Where the mountains meet the ocean.

So what's news? Well, as regular followers of this blog may have realised, I've recently got a little behind with my updates. This presumably means one of two things. Either I've been busier than normal or life of late hasn't been interesting enough to blog about. I'll leave you to decide as you read on.

We had a great weekend in Vancouver a few weeks ago. Hot on the tail of Easter in Victoria, Vancouver turns out to be a different kettle of fish being much bigger, busier and feeling altogether more, well, city-like. That's not to say we didn't enjoy the weekend. We had a fab time visiting the park, the aquarium, the markets on Granville Island and taking time to sit watching the seaplanes land at the harbour. We managed to tame the mass transit system (exact change only) and find time for a harbour taxi ride. The vast array of shops gave us a much larger choice than that normally available to us in Prince George. Our hotel in the heart of downtown was perfect in location and the service exemplary. Even the weather was good enabling us to forget the snow we left behind in PG and sun ourselves in Stanley park amongst the racoons, rollerbladers and totem poles. The aquarium particularly was a treat, especially the Beluga whales, one of which was pregnant at the time, but has since delivered successfully amidst a worldwide media frenzy. Vancouver itself is utterly beautiful as snow capped mountains emerge straight out of the ocean to surround the city (we were lucky with the weather because rain is to Vancouver what snow is to Prince George).

It's not all roses down in Vancouver of course. The traffic is appalling, property prices are sky-high and of course every big city comes with big inner city problems of homelessness, drugs and crime. Still, as long as you know which neighbourhoods to avoid, things are fine and we didn't feel unsafe at any time walking around downtown.

Perhaps slightly more surprising were the vast number of English people we came across in Vancouver. The city is the boarding point for the Alaskan cruises and so many folk choose to spend some time in the city before and after.

So would I recommend Vancouver? Definitely two thumbs up. If you can catch an Alaskan cruise at the same time, even better.