Crying over you (Vancouver to Sydney)

Something is in the air

This will be the last post (ha, see what I did there?) until the next holiday. To celebrate this fact I will include random photos from the trip to break up the text. Warning: this will be a long post and it will make you cry. Ok, maybe not you, but it made me cry. And Jayne. And Dan. Well something did. Maybe there's something in the air. The title is a no-brainer.

Leaving Edmonton ... a good idea
Another cold, grey morning in Edmonton. We packed and left the hotel efficiently as you would expect after almost three weeks on the road. For the last time, I got behind the wheel of the Barbie mobile. It was about a 40 minute drive to the airport. The traffic was light and the GPS guided us easily to the car rental return area. I'm never keen to drive on the wrong side of the road but it was much easier here than in Europe. The roads are wider, well marked and in Canada at least, the traffic is patient - even if they ignore the speed limits.

The car returned and we made our way to bag drop for Air Canada. They use the same sort of kiosk we have in Australia, except it is much more labour intensive here. We do everything ourselves; here you check and get bag tags and then get checked in again by an attendant. That's if you can walk and talk at the same time. Miss Yves St Laurent, so named because of her name brand luggage found the process all too difficult. She had the attendant check her in, print her boarding pass and bag tag, place the tag on the bag and then help her put the bag on the conveyor. Such a struggle. It was no surprise to see her a few minutes later causing a bouchon (French for  a jam) at security as her Yves make up bag was emptied and checked thoroughly.

We had decided on breakfast at the airport. A brave decision you think dear reader, well perhaps. While waiting to be security checked, I noticed an ad for a European Cafe. Surely they would understand coffee and croissant. Sadly, we were unable to locate said cafe and settled for the one next to our boarding gate. The coffee was, as expected, from a machine that does not require barista experience and the food was passable.

Sydney in Vancouver

Back in Van

The plane was a few minutes late landing in Edmonton but we arrived close to time in Van. I had a rush of blood to the head and thought we should catch the sky train. Unlike Sydney, the Canadian system is quick, efficient and cheap. $9.20 from the airport to the city centre and the airport is the terminus, so there was plenty of room for luggage - again unlike Sydney.

Once returned to daylight from the underground we needed to work out which direction to walk. I looked one way, Jayne the other. She quipped we should choose the opposite direction to what she selected. No, I said, you have the map, we'll go the way you choose. Yes, my amused reader, Jayne was wrong. Her sense of direction unerringly fails, every time.

We checked back in to the Westin and were upgraded to a corner suite with an excellent view of the mountains. The sky was a beautiful blue and crystal clear, unlike our smokey arrival a few weeks earlier. We dumped the bags, changed and walked up the street to book dinner at Zefferelli's. Some street hawker asked if I was interested in the services of a personal trainer. I must have put on more weight than I thought. Oh well, exercise and change in diet commences on Monday. I pondered this as we sat in the hotel bar drinking and eating and waiting for Dan to arrive. Dan is the real reason we are here, Canada was never on my list of places to visit.

Arrive he did. We did dinner. We did drinks. Tears. Hugs. Talked. Tears. Sometimes all at once. But it had to end at some point. Bed. Then we got up and did the talk, tears and hugs all over again.

Found a great place for breakfast. Awesome coffee and interesting food. Radically crowded to the extent they have a waiting room for you to cool your heels in while a table becomes available.

It was airport time all too soon.

Farewell Van, farewell Dan

Dan's Whistler on a clear day

So, you've all seen those soppy, tearful goodbyes in the movies. Airport scenes are the biggest tear jerkers. Well it's an hour after we parted company with Dan and both Jayne and I are still crying. Of all the tough things I've done in my life that was, without a doubt, one of the toughest. I'm sure the security people and customs have seen it all before, but I'm not sure what the servers at Vino made of us. We sat down and picked up the menu and began crying. And gin wasn't even on the list. Currently Jayne and I are taking turns at the crying thing. We are a sight. Such emotionally strong adults.

It doesn't matter how I approach this I can't be rational. I just want him to come home. Sorry, have to go. I can't see the keys through my tears.

Bits I forgot to write about previously:
Water - I know some areas have plenty of water, even frozen for later use, but they could learn a lot from Australia about water conservation. All the hotels offer 'green options'. The usual, hang your towels and re-use them, don't have your room serviced for a day and variations in-between. Some of these green choices are based around saving water. And then you step into the shower. Massive shower heads that generally have a pre-set pressure and waste huge amounts of water. Green indeed. And this wasn't just one hotel. It was everywhere we stayed.

Best friends - yes Canadians really are as polite and friendly as the brochures and stereotypes would have you believe. However, there is a limit and the Glacier walk tested it to the max. We had four different drivers in the space of a couple of hours, sometimes including extra 'associates' who provided expert (read rote learned) knowledge of whatever we were going to see. Much like the boy at Earls, don't go off script, but that's another story.

I digress. Each driver and expert wanted us to know their name. It's so tiring pretending that I care who they are. And then there is the fake enthusiasm, the over-top AWESOMENESS. Enough. I know they work for tips, but I didn't care and didn't want to play, I wasn't there to be their friend or participate in their games. Yes, yes, my indulgent reader, but really ... where is their tolerance for people who just wish to listen and enjoy the experience? And then there was the...

Font of knowledge - on one of the aforementioned coach rides, the driver asked did we have any questions. I assume, uncharacteristically, she was met with glacial silence (hahaha, I am too funny). So, she proceeded to tell us that she was a font of knowledge just waiting to share. A question from an American traveller: what is that red plant that we see everywhere? She was referring to a red ground cover plant and it was, literally, everywhere. Silence. Um, I don't know it's name but it's a carpet plant. Really? Who would have thought? As they used to say in the early 2000s, epic fail.

Hotel facilities - generally when we travel we stay in AirBnB style accommodation, not hotels. The hotels we selected were all well appointed and generally belonged to the same chain. However, the Edmonton experience was different. Again, we had a suite. It had a sink, coffee making facilities, and fridge. So, when I went to open a bottle of our fine Okanagan wine I could locate neither glasses, nor cork screw. I know right, corks in wine bottles, what is that? Anyway, after an initial fruitless search, I embarked on a more meticulous one. Still nothing. I phoned reception and had the glasses and cork screw sent up. Jayne asked the question of the person delivering the goods, should they have been in the room. No. It was almost a Pauline Hanson please explain moment. A sink with no washing up requisites and a bar fridge without glass ware. I still don't get it.

Well, dear reader, you can assume the rest of the journey went well because I am posting from Van. The next time we communicate will be in January when we are travelling to the Cook Islands.

Until then ...

Still crying over you.

Food glorious food (Lake Louise to Edmonton via Banff)

Road trip ... yay. As previously mentioned Canada is big. Bigger than Texas. Bigger than Australia. In fact, bigger than the US. (Sorry folks, it's true. Google it.) So it takes a while to drive from one place to another, especially outside the main cities. Today's drive was from Lake Louise to Edmonton. Why? That's a really good question. Inexperience.

It is always difficult to work out where to go and how long to spend there particularly when it's uncharted terrain. Even if you have some inside information, as we did. In retrospect we would have done somethings differently, but that's the nature of travel. I have never done a bush walk once. I always do it a second time to get it right. Travel is like that too.

The road to Edmonton was fairly uneventful although, as previously said in the last post, we took a detour to Banff for breakfast and had a wander around this delightful alpine town.  Very picturesque and in hindsight, we would have been better off staying here and simply doing a day trip tour to Lake Louise and the ice fields.  That way we would have also made Jasper. Banff even has free parking! 

Once we had breakfasted with a couple from Minnesota who shared our table in the very busy artisan cafe called Wild Flour (highly recommend it and its coffee), we drove through the wheat fields and ranches of Alberta across a vastly different terrain to what we left behind in the Rockies. Can't complain about the road system here in Canada.  Dual lane expressways everywhere and NO TOLLS!!! It's just that the drive was dead straight and dead boring, like the Stuart Highway back home. At least it has wedge tail eagles eating road kill. There isn't a lot of road kill in Canada, that we have seen. A couple of porcupines and some small furry thing that had more blood on it than a model wearing fur in a New York fashion parade. It could have been a mink I suppose.

Down the gun barrel straight highway there were a lot of signs purporting animal life. Elk.  Deer. Moose. Whatever. None of it proven. Except for the signs. The rolls of hay swept by. Fields of wheat, corn, lucerne, this time we really could have been in Australia out Bathurst way.

We skirted past Calgary. A drive-by will never do it justice, but it appeared to be a series of brand new dormitory suburbs. The houses all looked very similar, down to the paint. It appeared to be like the suburbs in Australia, massed housing in one area, retail in another and business/industrial somewhere else again. A world designed by car makers and purveyors of gas (as they say here) because you need a car to work and shop and therefore to live.

Finally we reached Edmonton. Glad we have a GPS because there is as much construction/deconstruction here as in Sydney. It was not easy to navigate to the hotel in the heart of Downtown, but we did.

Entrees: octopus and prawns

The usual inner city driving stuff follows: find street, miss street, swear a bit, re-negotiate route, drive around the block twice, at least ... you know the drill. Hotel found. Car parked. Eventually. Bags safely in room. Hmmm ... time to think about dinner.

Tripadvisor. We settled on Sabor a tapas/Spanish/Portuguese influenced restaurant. To say my faith in Canadian food was waning would be an understatement, especially after Whistler and its pub food culture, masquerading as fine dining. Or the Fairmont Chateau at Lake Louise and its 'resort' style food. OMG. Sabor is something else. Food, wine, service ... beyond anything in Canada to date and all at a reasonable price. Hence today's title from the classic 1968 musical Oliver, based on the 1838 novel, Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens. You see my discerning reader, good literature is fashionable forever.

Seafood paella and salad

We spent less tonight than we did on two burgers and a bottle of wine at the Fairmont at Lake Louise. I've said it before and I'll say it again: price gouging. And don't believe spin stories of transport costs. Petrol wasn't hiked up to the same extent as food and wine. They all arrived by truck.

The only down side to dinner was that Sabor is not open tomorrow - it's the Labor Day holiday in Canada. As an Australian who has often lamented the loss of public holidays for the family unit, I'm not about to complain. But, damn, they were good and there was so much else on the menu I could have eaten. Ah, well, first world problems.

Sydney or Edmonton? I'm not certain.

The intention was to post this and to write another blog about Edmonton. A walk around the surrounding area this morning demonstrated that was not such a good idea because there is not much to write about. It is a city. It is the Labour Day holiday and as such there is not a lot going on here. Mind you, in terms of Labour Day I'm not sure what they have to celebrate - low wages, one week annual leave - I can't imagine why people aren't queueing up for a piece of that. Some of the retailers commenced operations at noon in deference to the holiday but many and particularly restaurants are shut for the entire day so the downtown streets are all but deserted. Even finding somewhere for breakfast proved to challenging, but we settled on a cafe associated with the hotel and they served granola and yoghurt and toast. Yum, no sickeningly sugary food or plates piled high with eggs and bacon today.

Then there is the resemblance between Edmonton CBD and Sydney CBD. The photo should sort that out for you. There are no signs as to what they are doing but the disruption goes for blocks and is clearly keeping people away from the city centre. The sign at the entrance of the shopping mall that is attached to our hotel tells people they don't need a hard hat to come inside.  

The remainder of the day will be spent preparing for the flight back to Van tomorrow and finalising some reviews and resting and reading. And thinking about tonight's dinner at The Creperie. A little bit of France, we hope, in the middle of Canada.

The next blog will likely come from Vancouver International Airport on Wednesday if you are in Canada's time zone and Thursday if you are back home in Australia.

Until then ...