Canada « Join me for the Journey

While in Canada, we not only visited our friends on Vancouver Island but we also had a few days with my cousin in Vancouver…a city close to the top of my list of most liveable cities, although I believe it can be a little cold and dismal in winter! But this was summer.

I’ve enjoyed English beach on each of my visits here. The log seats and resting places are unique to this beach adding character as well as keeping the sand in place.

The walks around the headland towards Stanley Park are very pleasant. In fact many of the parks are great places to walk as I’ve discovered on previous visits.

But this time we just took our time to enjoy the sunny day and savour a delicious lunch at the Boathouse Restaurant… upstairs at a window seat. You can’t beat that!

On another day, my cousin took us by bus and train into the CBD to have dinner at the revolving Restaurant called Cloud 9. We made sure we were there in the late afternoon to see the city as we revolved slowly and stayed on to enjoy the sunset over the bay.

It was a great experience to look down on Vancouver as we enjoyed our meal!

Lots of high rise buildings… a central city of apartment dwellers.

Ever more apartments are being built to make use of available space.

This high-rise shimmered like copper, the mirrored windows forming abstract patterns of the city around them.

Vancouver is very close to mountains with some well known ski resorts.

Nowhere is far from water.

Sailing and boating are much enjoyed pastimes in these sheltered waters.

They have to sail amongst the ships waiting to go the docks to be loaded.

The restaurant revolved further to show the inner harbour.

The marinas here shelter many types of yachts and pleasure vessels.

On our final time around, the sun began to set and the water shimmered gold.

It was a very special way to end our meal at Cloud 9.

And then, at last, the sun was gone, the sky turned rose pink, making a silhouette of the mountains, and it was time for us to make our way back to Richmond.

More of that town anon.

Jennie and David

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with my cousin who lives in the nearby town of Richmond.

I have visited Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada, several times. On those visits I spent much time, both day and evening, in the famed Butchard Gardens near to the town of Victoria. But this time, we visited the private garden of our friends; a garden lovingly carved from a bare block of land; a garden of peace and the joy of plants.

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The central feature of this garden is a Lily Pond. Most rooms of the house look out across this peaceful pond to a landscape of an inlet of water and to the mountains beyond.

While I wandered in the garden, camera in hand, David talked to our friend about the plants in her garden and how they had designed the garden from a bare field.