Tonight, I sit in front of the computer while Dexter lies in bed, muttering that he doesn’t like anything as he struggles to fall asleep. Lots of “Hmpfing” going on over there. This is day two of our trip to Vancouver, BC. The boys have now used their passports for the very first time and are two countries down, many more to see. Some of the questions that came up on our drive up to Vancouver included “is there a roof over Canada?” and “what’s a border?” We are still working on the concept of city, state, country, planet, solar system. (could be worse – if it were up to me we’d be starting from the other direction, Multi-dimensional branes, multiple universes, the universe, galaxy groups, galaxy clusters, individual galaxies, spiral arms, globular clusters, etc.)

After a easy drive up to Vancouver in which the boys asked questions the WHOLE ~2.5hr drive (I thought Joel was going to jump for it at one point in time, especially since he bought these incredibly cool Melissa & Doug car bingo games which sound like a loud clap every time you flip a bingo door closed and Dexter opened and closed those doors for about an hour before I got him to give me the game piece back). Driving in downtown Vancouver is another matter. Slightly more chaotic to say the least. Our hotel is incredibly close to 2nd Beach in Stanley Park and our room overlooks a busy bus stop, much to the boys delight. In fact today, as we were getting ready to leave for 2nd Beach, a bus broke down and needed a tow. That was pretty impressive to watch and the boys faces were glued to the window. Window washing will be a must for house keeping.

Anyway, we came up on Sunday and met my cousin Greg, his wife Nicole, and daughter Emma in Stanley Park that afternoon. Our goal, which we achieved, was to ride the little train in the park. What we didn’t know, was that on the train ride, a native american story is told, the subject being the Sassquach. “What’s a Sassquash?” was asked over and over again. Basically, we gave up and just said “Uncle Too Tall with more hair.” Sorry Ryan. Anyway, I must have retold that story about 15 times during and after the train ride as we then played in a play ground.

We said our good byes, and finally checked into our hotel room. (Speaking of our hotel room – Joel and I just witnessed a good old fashioned fist fight outside. I had just checked to make sure the boys were sleeping when we heard more than usual noise outside. We pulled the blinds to see two men getting their assess handed to them by a mean man. Cops showed up too late but then went after the mean man. Don’t see that every day, but I digress.

By the time we had checked into our Best Western hotel, we had missed the dinner window for the boys = cranky. The restaurant advertised has since been remodeled and is not kid friendly. Oops. So, I went in search of pizza & fruit and we ate in our hotel room. I think we had a half hour of PBS TV time and then we waited for the boys to fall asleep. OK, here’s the funny thing. You know you are getting old when you’re walking through the city looking for food and you smile at a passing man. Then the thought pops into your head – he’s in his twenties and you are 40. What happened? Also, I brought booze on the trip. Yep, following in my father’s footsteps. I had 3 little baby bottles of booze left over from my 40th birthday party favors. So, I made Joel and I mixed drinks. In fact, I’m sipping another one tonight.

OK, this morning, we headed back to Stanley Park to visit Vancouver’s aquarium. The boys got to see their first Beluga whale show, hear seals bark and do tricks and see dolphins being trained. They did fairly well for having to wait around a lot. I got to see a dolphin poop. It’s green in case you were wondering. Back to the hotel for a nap. I fell asleep the quickest, followed by Nicholas, and Dexter. Joel had the misfortune of falling asleep after he woke Dexter up while I was out of the room purchasing a picnic dinner from the local Safeway grocery store. It was the repeated call of “I’ve pooped” that got Joel going again. Once I returned, we got ready to go to 2nd beach and you’ve already heard about the city bus tow truck incident. We had tons of fun playing on the play equipment, followed by our picnic and a dip in the city’s salt water pool. That’s where I saw a Daniel Craig look a-like. Complete with form fitting swim trunks. OOOH LA LA.  (sorry, no picture)

Now here Joel and I sit, sipping our drinks, turning toward the window any time we see flashing lights. I think 4 police cars have passed by since the fight. Tomorrow, we meet our friend Linda at Granville Island before heading home.

(It’s now a week later – boy how time flies.) Tuesday worked pretty well. The boys got to watch a ton of PBS TV as we packed our bags, ate breakfast in our room, and got ready to leave the hotel. We were actually a head of schedule to meet Linda when the boys realized that I had authorized Joel to take the boys’ luggage down to the car. A twenty minute medium tantrum followed which pushed us 10 minutes late. Not too bad. We met Linda at her condo on the other side of downtown Vancouver. Man, it was good to see her. We met Linda and John on our Rick Steve’s tour before the boys were born and thoroughly enjoy their company. Too bad John was on travel with work. From Linda’s condo, we walked down to the water and took the little people ferry over to Granville Island Public Market. I should mention that 4 ferries docked to say they couldn’t take us before one showed up that could. We walked around the market a bit, but it was hot, and crazy busy and close to lunch. The boys were a little overwhelmed. Linda gave them both $20 Canadian to spend on toys and that was a lesson in patience as the boys tried and tried to decide on which toys to buy. In the end it was cars for Nicholas and trains and one car for Dexter. A little lunch followed and back to the ferry we walked.  Thank you, Linda!

It was now 2pm and time to head for the border. Joel navigated us smoothly to the border and we crossed with no problem. We powered through to home and arrived around 4:30pm. It was good to be home. Alas, we didn’t get to enjoy it for long as we ate a quick dinner and then were off to swim lessons. When we got home and were putting the boys to bed, Dexter told us he was sick. We now know that this was the first stage of Step Throat followed by Scarlet Fever. Yippee.

It was a great trip and we had lots of fun. The rest of the week at home, not so much fun with Dexter sick and a to do list that didn’t get finished. But now Michelle is here and routines will be established once more. After a week off, I’m not looking forward to going back to work.

We’ll be back some day, Vancouver.

Vancouver – July 2012

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