration of my stay (Sid being a non driver) and, to top it all off, he put me up in his apartment. Much kudos indeed.

After a bit of a rough start getting to the airport (I’m not going to go into detail but I thought for a while that I was going to miss the plane) I flew to Vancouver and met Sid at the baggage carousel in the airport. After claiming my checked bag we got the car from the rental place (another story here too) then went to lunch at a restaurant by the water.

Wow, in British Columbia once again. 

Ship in Burrard Inlet

So my summer vacation happened to be in October, at the tail end of what may be thought of as the summer tourist season (and before the winter skiers start to arrive).

Now having a vacation in October is not necessarily a bad thing. There are actually many pluses in doing so. During the summer sometimes the weather is too hot or too cold or it’s too humid, all that kind of climatic stuff. Me, I enjoy the fall, the change in the weather, the cooler nights, and don’t forget the beauty which is manifest by the change of season and the colours of the leaves. Also, and this could be a big thing, the end of tourist season means fewer people visiting national historic sites like Ft. Langley and the Britannia Cannery. No lineups. How cool is that?

I was fortunate that for the first few days after I arrived there was sunshine for much of the time. And when it rained, which it did, particularly in the later part of the week, I thought that was okay too. It just presented different photographic opportunities. The expression ‘available gloom’ comes to mind.

So I arrived on Saturday and we went to the Flying Beaver for brunch. We did a little expedition to Grouse Mountain (but didn’t take ‘Skyride’ car to the top of the mountain. The fee for riding the gondola was so exorbitant in my estimation, 40 bucks, that we decided not to go). Instead we found a road that lead to Capilano Lake and the Cleveland Dam where we stopped and took pictures. Tres tranquil.

Capilano Lake

On Sunday we did Ft Langley and the Farm Machinery Museum (also in Langley and actually much cooler than it might sound).

Cooper's shop, Fort Langley

Sawyer Massey tractor

Sid had to work during the week and this gave me time to tool around on my own and do mini photographic expeditions, unt I did. I drove along beaches, checked out log rafts at Wreck Beach, crossed the Lions Gate Bridge to North Vancouver, ventured out to Granville Island, and even did typical tourist stuff in Gastown (near where Sid works). I also did Stanley Park and saw some cool laughing sculptures near one of its entrances.

Lions Gate Bridge

M V Meander at False Creek

Log rafts in the Straight of Georgia off Wreck Beach

Stanley Park Drive

A-maze-ing Laughter by Yue Minjun

The next Saturday, the day before I had to leave, Sid and I set out for Steveston. Now it was a rainy day mostly and so we did get a bit wet when we were walking around, but that was okay. It gave the place a wet atmosphere, which suited. We photographed the Britannia Shipyards, boats in the harbour, and took a tour of the Gulf of Georgia Cannery National Historic Site. The only really downside to the day was that, particularly in the shipyard, some of the exhibit areas, buildings and sheds, were closed to us.

Britannia Heritage Shipyard

Gulf of Georgia Cannery

And so we came, we went, we took photos, we drove around, we had lunch.

And then I lost my memory, or ran out of memory really. Well, I mean that the camera ran out of memory. I was down to my last shot when we decided to do a run back to civilization (again not really, but back towards Vancouver and to a place where there were malls) looking for some place that would sell memory cards for my Nikon; a Staples, Future Shop, something along those lines.

We found the former not far from the later. I picked-up some more memory for my camera, Sid picked up a memory stick for his pocket.

After returning to the car we had a brief discussion on where to go next: back to the docks, home for beers, or perchance head off for otherwhere. We consulted our trusty map and discovered something very interesting at a place called Deer Lake Park, and so we made our way there. And that’s the subject of the next part of the posting.