Travel diary

Found this in my saved drafts.
Dated 13 Oct '09

Ok so the first 2 days of our trip are done, and we leave Vancouver tomorrow morning.

The hostel that we're staying in right now is really nice and comfy, with a dorm of 4 and comfy fat blankets and pretty washrooms and decent breakfast!

Vancouver in general seems much nicer than Toronto. The people for one thing are much nicer and friendlier and helpful. It seems cheaper too, at least for transportation. There is no Provincial Tax, unlike the 8% in stupid Toronto. And plus this place is soo superbly beautiful. The fall leaves are all turning red, and this morning when we were walking towards University of British Columbia, a red tree would suddenly pop out of green coniferous (I think) trees. Very beautiful.

Which brings me to how absolutely marvelous the UBC campus is! It seems much nicer than York, bigger, greener, cleaner, with (nude) beaches next to campus. Oh and we saw fraternity/sorority houses, with their Greek names. So much fun. I wonder how popular they are in Canadian unis. I really do wish I could transfer to UBC. I'm sure I would have liked the calmness of the city. To a certain extent I regret not having researched more on unis before coming here.

Then we went to Stanley Park, which is simply HUGE. We spent most of the day walking, mostly in circles. And then at the end of the day got lost, and had to lumber around in the dark towards the Fish House, where we has a reservation. But it turned out to be nice food, I had to have the Penne Pasta, as it was the only veg thing they had. But then the Lava Cake was quite decent. Though Bloody Mary was simply awful. Note to self - NEVER have it ever again. But the Fish House people did not charge me for it since I drank a sip of it and left it because I didn't like it. Very sweet, no? It's funny how sophisticated and classy the place was, and we were probably the only people who didn't drive there, instead we hiked :P

Yesterday we walked to Granville Island (we really seem to be doing a lot of walking). It was very nice and the Public Market was very cute too. Oh and the I bought the first season of the original 90210, as I haven't been able to find it online anywhere. Yipeee :) In the evening we almost went clubbing, but decided we were under-dressed after seeing all gals turning out in strapless dresses and high heels. How people can survive without 5 layers of clothes in that cold beats me. And Vancouver Film Festival (VIFF) is also on. Somehow wherever we go there seems to be a film festival going on. TIFF was on when we landed in Toronto.

Tomorrow is a long bus journey, so I'm glad I bought an iPod, brought Sons & Lovers and brought my laptop.

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I loved travelling in that Moose Travels tour bus. The people were really friendly. The overnight stay at Shushwap Lake was quite memorable, with cute Australian guys in the same room, haha. And the discussion on who was from where over dinner in that very typical pub/grill place was so interesting. Almost made me wish I had been travelling for as long as some of them had. One of the guys was doing an around the world in an year trip. So cool.