It's a Different Country, Eh? (Part I)

(Note: no crochet content, but there's lots of photos!)

Ever get that "I need to get the hell out of Dodge" feeling? How about out of the country?

Well, since I live in Seattle, out of the country is achievable for me.

The kids and I packed up and headed to Vancouver, B.C. last weekend to explore the city and have some "let the maid make the beds" fun.

We were bummed to wake up to cold, cloudy, rainy weather, but by the time we got to the border the sky had cleared quite nicely. We made it through the border with a 40 minute wait (not bad for a Saturday morning) and made it to our hotel in the early afternoon.

We spent the day walking around downtown and then headed to the Richmond Night Market, where we saw all of the "junks" as my friend Fenny calls them (correctly, I might add). We also had some fantabulous food along the way, stopping for a bite here and a nibble there and of course bubble tea aplenty!

We were also delighted to hear, and eventually see, a group of Korean drummers, who we followed to a stage only to discover ourselves in the middle of the Korean Heritage Festival! We were really excited until the MC (about 17 by the looks of it) came out spewing hip hop (boyyeee) and then was joined by more of the "Korean heritage" people lip-synching to rap and flashing underwear at us. Who knew 50 Cent was such a predominant influcence on the Korean way of life?

Once we were fed, junked and heritaged out, we headed back to our hotel so I could crack open my new copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince whilst letting the children gorge themselves on Cartoon Network (Mom, can we PLEASE get cable?). A little after 11:00p.m. I was startled to hear a knock on our door. I mean we were in another country for goodness sakes!

I peeped out the door to discover our good friends Fenny and Wei, who were in town for the day and stopped to say goodbye before heading back to Washington state. It was so nice to see them!

Sunday was filled with shopping and play. It was a gorgeous day and after breafast we headed to Yaohan Centre for some shopping and then to Stanley Park, which is one of my all-time faves. Parking was precarious, but after a couple of loops we found a place to leave the van so we could explore. We found a really fun water park and the kids had a blast running through the various water features while I was, of course, reading HP (natch!).

After the park, we headed to a very late lunch (early dinner?) and then left Canada. I let them out at the border to run through the fields and take pictures of each other while I waited in line. Adler was loving the fact that he was in another country all by himself (LOL). The kids were very bummed to be leaving and I agreed. We heart Vancouver!

Following are a group of thumbnails from our trip. Click any for a larger picture (all have comments).