I could just write about couchsurfing as the trip is so far just so amazing due to the couchsurfers I've met.
However. I took the plane on April 2nd from Montreal. I was supposed to meet Steffi at the airport but I realised that her flight from Germany was delayed and that she would miss the flight to Vancouver. I took the plane on my own just like a big girl.
Once in Vancouver I gave my couchsurfer a ring telling him that we'll be late due to the circonstances.
The airport is pretty small and pretty boring and the internet connection is not for free (a bit annoying when you know that you have a laptop with you!).
I decided to look into my travel books to see where I really arrived. Beside the wonderful flight over the Rockies and landing over Vancouver which was so green (quite refreshing after so many months down in the snow!), I didn't know much about the city.
While reading my books a guy sitting next to me was of course curious to know where I was from and where I was going to and he even gave me his e-mail in case I come over to Calgary!
After 4 long hours, Steffi finally arrived after a 24-hours-trip. We just grabed a cab and headed to Geoff our host for three days.
He was so nice giving us his flatkeys and showing us on the map where to go during the day.
Steffi had to fight with the jetlag for a couple of days that's why we were awake pretty early which wasn't bad as we went out in the morning and had a real north american breakfast with eggs and something what they tend to call coffee but which is just brown water to me!
We walked and walked for ages, we were lucky with the weather. We headed in direction of the university but made our right at some point and arrived close to the water, had a wonderful view over Vancouver: The sea from one side and from the other downtown with mountains in the background. We had a little fishy snack in the harbor and went up to Grandville Island which has a wonderful covered market.
At some point we realised that we were pretty much tired and headed home and made diner and the 15 kms-walk just told us to rest for that day !!!
The next day we were a bit more lazy, checking e-mails and stuff but as it was rainy the weather wasn't calling us out either. However we had a walk downtown (while raining). Nothing amazing about downtown to say though. Skyscrapers which are not particularly beautiful.
We went to chinatown (which is the 3rd largest in North-America according to Lonely Planet) and just walked through an asian supermarket just wondering what all those colorful things might be!
At some point we arrived on Hastings Street which is just close to chinatown. We heard that there was a dodgy area in Vancouver close to that and suddenly we realised that we were in that area!! Plenty of people and I would say all on drugs! It was kind of impressive as it was just a corner away from the calm chinese life!
Later that afternoon we met Geoff and his friend Cameron. They took us with the sea-boot on the north shore of Vancouver to have a view over the city.
In the evening Cameron had a show with his band on Commercial drive!! They did so well!! It was absolutely cool. His band's called BELLA and even were first part of the "New Pornographers".
After the show the cafe closed though, so we had to leave already sometime after 12 but Geoff, Steffi and I felt like having another beer and looked for the next best option which was a jazz-bar who kicked us out as well at 1.30am!
Luckily Steffi and I had bought the day before some beers which were left in the fridge and ended our lovely day in Geoff's flat sharing a lot good music.
As we will fly back from Vancouver we will stay again for a couple of nights at his place which is just awsome!
