“I’ll have the ice cream, you guys can drink the beers”

Today was a good day, eh?  Whereas the smoke was actually somewhat worse than yesterday, the comradery and to-doery was wonderful.

The morning got off to a late start, which was ok given the hectic pace we’ve been setting on this trip.  First up on the ol’ itinerary was Grouse Mountain, one of Vancouver’s encircling mountains, which is noted for its steep gondola ride (it ascends about 2,600 vertical feet in 8 minutes).  It also featutes the “Grouse Grind”—a “trailcase” built straight up the side of the mountain, which is the province of superfit hardbody types who run up it, presumably for fun, and then there’s a large ski park at the top.  The gondola ride up was just the right amount of scary, given that it wasn’t an open air car, but the activities at the top left a bit to be desired.

I'm not going to lie, I freaked out a bit

There were certainly hordes of fellow tourists up there, but not a ton for us all to do.  They do have two grizzly bears, rescued as pups, who hang out all day in a generously-apportioned enclosure.  We saw a talk about barn owls.  James played with a beat up, oversized Jenga set that constituted almost the entirety of the so-called “Wild Wilderness Games” activity section.  Basically, what’s happened is they had this winter sports venue and they wanted to monetize the summertime, so they chucked a bunch of stuff up there, and that’s Grouse Mountain.  However, they did have a mildly entertaining lumberjack show.  It was kind of cheesy, but fun, and James like it (but not as much as Erica.)  Essentially, two beefy millennials, trussed up as lumberjacks, told corny jokes and competed in various lumberjack-related competitions (axe throwing, who can chop and saw the fastest, log rolling, tree climbing, etc.)  One of the guys climbed a 60 foot tree and then descended at basically free-fall speeds, and we later learned he is the 5-time world champion speed tree climber. Not bad, eh?!

 Bears!

Ye Olde Lumberjacke Showe

Our next stop was supposed to be the Capilano Suspension Bridge Park, which is a very long suspension bridge (just as it sounds like it would be), plus a tree top walkway thing, but it was so crowded that we skipped it and headed back into the city to enjoy the very large swimming pool in Stanley Park.  James, who was terrible yesterday, held it together much better today, and of course loved the poor and its several water slides.

After, we headed out to Granville Island, a kind of touristy market warf kind of deal.  The restaurant was adequate, if overpriced, but we sampled some of the wares of the microbrewery on the island, and it wasn’t bad.  We'd promised James ice cream for being a good boy, and he's the source of today's post's title.

The hotel room is hot again tonight.  Tomorrow, we head up the Sea-to-Sky highway to Whister.  Toodles!

Grant