First Impressions

G'day all,

So we arrived in Vancouver last wednesday night after the longest day of our  lives and we were happy to be on solid ground again. After getting to the hotel we went for a walk and found Granville street (about 2 blocks from where we are staying) to be where all the pubs and shops were. We stopped at a pub for a drink and watched a bit of the first game of the playoffs for the Vancouver Canucks in Ice Hockey. The Canucks are everywhere, the people here are absolutely fanatic. It doesn't look good so far though because they are 0-3 down against the LA Kings for a best of 7 games, so it may not last much longer. Marty is attributing their losing to our arrival as they finished top of the ladder in their conference and the LA Kings were 8th. 

A shot from Game 3 of the Stanley Cup quarter final playoffs between Vancouver and LA Kings

A Canucks Donut

We have discovered very early on that it is still quite cold here, but it did give us an excuse to jump on the Canucks bandwagon and buy a scarf each. When the sun comes out it can get warm (although that has only happened twice so far) and it is very warm anywhere you go inside.

Off to watch the Canucks

We have been getting a bit confused with everything being on the other side, drive on the right side of the road, keep right when walking on footpaths, getting into the car on the other side, even keeping right when going down stairs and escalators.

Besides from watching the three hockey games (they play every second night) we have been walking around downtown alot, I've done a bit of shopping (I may of gotten excited about some of the cheaper clothes), and we have been trying to sort out an apartment, bank accounts, phones and jobs. We have been looking at a couple of apartments and are putting in applications today but that is as far as we have gotten, hopefully the applications go well and we will be into a place shortly. We have extended our stay at St Clair Hotel until Sat 21st but I'm not sure what we will do after that.

In relation to jobs, Marty has applied for some and is hoping to hear back and is looking through more, covering sports sales, engineering and landscaping jobs. ALS contacted me last wednesday and I am going out there to meet everyone and have a look around on tuesday. I start next Monday 23rd April but after training will be working tuesday to saturday.

Marty and I both completed the Vancouver Sun Run on Sunday and we went well. Marty finished in 43.11 and I did 1.08.25 and we were both happy with that, Marty off not much training and recovering from the Ironman and me coming off my knee injury.  There were 49,000 people registered for the run which makes it twice the size of Run4theKids but not as big as City2Surf.

The start of the Sun Run

Before the Run

 

Tourist wise we have not done that much, we went for a wander around Gastown (part of downtown Vancouver) which is a older area with cobbled streets, and we spent sunday afternoon on Granville Island visiting the public market and the Granville island Brewery. 

The entrance to Granville Island

There is still much for us to do but luckily we have a while to cover it all.

 

The views around Vancouver are absolutely amazing. Its almost impossible to go anywhere without seeing snow-capped mountains in the background.  Below is a photo Marty took while going for a run on Friday afternoon.

Pic From Stanley Park

Well that's about it for now.

Ez and Marty