8 September Vancouver

Thursday 8 September

So today we were by ourselves and decided to take the Bum Boat across to Granville Island to visit the umbrella shop where I bought my sunshade brolly. We found it easily enough but they said that we would need to visit the city shop to have it checked over. Not a problem. It was close to where we planned to go for the day so returned to the ferry and took another Bum Boat across to the Plaza of Nations.

Where the ferry dropped us off we walked right by BC Place and Rogers Arean, the two main stadiums in Vancouver. Our route took us past Starbucks so we stopped in for a coffee before continuing on our way. As it turns out the umbrella shop was very close to the Vancouver Lookout which was where we were headed. They checked my umbrella over and re-sewed a couple of spokes, so it’s now good as new. No charge. I wish we still had a good umbrella shop in Sydney but it is long gone.

The lookout was not crowded and we managed to walk around and take in all the information before returning to Robson Street to walk back to the B&B. Having picked up a gelato we had covered a lot of ground in a big circle around the city. Vancouver is like that – very easy to get about.

Dinner was at Johnnie Fox’s Irish Pub which turned out to be a good choice. We enjoyed our last meal in this lovely city. After dinner we made our way down to the waterfront and returned to the lookout. Our ticket was available all day so we decided to return to the top to watch the sunset. Having absorbed all the information earlier in the day we did not need to spend time reading all that, which was good because it was very crowded. It was also a lot clearer as the clouds had dispersed and the mountains in North and West Vancouver were clear as was Mount Baker.

Johnnie Fox's, a cosy dinner venue

Robson Street was alive with buskers

There are some lovely buildings in Vancouver

Mt Baker (left) and Burnaby, a satellite city to the right

Canada Place in the foreground and West Vancouver mountains

The trees on top of this building looked gorgeous in emerging autumn colours

The buildings now obscure a terrific sunset over the bay at this time of year

And the float planes still come and go

These cranes on the waterfront looked gorgeous with the sun enhancing their red colour

Busy Cambie Street, a main thoroughfare into and out of the city

Lions Gate Bridge

Lots of activity after dark on Granville Street

Robson Street all lit up

Tomorrow we board our floating home – Radiance of the Seas – to sail home to Sydney.