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Vancouver leg of
The Search For Tour...
Canada 07
Day 1 After a quick debreif in Toronto Slim and Rocket headed for Vancouver. The pressure was on from the start. We took on board the inspirational words from Trav back home; Gibbo was to maintain gas consumption but improve in the areas of flirtation and drought breaking, Rocket to spark the group early like in europe and Stu to provide comic looseness which makes the tour halarious. Solid from the absent Trav eler. We landed in Vancouver under heavy turbulance both from the cross winds at the airport and from the maniac taxi driver on the way to the hostel. Clocked him at 94 in a 50 zone, all over the shop. Hostel was in one of the dustiest locations in Vancouver, nearly too dusty for us, is that possible? It was right on the wrong edge of China town and only a block from drug deal central. In the hostel we met Graham (thats what we called him), bout 95 year old chinese bloke who was there when they built the great wall and spoke b***** all english. Apparently he is Johnnys father, chinese bloke who runs the wang fat hostel in Hong Kong. Anyway he showed us to our twin private room that turned out to be a double bed in a closet. Gibbo told him we werent gay and that he wasnt sleeping with me, graham got on the blower to his daughter and they sorted us out a 4 bed dorm for the same price and less room. We gave a TDI spy (Chris) in the region a call and arranged a rendezvous. Turned out to be the Trap and Gill pub in the graville street area. On the way we saw a bloke praying to a dummy modeling a bikini in a shop window, a guys behind us said ‘ i pray for that every day too mate’ very random. We sat down, arranged a tab and sucked my first Kokanee, not bad. The spy turned up heavily distguised when we were on our 4th. After the obligatory introductions we got down to business, talking about the best places to see in Vancouver, how we could get into the aquarium for free and getting dusty. By the end of it we were pretty hammered. The bill came to 164.50 plus tip and included 22 Kokanee pints, 1 Jim beam and coke, 6 scotch and cokes and a tuna burger with the lot. Using TDI funds we paid for the spys night cause we are good blokes and for getting us into the aqaurium for free and taxied home. Dust was falling at quite a rate by this stage but gibbo was still sniffing to break the drought. He needed a reason to go knocking on chicks doors at 1am. Rocket provided it by giving him an apple out of the fridge and telling him to go an ask if they have an apple peeler. Some of Rockets best work there. Needless to say they didnt but gave gibbo the ‘in’ he required and needless to say he wasted another opportunity.
Day 2 Woke up dusty as. During the night a dust cloud had parked itself over our beds and deposited a thick 2 inch layer of the finest dust particals British Columbia had to offer. Late start for the boys and after a quick rark in the bin from Rocket we were on our way to Grouse Mountian. We took the ferry over to North Vancouver. Gibbo slept on the bus but was awake enough to see the wolfs at the bottom of the mountain and get on the Gondola up the mountain. A nice view soon became very low visability by the time we had reached the summit. It was snowing, adding to the 4.39m snow base already existing. Had a look at a couple of movies in the theatre about the mountain and the resident bears and then took a sleigh ride. We also made an appearance as extras in a movie, think its snow dogs 2 or some other high quality film. We also had a burger and fries that we couldnt stomach so we rolled them up and put them in our bag for later. Overall the mountain was really nice, the complex on top was cool and worth the trip up there depsite not being able to see Vancouver. Tried to check out the Capilano suspension bridge on the way back to Vancouver but its still damaged from the hhhuuuuggggeeee winds that ripped through there in December. Picked up some supplies from the chinese supermarket, had instant dodgey noodles then Rocket headed for bed while Gibbo entertained the girls from Calgary next door. There was a hot french chick who was out of gibbos league and three other scrubbers who would need quite a few beers for him to consider.
Day 3 Less dusty this morning after early kip shop. Hired bikes from our mate Simo and headed for Stanley Park. Gibbo blowing a lot of black smoke from his bike as we approached only the slightest hill. Then it was all downhill to the aquarium. Chris came through with the goods, his girlfriend met us at the door and got us in for free. The aquarium was cool, its was different from th ones back home. We checked out the Otters, Harp Seals, Baluga whales, Dolphins and some pretty huuuuuuge fish tanks with some of the biggest fish ive seen. Need some serious tackle to pull some of their lips. Thumbs up from TDI. Gibbo took some pretty useless pictures of Rocket at the totem poles but after recieving a mouthful about how to get the person and the poles in the same picture he got it right. Needs further work on taking person on landscape photos. Further down the road we stop for another photos only to hear a hissing noise. Can you hear that gibbo asked. We found a hole in gibbo tyre that was leaking fast, gibbo said do you think thats a problem?? Arrh yes was the answer. A further 20m meters and the tyre was completely flat. After walking 3km back to a bike shop to get it fiexed we circumnavigated the rest of stanely park. Its a huuuuge park in the city, its so nice and if you lived nearby you would be there all the timerelaxing or recreation or exercising. So nice to be in a calm silent place in the middle of the city. A lot of trees were still down and some of the tracks were still closed from the high winds in december. We headed back to the hostel and waited for stu to arrive. The fridge was stocked for Stu with his accustomry chocolate milk and apples, solid work and tour experience from the lads. After transit from vietnam via manchester he was one dusty looking character. We went out for a meal, had a couple, played some pool, gibbo sniffed about for a while then we called it a night.
Stay tuned
Rock
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