Oh, Canada!

June 4th: we started the first trek of our roadtrip today driving through the beautiful green tree lined Interstate 5 up into Vancouver.  I was able to take a stab behind the wheel as well hoping it would speed up our time at customs.  It didn't seem to make any differences because we had to sit around for about 20-30 minutes along with all of the other International visitors into Canada. Our hotel for the evening was a Days Inn hotel.  When Tom and I were booking in, the front desk lady told me I had double booked a room for Fletch and I!!!  Thankfully they dropped the charges even though it was after the cancellation time!!! I'll be writing up a good review for the hotel later on.  The gardens in this hotel were spectacular, but I forgot to take a picture. :( Oh well!!!  After checking in and getting ourselves acquainted with the area we took off in search of Capilano Bridge ... a bridge I thought I walked across for free with some friends in June 2002.  Well, after driving through rush hour traffic in downtown Vancouver with blinking green lights (what in the world does that mean?), we found this gorgeous bridge ... but it wasn't the same bridge I crossed 6 years ago!!! There is a $27.95 fee!!! Well, Fletch and I decided to pay the fee and boy are we glad we did!!!  I will put the slideshow pictures up in place of the Washington, DC photos soon so you can tell just how beautiful it was!!!  This park reminded me of why I studied Outdoor Recreation in school.  It was so great to get out of the crazy busyness of traveling and planning straight into such a beautiful God made park!!!  It was a little cold, so I bought my first souvenir on the trip ... a cute pom pom topped knit hat.  I also enjoyed a really nice bowl of minestrone soup while Fletch had frozen yogurt.  Wow ... we are so different.  Well, actually, I have to be honest: I ate some of his frozen yogurt as well.  Along with my soup and hot chocolate. :)  Mum and Dad took the car and spent most of the  2 1/2 hours at a nearby mall.  Dad, Fletch and I dropped Mum back at the hotel and went back into the city to see some sights.  We ended up eating dinner at Cloud 9 which is a revolving restaurant on top of a hotel.  It took our entire dinner for us to revolve 360 degrees!!!  Fletch put a small piece of paper on the window sill and waited to see it again after a full revolution.  It was hilarious!!!  We did check with the waitress to find out how long it takes to make a full revolution ... I can't remember how long it took, but it was definitely over 90 minutes!!!  

We made a change in our itinerary which is really really exciting, personally, for me!  Mum and Dad didn't want to spend another day in Vancouver, but rather broke our 10 hour trip to Banff into 2 days.  I found out that Salmon Arm is in between Vancouver and Banff exactly 5 hours and e-mailed an old friend, Patti.  I met Patti on my DTS in Australia January 2000.  We kept in contact after the DTS and she is the reason Fletch and I met ... in a way.  We were chatting one night and decided to put our profiles on a singles website to see what would happen.  I found a Canadian singles site, ChristianCafe.com, and we signed up for our free trial!!!  If it wasn't for chatting with Patti, who knows how the Lord would've had Fletch and I meet!!!  Patti didn't find her husband then, but was led to him and now has a new born baby! I haven't seen Patti since our friends' wedding (Luke & Angela Haythorpe) June 2001.  The Whipps will be staying in Salmon Arm and I'll get to hang out with a dear friend. :)  YEAH!!!

Next up:  My birthday on Vancouver Island