Vancouver's Short Summer
Just a quick note to let everyone know we're still alive, having survived South-East Asia and Wales. I'm cheating a bit - this is Mike's e-mail to his mates which I've copied... sorry - normally it's the other way around...
We're in Canada for its brief summer - it's been in the thirties all week, but just to give you an idea how brief summer is, here's the events they're squeezing into this week:
- Vancouver Indy Race
- Extrava-gay-za
- Comedy Festival
- Northern Arts Festival
- Pope's visit
- Vancouver bath-tub race
- Numerous film/poetry/arts festivals
When you add to this the fact that the Aquarium's Beluga whale gave birth to a baby on Sunday, you can see that the fun is unremitting.
Vancouver's actually quite a cool place; a compact downtown (doontoon in the local accent), with spectacular views of vertical mountains at the end of every street. Lots of street people add colour, including the charming lady who invites strangers to "pat my duck" for "two loonies" (two dollars - yes - it's a real duck in a box...)
To get away from it all, on Sunday, we're going to take a boat-plane out to Vancouver Island where we're going to walk the West Coast Trail - 75km of wilderness walking (but no bears! sez Mike).
If we survive that, our next destination is the Rockies, where we're intending to submerge ourselves in hot springs until we've recovered!
I'll be in touch soon, Cheers,
Jane x