Ireland day 0961. Thursday 16 May 2024- Vancouver 2

Today’s summary	Effects of jet lag beginning to wear off so had a more leisurely breakfast and a later start than yesterday. Walked up the hill to the Queen Elizabeth Park to look the lovely (ie warm and tropical) Bloedel Conservatory. Then walked a few blocks west to the Van Dusen botanical gardens where we had lunch and a look round. Out to the pub to watch the Canucks v Oilers hockey match later this evening.
Today’s weather	A few spots of rain in the morning but cleared up by lunchtime and the afternoon was sunny and dry. Moderate westerly wind. Appx 18c

Today’s overview location (The grey mark shows the location of our route)		Close-up location (The orange line shows where we walked) (Click button below to download GPX of today’s walk as recorded, or see interactive map at bottom with elevations corrected): Botanical Breather

Commentary

(Summary blog only. Last full blog was Day 0368).

By the time we got back from the restaurant last night (“Say Mercy” in Riley Park, which was excellent) we were both absolutely knackered. So as soon as we got back to our guesthouse, we collapsed into bed and slept for a solid nine hours.

That meant that we weren’t awake ages before breakfast, and that by the time we had finished eating, it was pushing 10am. That was fine, actually, as we had planned a slightly less stretching day than yesterday – which by the way had turned out to be a bit of an epic, by the end totalling almost 30km of walking.

Also, it was raining a bit this morning so we were quite happy to delay our start until it started to dry up again. Eventually it did, so we headed out on foot again, this time in the opposite direction to yesterday, due south and up the hill to the Queen Elizabeth park. The last time we were in Vancouver, we hadn’t had time to visit the park, and particularly wanted to see the renowned Bloedel Conservatory.

We put that to right today, and it was certainly worth making the visit. The conservatory itself was fantastic (appealing of course to my penchant for warm and exotic places). But what we hadn’t quite appreciated was that it’s built on the top of a hill, and the views to the north up there, over the city of Vancouver, are fantastic.

By this stage it was, amazingly, almost lunchtime. We knew there was a good café in the nearby Van Dusen botanic gardens, so we walked a few blocks west and south down Oak Street and availed ourselves of the refreshment facilities as soon as we had checked into the garden.

After lunch, the sun came out again and everywhere was looking lovely. So we had a good look round, particularly enjoying the Rhododendron Walk and the maze. The latter mostly in retrospect, once we had successfully escaped.

Once we’d seen enough plants for a day, we hiked back to our guesthouse (thankfully mostly downhill) and managed to put our feet up for a few moments before heading off on the next chapter of our Canadian adventure. The Canucks are playing the Oilers tonight, for game 5 of the [ice] hockey stage 5 championships, and we are off to the pub to watch it on the TV in proper Canadian tradition. Another experience to add to the rapidly growing collection!

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


Windsor Guest House, where we are staying at the moment. It’s in a great location on 11th St	Fantastic view to the North over Vancouver from the top of Elizabeth Park near the Bloedel conservatory. It’s the highest point in Vancouver

Fantastic display of azaleas in the Rhododendron Dell in the Van Dusen botanics	Val trying out one of the giant armchairs for size

“Iconic” Vancouvrt skline with the Lions peaks in the centre. Apparently there’s a long distance path (aka thru-trail) which goes right between them	I love these giant Canadian trucks. But they don’t look very fuel efficient

In the Bloedel conservatory. Magnificent