Sunday 29 February
Today we left lovely Victoria. A 90 minute bus ride to the north of the island, where we boarded a ferry to take us to Vancouver. Boy, that was a big ferry. I thought we would traipse off the bus and lug our bags on board. But, no. The bus drove onto the ferry, along with many other buses and trucks and literally hundreds of cars. We got off the bus once it had parked on Deck 2 and took the lift up to Deck 6 where we sat in comfortable seats with good views of the coastline. Not sure which coastline, but it was damned pretty.

 

Another 90 minutes and we arrived in Vancouver. Back to Deck 2, back on the bus and the same bus, same driver, took us into Downtown Vancouver. We arrived at our most glamourous hotel at about 2pm, 5 hours after leaving Victoria. Booking.com have really come good with this hotel – it is gorgeous, and apparently legendary. Who has stayed here? Here’s a short list:
John and Ethel Barrymore
Marlene Dietrich (and her 40 suitcases apparently)
Errol Flynn
Laurence Oliver
John Wayne
Gary Cooper
and David, Prince of Wales (later the short lived Edward VIII) and his brother Bertie (George VI) when they were here in 1927 for the apparently famous gala event (which fame has passed us by) the Seaforth Highlander’s Ball. Bet they loved that…….

We have a slightly downmarket room from those which the rich and famous stayed in, but nonetheless a truly lovely one. Directly opposite the Vancouver Art Gallery.

We walked around downtown and then walked down to Gastown, the old part of town on the waterfront. However, that walk was cut short by rain and we hotfooted it back to the sanctuary of our room and a quiet dinner next door.

Monday 29 February
Better weather today, overcast but not raining. When one travels with Cherrie, one visits gardens. A lot. We went out today to the BC Botanic Gardens, which are in the grounds of the BC University. It’s quite a long way out of town and we were advised to get a taxi as we would have had to change buses and it would take a long time. So, we took a taxi. “Where?” asked the driver. “Botanic Gardens” we repeated, in our best British accent. “Never heard of it” he said, in his best Indian accent. “We’ll get out here” we said, but his foot hit the accelerator and we were stuck. However, he did manage to make a call on his hand held mobile (whilst driving) to dispatch (or DESPACH as his pre-loaded number recorded on his screen) to ask where the gardens were. “At the BC University” said the man at despach. “Where?”…..Anyway to cut a long story short, Cherrie took notes of the conversation (he was on speaker phone) and directed him. We arrived $35 later. We did not tip!
The gardens are pretty much dormant this time of year but we had a lovely three hours strolling through all of them. Lots of rhododendrons, some starting to flower, a north American alpine garden

Physic garden full of olde worlde medicinal plants

rainforest garden, a food garden which bounty is distributed to the homeless and hungry (they are still hungry at this time of year as the garden is barren) and lots of other treats including sweet little black squirrels.

We even saw a Glacial Erratic. That’s a large rock which was transported thousands of miles by a glacier about 18,000 years ago, during the last ice age. It really just looked like a very big rock but we knew we were looking at something special and we thought of you, Bryan, Tim and Signe)

Back to town via an uneventful taxi ride which the woman at the Gardens ordered for us. A different route this time, past vast properties with great views of Vancouver harbour. Back in time to spend another 3 hours at the Gallery and the MASHUP exhibition – a study of the birth of modern culture. Described thus “Something happened 100 years ago that changed the way we think about art and culture and the way we see the world. The last time this happened they called it the Renaissance, this time we’ve called it Mashup”. The exhibition takes up all four floors of the Gallery – their biggest exhibition ever – and includes works by some artists we have heard of (Marcel Duchamp, Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol) and many we haven’t (Jean-Luc Godard, Liz Magor, Isa Genzken, Hannah Hoch, Dara Birnbaum, Keith Haring, Barbara Kruger, DJ Spooky, Hito Steyerl). You learned lot reading this are probably aware of all these artists but we simple farmers from Berry were blissfully unaware. A really interesting exhibition, although no Picasso’s of note (well, not to us) so we only got really excited about these iconic Warhols.

Christine is exhausted so room service and an early night. We have tomorrow in Vancouver before boarding the train – The Canadian – for our 4 day journey over to Toronto.
3 days in Vancouver is not enough. A lovely city with more to see. Shame we didn’t allow another couple of days.   Tomorrow we hope to get back to Gastown and up to the Museum of Anthropology – also in the BC University grounds…oh goody, another taxi ride, or 2.