On our way to breakfast this morning, I noticed this rainbow crosswalk.
How did I not see this yet?
We've walked by it several times.
Guess I'm just not that observant.
We wentback to the same place as yesterday and I had a bagel with cream cheese & jam again and an order of bacon on the side.
My Honey had his bagel breakfast sandwich again.
Doesn't that look delicious?
They had croissants fresh out of the oven this morning so you know I had to try one of those.
It was possibly the best croissant I've ever had in my life.
So good that My Honey ended up getting one too (mainly because I didn't want to share).
We were just loving this little gem of a place so were super bummed to find out that they aren't open on weekends so we won't be coming back - at least not this trip.
We stopped back at the room before heading into Vancouver so I thought I'd share a picture of the room.
We'd picked up tickets yesterday for Grouse Mountain and a harbour cruise for tomorrow so we were heading in to go to Grouse Mountain today.
The hotel had a lobby type area on each floor with seating.
Very big and spacious - we really liked it.
When we got to Canada Place to catch our bus to Grouse Mountain, we started seeing all these people in costumes.
My Honey asked a girl what was going on and turns out there is an Anime convention in town.
I love these things, just like comicon, people get dressed up in these amazing costumes.
You can tell they put a lot of time and effort into them and I think it is so wonderful.
Look at those awesome horns!
There were just costumed people every where.
I don't really know anything about anime but that doesn't stop me from enjoying the costumes.
Pretty cool.
How fun would it be to get all dressed up with your friends and go to something like this?
Some of them really get into the costumes, they act the parts and pose and everything.
There was a huge line up of people waiting to get into the convention center.
We thought maybe we'd go tomorrow when we have more time and check it out.
We hopped on the bus and it was about a 30 minute drive out to Grouse Mountain.
Made it.
We got in line right away for the cable car.
That's a long ways up!
There it is.
Waiting patiently to board.
It was pretty crowded on there but since were pretty much last to board, at least we got to be close to a window (a side window).
Looking back down at the parking lot.
The higher up we got, the more we could see.
What a spectacular view.
It felt like we went through the clouds (which we kind of did).
Those trees are a long way down.
Made it - there were so many things to do that we didn't know where to go first.
There was a rope challenge for the kiddos, we skipped that.
First stop ended up being the main house that had the gift shop, restaurant and washrooms (that's where I needed to go).
They had a wall full of pictures of celebrities who've been here and it looks like the 'Bube' is among them.
Not surprising since he is from Vancouver.
We went out to the front side to get a view down the mountain.
The clouds had rolled in so it was hard to see.
Another car load of folks arriving.
There are two cars running constantly and as one reaches the top, the other is reaching the bottom.
On it's way back down now.
Amazing how many people they move in these cars in a day.
The clouds/fog broke a bit and you could see the city down there and the harbour and boats in the harbour.
On a clear day this view would be amazing.
Grouse Mountain selfie.
This is the back side of the main building - looks like there is lots of seating out there with great views.
In the center of things is more seating, there is even a fire pit with seating around it.
There is also zip lining if you are interested and this is where you get equipped for it (I think I had my fill of zip lining in Costa Rica, it was fun but I don't feel the desire or need to do it again).
Just another view from another angle.
They have two grizzlies and we really wanted to go see them first.
We figured if we followed these footprints that they would take us there.
I think we are headed in the proper direction.
There were some really great carvings along the way.
These were an ode to lumberjacks.
Just look at the detail.
This one has a chainsaw.
This one had just a hand saw.
I only noticed that there were a couple of baby owls tucked down in the left of this one on our way back and I didn't get a picture.
Finally, an eagle.
What talent to create these.
We came out from the trail we had walked to this view.
We bee-lined it right over to the grizzlies.
They were in an enclosure that really only consisted of a short, electric fence.
They were so close you could almost (but not quite), reach out and touch them.
They were completely oblivious to their audience.
Just kept right on doing their thing.
They were chowing down on watermelon of all things.
Just look at the claws on him.
We watched the bears for a bit then headed over to the chair lift.
I was excited at first.
Then as we started going, I realized how high we were and that we were very much in the open except for a little handrail and it kind of freaked me out a bit.
Where we were headed was shrouded in cloud or fog.
I was getting a bit more relaxed and snuggled in close to My Honey to enjoy the ride.
Back behind us became fog covered as well as we were ascending the mountain.
The ground was a long way down.
Mother Nature really is the best artist.
We went by some pretty wild flowers.
Then fittingly enough, we saw of all things, a grouse.
I don't mind sharing the wilderness but I certainly hope we don't encounter any of these creatures up here.
I prefer to admire them from afar.
By the time we got to the top, the clouds had rolled in pretty thick.
We could still see that there was a windmill off in the distance a bit so we walked over to it.
There was a viewing platform that you could go up to if you wanted to but with the clouds so thick, we wouldn't have been able to see anything so we didn't bother.
We did walk around it though and look down over the edge.
People were hiking all over this place - they are braver than me, I wouldn't have ventured over this edge.
This little chipmunk was braver than I, he was all over that cliff.
I was lucky he sat still long enough for me to get a picture.
Even with the clouds, it still looked pretty.
This was the zip lining platform I think.
The chipmunk came back, he ran right over my foot.
These windmills sure look tall when you stand underneath them.
This one had silhouettes of animals all around the bottom.
Wildflowers.
The mist over the mountains looks really nice.
Looking back down the mountain, you could barely see a thing.
We got in line to take the chair lift back down.
My Honey noticed the girls shoes in line ahead of us and pointed them out to me.
I love them!
On our way back down.
Our dangling toes.
I was worried that my flip flop would fall off but it didn't.
That's Vancouver you can see down there - how awesome is that?
The chair lift had gotten much busier, all the chairs on the way up side were full.
As we passed people, you could see the ones that were terrified and were holding on for dear life and the ones that were uber relaxed like they've been doing this every day of their life and it's just a walk in the park to them.
The air cleared so we had a pretty good view of the whole Grouse Mountain area.
As we neared the bottom, we passed over the grizzly enclosure.
They were pretty darn close.
We got off the chair lift just in time to make our way to the lumberjack show.
We found a spot to sit.
There were lots of others already there waiting for the show to start.
I'm sure they are going to climb these poles at one point.
The first event, chopping a log in half.
Then they did axe throwing.
They did log sawing.
They did some wood carving with a chainsaw.
They two 'lumberjacks' were very entertaining.
Getting ready.
Then as suspected, up the pole they went.
I am simply in awe of this - they make it look so easy but I know it definitely isn't.
Then the final event, walking on the log in the water.
That's pretty amazing too, I don't think I could even stand on it for a second let alone have another person on the other end trying to knock me off.
They put on a pretty good show - I'm glad we got to see it.
We headed back to the main building and got a snack.
We sat out on the deck to eat it.
It was like sitting on top of the world.
What a view.
The clouds had cleared up significantly so you could see much more.
I saw some people eating fries and they looked really good so I went and got some for us to share.
They were so delicious that My Honey decided to get his own.
They had vegetarian chicken strips which we tried too (they weren't that good).
After we ate, we headed back down in the cable car and back into Vancouver on the shuttle bus.
We got off right by the convention center and there were still tons of costumed folk milling about.
I loved just seeing them.
Lots of colorful hair.
We just sat around for a bit and took in all the costumes.
She looks bad ass.
So does she.
Love those elf ears sticking out.
Posing for pictures.
There were lots of photographers there going around getting great pictures.
I wonder if these are actual anime characters or costumes from their imaginations?
I saw her earlier - she looks cute.
We saw quite a few Sailor Moons.
This whale looks like it's made out of lego from afar.
When you get closer, you can see that it's made out of blocks.
Still very cool.
It had cleared right up and turned into a gorgeous day.
We decided to go for Ramen again today.
This was also a place recommended by Captain Mike last time we were here.
Ramen Danbo.
There is always a line up but thankfully it wasn't too bad when we got in the line.
It started to grow much bigger as we were standing there.
They had a good system though and got people in and out quickly.
I got the Miso Rekka Ramen which meant I wanted it a little on the spicy side.
It's only a tiny little place and it was packed.
The seats were cubes with lids that you could open up and store your backpack or purse in.
What a genious idea.
My Ramen.
The spice caught up with me very quickly so I wasn't able to eat much but what I did eat was really good.
We got gyoza too - it was good.
My Honey loved his.
After we ate, we headed over to the harbor front to take in the sights and walk it off.
Some of the yachts docked there were pretty spiffy.
Lots of beautiful flowers blooming along there too.
Such a vibrant pink color - gorgeous.
A more muted tone of pink but still beautiful.
I am a pink loving girl after all.
The Black Eyed Susan's were lovely too.
All together, they look so summery.
Check out that monster yacht.
There were a couple little quirky boat houses.
To me, having one of these would be much more interesting than one of the fancy yachts where each one looks like the next.
Lots of condos on the waters edge.
Lots of people out enjoying the weather.
Puppy just trying to get to the little girl - he was so cute.
We came across another splash park.
Nobody was using it though.
We stopped and had a good look at the sea planes.
You can do Seaplane Tours - maybe next time.
We watched a couple take off and a couple land.
Canada Place didn't look that far away so we decided to walk all the way back there.
We knew we were getting close when we started running into costumes again.
These ones were so great!
People love to pose with them and normally they are very obliging if you ask.
Canada Place kind of looks like a cruise ship.
It's a very cool design for a building.
A group of costumed girls taking selfies.
We got some dessert.
I had this After Eight Sundae.
My Honey had crepes.
Then we did some more costume watching.
Ha ha - this guy was awesome.
He was dancing and those tentacles were flailing around, it look great.
There were lots of school girl type costumes too.
More posing for pictures - might was well make the most of those costumes.
We watched for a bit then we hopped on the Sky Train and headed to the casino out in Richmond, the one we stayed by when we were here in April.
We didn't have any luck at all though, we both lost but not too much then we headed back to the hotel.
It took us about an hour to get there on the Sky Train but I enjoy riding on it so I didn't mind.
I 100% agree!
Meanwhile, back home, Miss A went to the city for a friend's birthday party.
Looks like the girls had fun.
There's that beautiful smile.
Very intense.
They make games so realistic these days.
It looks like they are having a blast.
It sure is!
That is all for today, until next time, be happy!
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