Greetings, Faithful Readers. Sorry we haven't posted anything for a while, but our RV park in Vancouver had woefully weak wi-fi, so we didn't get much air time. Plus, I was terribly busy going to statistical meetings Sunday through Thursday (which is why we went to Vancouver), then reflecting and ruminating on the scintillating ideas I had heard, so I didn't have much time or energy to type up the highlights for your edification and entertainment, or anything else. Stay tuned.
Macy has a cleft lip and cleft palate condition that is going to require surgery. By a great coincidence, channel-surfing that evening or the next I came across an infomercial about a charitable organization that provides surgical repairs in poor countries for children who would otherwise have to live as an outcast with that condition forever. Really sad. Really great that Jeff and Valerie are going to give little Macy the chance at such a better life.
So, Jeff faxed the forms to us and Friday morning we went looking for an actuary. Wasn't easy, even though the GPS found a couple offices not far from our RV park, but thanks to Susie's persistence - she said, Stop at that bank. I'll go ask them - we found a nice and helpful guy, still in his office on a Friday afternoon and we got the stuff notarized and in the mail. That plus laundry and some Tuzigoot clean-up occupied our first day in the exciting city of Vancouver.
Saturday we played tourist - rode the SkyTrain (world's longest automated light rapid transit system) to down town, then hopped on a hop on, hop off tour bus. Some city scenes:
Our trip took us through Stanley Park. We didn't get off the bus, but here are a couple of passing shots of the gardens in the park.
Our RV park was about 10 miles from the downtown convention center where the American Statistical Association was holding its annual meeting. I rode the SkyTrain to and from. The nearest station was just a 15 minute walk from Tuzigoot.
The SkyTrain system is interesting, there are no turnstiles. There are kiosks for buying tickets, but no machine or person collecting them. After a couple of days I asked someone in the RV park office if I was missing something. Is there someplace I'm supposed to show or submit my ticket? No, he said. Occasionally, a security officer checks for tickets, but that's it. Every once in a while the government has a discussion about installing turnstiles, but so far it hasn't seemed to be worth the trouble. Anyway, I kept faithfully buying a ticket for each trip (tax-deductible, you know). It wasn't until Thursday afternoon, my last trip of the week, that a security lady came walking through my car. My ticket wasn't right. I had boarded at a different station down town from my usual boarding place and bought a ticket from a different line. When I realized I wasn't in the right place, I had to exit and then enter the correct station, which I did but assumed the ticket would serve there, too. Apparently not, but, she let me get by with it.
The guy next to me was frantically searching through his backpack - a professional looking guy, not a student or other suspicious type. He kept searching, she kept waiting. We came into the next station. She said, you need to get off and buy a ticket. He kept searching and ignored her. The train signaled it wanted to leave. Rather than hold up the train, she got off (she had a bicycle-transporting passenger to talk to) and we left, the guy still searching through his backpack. I never made eye contact and I didn't ask him if he really had a ticket or not. But, shoot, if the only penalty is having to get off and buy a ticket, oh, the shame, I suspect there's a lot of free-riding going on. Not that I would think of it.
I took Wednesday afternoon off from my grueling schedule of meetings and we drove over to North Vancouver and then on up the coast for 40-50 miles. The North V attraction was the Capilano suspension bridge. The first bridge at this location was built in the early 1900s by the owner whose son liked to hunt on the side of the gorge opposite their house. Subsequent owners turned the bridge into a tourist attraction. The bridge is 450 ft. long and it's about 230 ft. above the river below. And it's very flexible and bouncy, without trying to make it bounce, which you're told not to do. It also twists side to side which makes it difficult to walk. Some people were creeping along, white knuckles tightly grasping the side rail. Here are a couple of my pictures:
Then, we drove west to the coast. I had in mind catching a ferry to one of the islands that dot the passage between the coast and Vancouver Island, but the cost and the timing weren't right for the late-in-the-day time we arrived at the ferry terminal, so we drove on up the coast.
We (the GPS) found a nice, informal, local pub with outside dining and fish and chips on the menu, so we stopped there. A couple came in with two pre-school children. The waiter brought them some Dr. Seuss books for entertainment. Mom started reading real loud, with added commentary, the better to educate the young 'uns. SEE THE FUNNY HAT! We kind of rolled our eyes and said, Why do parents think they have to do that? Several minutes later, Mom realized there were other people in the area and turned around and said I hope we're no bothering you. Oh, no. Not at all, we said.
Later, as we were leaving we stopped and I told Mom, Actually we don't mind hearing Dr. Seuss stories. Reminds us of our grandkids. We had a nice chat. Dad, it turned out, was just back in town after a couple of weeks fighting forest fires. They were celebrating his safe return. The air in Vancouver had gotten progressively hazier as our week there went along and the paper said it was due to hundreds of forest fires burning throughout British Columbia. Dad said many of the fires are being allowed to burn in a managed way.
Our return coincided with sunset and you can see the smoke in these pictures.
What, you may be asking, did Susie do while you were busy doing statistics? Well, we had two nice dinners out with friends and she drove to a nearby shopping center a few times to make her contribution to the economy. She was also working on a special project that I cannot divulge.
Here's a picture of our RV park, taken from the second-floor deck over the office, which was one place I could connect to wi-fi and sometimes use it if not too many other people were online.
Fairly dense, as you can see, but there were nice hedges separating all of the sites. We're in the far row, backed up against those trees. It was not easy backing into our site. Right behind those trees, and I mean right behind, is a very busy train track. A busy highway ran along another side of the park, so we were right at RV park home.
Conference ended Thursday noon and we headed south Friday morning. We had heard stories about long delays in border crossing, some times due to motor homes being given a complete search, so I had planned to avoid the crossing that connects to Interstate 5 and cross elsewhere. The GPS had picked a route Thursday evening. Somehow, she changed her mind overnight and before I realized it we were in the queue for the I-5 crossing. Just took us about an hour and a quarter, though, and only a few questions to answer. Construction was the main hang-up.
Here's a peace arch at the border, then a very welcome sign.
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Susie and Rob
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