Vancouver, Canada: 6/30/14
For whatever reason, I had it set in my mind that while I was in Canada I needed to do two things: thrift shop and drink coffee. Don't ask me why these tasks had to be accomplished in Canada. I mean, I do them all the time at home and doing them 10 hours from my house shouldn't change the results at all, but I was determined. I was a girl on a mission to find the best thrift store and coffee in Vancouver.
So my family put up with me and we walked. And walked. And walked. No coffee shop we passed looked good enough. I'm not even sure what I was looking for, but I knew I would realize it when I found it. Fast forward another hour to the moment I stopped in front of a tiny shop called "Beaucoup: Bakery & Cafe". Its small building, adorable fonts and design, and mouth-watering scents that came from within won me over.
That, and the fact that I had been searching for coffee for almost four hours and was dead on my feet.
Anyways, I went in and bought a caramel latte.
And in case you're wondering about my Canadian thrifting, it didn't go so well. The few places I stopped in were over-priced, so I didn't end up buying anything, though they did have a good selection!
One of the other things I did while in Canada was hike (ok, so it was more of a walk up a gradual slope...). My family drove a ways out of Vancouver and walked among the towering trees and across a suspension bridge.
I stopped and took a picture that I'm fairly certain a hipster would post on Instagram along with the caption, "where the wild things are". But since they're hipster, they'd throw in some hashtags like "#summer2k14" and "#latergram".
Get it? You know... because Canadian's say eh a lot?
Well, it was funny to me.
Ok, bear with me for three more Canada stories, and we can be done with this travel log.
Oooh! I made a pun again without even trying! I said bear... and Canada has bears. Or maybe that's Alaska. I'm not really sure.
Moving on... one day we hopped on a water taxi that took us to Granville Island.
(quick side story: we were asking the water taxi driver what there was to do in Olympic Village, and he suggested in his funny Canadian accent that my family try the liquor store. If all there is to do in Olympic Village is shop for booze, I consider that a strike against the area. My family just died laughing afterwards)
Anyways, Granville Island has this huge public market that is pretty much Pike Place Market in Seattle, WA times four with several buildings making up the market.
As soon as we got off our water taxi, it had started to rain a little bit. It wasn't bad. Just a light drizzle and cloudy, grey skies. However, within the first ten minutes of us being on the island, it started to pour. And I mean pour. Simply walking between the market buildings was like getting a full shower.
It was pretty intense, and the girly-girl inside of me truly feared for the life of my leather purse.
During my short visit to Canada, I quickly noticed how proud Canadians are to be Canadian.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for being proud of your country ('murica!), but I just wanted to point out how they show their pride. They would just throw the word "Canada" in with everything.
For example, I'd watch a commercial for toothpaste and the voice over would say, "9 out of 10 Canadian dentists prefer Colgate". Or it would be something like, "Canadians love Bush beans!" Maybe you know the mattress company, Sleep Company USA? In Canada, it's called Sleep Company Canada, complete with a maple leaf inside of the "o".
Now I need to take a second and comment on that maple leaf. It's on their flag, so it has to be on everything else too. It's in the McDonald's golden arches. It takes the place of the apostrophe in Wendy's.
I thought all of this was just because I was there during Canada Day weekend, but I'm almost certain that it's always like that. In that case, I'm very impressed with how many times the country was able to put its name and symbol on everything. I think their pride is contagious.
'anada.
I've saved the best for last guys. I have been SO excited to share with you all the glory of La Casa Gelato. Get this: 508 flavors of gelato with 218 on site at any given time.
Uhhh... what?! I couldn't believe it either.
Yet, it turns out that there's a bad side to 218 flavors of gelato. If you're indecisive (like me!), making a gelato choice is 100% impossible. Making that decision gave me stress.
But lucky (?) for me, I'm a stress eater, so all I had to do was go eat the unlimited samples of creamy gelato goodness!
A lot of the flavors were fairly normal, others were exotic, and the rest were gag flavors. I mean, hummus? Aged balsamic? Wasabi? Chocolate BBQ smoked salmon? (and yes, those are all real flavors!) Do people actually want to eat an entire a whole bowl of that? I sure hope not.
After about an hour of trying to come to a decision, I ended up with half lychee/ half longan flavored gelato. And it was gooooooood. Totally worth the 10+ hours in the car with my 13 year old brother that it took to get there.
In closing, Vancouver, Canada was gorgeous and I hope to return in the future! I even think I got the accent down for my next Canadian adventure.
Until next time, eh?