Running out of holiday themed titles...

Saturday

Today we drove back to Vancouver. I didn’t get lost, and we didn’t miss the ferry, yay J

Sunday

UGH. Kate and our roommate of one night convinced me to do the stupid Grouse Grind. It's a walk/hike up Grouse Mountain, and is basically stairs or scrambling up rock piles the entire way. 

It took FOREVER to get to the quarter mark! I was gasping for air for about the first third, but then my breath was ok – my legs just kept getting reeeeealllly really tired :P So I stopped for lots and lots of breaks, and admired the scenery and a random squirrel that some people managed to hand feed at the half way mark. Kate gave up waiting for me, and just met me at the top, and Laney was smart enough to go shopping downtown instead while she waited for us. 

As we were on our way to Grouse Mountain, I texted someone in my phone wondering if it was still their phone number – he lives in Vancouver. And yes it was still his number lol. And he invited us to come to a Thanksgiving potluck they were having.

After that was some random looking in shops downtown, before thanksgiving dinner with Jon Evans and his family & friends. We bought Tim Tams as our potluck contribution, and Kate and Laney didn’t hate the pumpkin pie – even with my less than enthusiastic (non)endorsement. Our train to Jasper departed at 8:30pm. We checked our baggage before heading off to dinner, and walked to the train station afterwards – it was just a ten minute walk down the road. There was nearly no-one on the train, so we had our pick of seats – which reclined, and had footrests. Comfy-ness for sleeping!

Monday – Thanksgiving

Woke up on the train by a ten minute stop at Kamloops. The people behind us on the train TALKED SO LOUDLY for no reason. SHUTUP freaks! I’m trying to sleep! Kate also tried waking me up for breakfast – nope don’t care – sleeping. So I woke up later and ate my last bagel and the remainder of my Walmart grapes instead. And then dozed on and off for the next little while – until I’d been awake for a while and decided to write some more blogs to post when we next have internet. Tah dah!

Continuing with my blogging on Tuesday night, I recall arriving in Jasper, and booking our tour from Jasper to Banff, and then catching the last shuttle bus to go from Jasper out to the hostel for the season… lucky? Driver was awesome and gave us a celebratory last shuttle discount :) Later on we caught a cab into town, ate at a Greek place, and bought some groceries.

Tuesday

We started by catching yet another cab into town, and checked out the information centre, before hitting up some souvenir stores. Kate wanted a coffee, so we stopped at a place called “The other paw”. Our cab driver highly recommended their soups, so I gave it a shot. I picked the “Wicked Thai Chicken” instead of the “Creamy Cauliflower” soup option, and got an apple-crumbly slice to eat afterwards, in case it was super spicy. BEST. SOUP. EVER. Oh my gosh it was so GOOD! With mushrooms, and rice and chicken, in all the creamy Thai-ness and just a hint of spicyness…. WOW – SO GOOD!!!!! I can’t even show you a picture of it, because I only bothered to grab my camera after I was finished everything…

After our food, we headed along the walking trail up to the Old Fort Point. We had a minor detour at one point, but as it resulted in awesome photos, and we soon got back on track it wasn’t a problem. 

The lookout gave us great views, especially since the sun had decided to come out after a fairly cloudy night and morning. Yay, mountains!!!! 

OH, I forgot to mention – we saw an ELK right after we started our walk!!!