This is by far the funniest thing I’ve found on YouTube yet. A comic masterpiece. The trench run bit gets me every time.

“The saddest, most desperately lonesome and melancholy mainstream film in recent memory.” – Walter Chaw

and i loved it.

Even though the weather looked cloudy and gray, we wanted to get out and do something with our one full day in Vancouver. We decided to drive over to Stanley Park (a huge “Central Park”-style park adjacent to downtown Vancouver. Nestled inside the park is the Vancouver Aquarium. There were fish, eels, snakes, spiders, dolphins, beluga whales, otters, and lots of people. It wasn’t a huge facility and it only took a few hours to get through.

We headed back to the hotel and then walked out to Chinatown to find some lunch. After browsing around looking for a suitable place that wasn’t too “sketchy”, we ended up at a trendy small place called Wild Rice. We were the only customers in the whole restraunt – but the food was well presented and tasty. It was all served “family-style” but Krissy and I both had our own dishes primarily. She had some salmon and oriental greens with noodles, I had some sweet & sour ribs, brown rice, and szechuan chicken.

Again we had eaten late so dinner wasn’t an option. After another dip in the spa, we drove over to Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club. We took a short break around the corner at a Tim Horton’s to try their famous doughnuts. They were definitely better than Dunkin Donuts, but not as good as a hot Krispy Kreme. Coffee was good too!

The comics were pretty good – but as it usually ends up for some reason, the first guy and the host were the funniest of the whole show. The middle guy and headliner were’nt that good. But it wasn’t too expensive (before we bought a drink anyhow) so it was a fine way to end the night.

Our last day will bring us over to the Capilano Suspension Bridge, and then back to Seattle to fly home.

With a continental breakfast start, we drove up 2 hours to Whistler on the scenic Sea to Sky Highway. We made it to Whistler Village just in time to go on the 12:00 ZipTrek tour. We donned all of our harnesses and helmets and walked up to our first practice zipline. It was a great, short ride across the cable – just enough to get us excited for the real tree-to-tree lines. After a a van ride up a private road (where we saw a ton of Olympic construction for the bobsled track) we loaded out for the first line. The whole tour was awesome from there. Long lines, high in the sky, above raging waters and amidst huge trees. Krissy and I had a blast. Took some great videos mid-flight and several shots all around the tour.

While we were in Whistler we walked around and decided on a place for lunch before heading back to Vancouver. Krissy had a salad and I had a cajun chicken sandwich. On our way, we stopped at a huge waterfall to take in some unique scenery. It started to really rain, so we just kept going back to our hotel.

By the time we got back it was fairly late. We went in the hotel’s rooftop jacuzzi and then took a nap in the room. It was too late to go and grab dinner – so we skipped it and just watched a bit of TV before nodding off to sleep.

We woke up bright and early and grabbed some brekfast at the Old Dutch Inn. Surprisingly good food and got a good meal in before heading out to Horne Lake.

The paved road ended and we traveled a dirt and gravel road for a good 15 minutes to reach the Horne Lake Adventure Camp. Our tour guides gave us a description of what our tour consisted of, donned our helmets with headlamps, and grabbed some coveralls to bring along so we didn’t mess up our clothes. After another short drive and a 10 minute hike, we reached the cave entrance. It was a small, square-shaped grate that is usually locked when no one is inside. We put on our coveralls and entered the cave. It was an amazing experience. We got to see incredible natural formations inside – “soda straws”, white calcite that looked like ice cream, stalagtites and stalagmites everywhere. We had several crawlways that we had to get down on our belly and crawl through, and one area had a pump that removed a pool of water so that we could get through to the other side! We also were able to do some rapelling, rock climbing, a few ladder climbs, and lots of hunching and ducking throughout the cave. It was a blast. We took lots of pictures inside with a disposable camera so there should be good documentation!

After emerging from the cave, we headed back to the car and drove back to Qualicum Beach to grab some lunch at “Lefty’s”, and then back out to a park about 20 minutes away called Cathedral Grove. Huge trees with some trunks at least 10 feet in diameter surrounded a short path through the park.

We then headed back to catch the ferry to get back to the mainland and to Downtown Vancouver to our hotel, the Hampton Inn. After unloading our luggage and setting up our last “home base” of the trip, we had a simple dinner downstairs at the hotel restraunt, “Zachary’s“. I had a decent steak and Krissy had a halibut & salmon linguini dish. We had a small slice of cheesecake to end the night.

Next, we head to Whistler to go on the ZipTrek tour.

Our stay in Seattle was over and we headed towards Vancouver. We made a quick stop at a breakfast place highly recommended called “14 Carrot Cafe”. Pancakes, omelettes – all good. Then we drove all the way up to Horeshoe Bay, passing through downtown Vancouver, and driving onto the BC Ferry to take us across to Vancouver Island. After a nice 1:45 voyage across the bay, and a quick lunch on-board, we headed out to Qualicum Beach. Our motel, Sand Pebbles Inn, was nested right on the water. Krissy and I took a walk up and down the beach before we headed into the town center to find some dinner. We went to a small pizza place and Krissy had a salad and I had some mediocre, watery baked spaghetti. Can’t have a great meal every time.

After a stop at the hotel’s breakfast, we drove out to Woodland Park Zoo, which was only about 10 minutes away. It was a pretty nice layout, with all types of animals – giraffes, monkeys, gorillas, lions, etc. We had a quick lunch of chili at the zoo’s food pavilion, and then drove a few blocks down to meet Amber in Fremont. We walked down to a coffee shop and sat outside on a seat of rocks with our mochas. Then we headed down to the locks and watched a ton of boats being lined up waiting for the water to rise. After driving around a bit, we headed to Ballard and went to a cool bar for a few drinks. It was now dinnertime, so we went to a mexican place called Oaxaca. One last stop was at a unique Seattle shop, Cupcake Royale, where we finished our “outskirts of the city” tour with Amber with a few tasty cupcakes.

Our itenirary today will be mostly drive time as we venture north towards Qualicum Beach which is located on Vancouver Island.

Pike Place Market. We found a small french cafe and started our day with some crepes. We walked all throughout the market, and yes, saw some fish throwing along the way. Beautiful inexpensive flowers. Honeys and jams. Various trinkets and handmade goods. It was full of people from end to end. We caught the overwhelmingly strong scent of fresh doughnuts around the corner from the fish store, and had to get a half-dozen, bite-sized, powdered, and frosted.

After we were content to have seen most of the vendors, we ventured into downtown. Walked past several more stores, including the world’s first Starbucks, a handmade cheese shop, and at least 4-5 more Starbucks. We hiked up to the Westlake Plaza area and sat in the open square for a while, people-watching and saw the city horseback cops making their rounds. We walked around for a bit in the mall and stopped into a coffee shop (not Starbucks!) and had some molten dark chocolate mochas.

At this point we were feeling a bit tired from all the walking so we came back to the hotel and crashed. We didn’t realize it, but we were VERY tired, and slept until late in the night. Since it was Sunday night, most restaurants were closed, but a local place a block away from our hotel – Blue Lake Bistro – was open until 1AM, so that was our place. Krissy had mushroom soup and salad, and I had a chicken parmesan. The rest of the night was just spent hanging out in the room, watching TV. Chilling out. It’s ok to just chill on vacation, right?

So today, now that the weather is good, we plan to head over to what is supposed to be one of the world’s best zoo’s. Woodland Park Zoo. And possibly meet up with Amber for lunch or dinner, since the zoo is blocks from her house.