Kayaking

Important announcement: I got my Kayaking Certification done and am now a member of the False Creek Kayaking Club!!! YAY!

Today was the second of a two part certification course, and we spent most of the time on the water, in Alder Creek! We learned (or reviewed) different paddling techniques, and then the teacher lead us on a lovely paddle around the bay. It was sunset, warm, but not hot, and just simply incredible. Vancouver has the incredible luck of being a city surrounded by nature, and all I have to do is bike down to False Creek, put my name down on the list, put a kayak into the water, and all of a sudden, I no longer feel the omni-presence of the city putting that undeniable pressure on me!

Looking forward to many more paddles in the coming months! They tell me that the club is open year-round. I wonder how long I'll be making it... until November? Maybe?

Quote of the day

My iGoogle homepage graces we with three quotes a day. I thought this one was worth passing on:

Sometimes people are layered like that. There's something totally different underneath than what's on the surface. But sometimes, there's a third, even deeper level, and that one is the same as the top surface one. Like with pie.
-Joss Whedon

I'd also like to take this opportunity to announce that I made pumpkin tarts on my own! I used the left over pie crust from Pi-Day, and voila!

Nelson

Chelsea and I were busy busy little bees:

Wednesday

Bus departure at 6:30pm from Coquitlam. Food that was deemed necessary for an 11h bus ride: 1 box of Decadent chocolate chip cookies; 5 rice balls; 2 tupperwares of edamame; 1 bag of pita bread; 1 hummus container; 1 orange; 1 tupperware of grapes; 4 pumpkin tarts; 6 blueberry-orange muffins; 1 bag of Miss Vickie's chips; 2 hard-boiled eggs. That's it, I think.

Thursday

Arrival in Nelson at 5:30am, I'm exhausted, Chelsea looks normal, but hasn't slept all night. The day is spent getting ready to leave for camping, and we start by doing the most natural thing: taking a 4h nap! Then, I get to discover the "small" town of Nelson, bakeries, clothes, woodworks, used book store, amazing milkshakes... and then, more food shopping, and an adventure to find plates, a car rack (at Chelsea's dad's house), a canoe, another snack... and then, we are on the world's longest free ferry ride! Another nap later (to the great amusement of Chelsea and her mom, after ingesting sugar, I tend to fall asleep in cars), we get to our camping spot! Time for more food, a canoe ride, yet more food, a nice chat with Chelsea's mom's friend Moss, and bedtime again!

Friday

Rainy, maybe even stormy weather puts a dent in our plans for a relaxing day in the sun. So instead we ate, canoed a bit, ate some more, threw a football around (which made my right arm hurt for 2 days afterwards...), ate some KD, packed up, and then went to the Hot Springs!! Then, to my great happiness, we camped out in a trailer park! Now, Chelsea maintains that her dad's land isn't a trailer park, but to me, a land with a mobile home and a trailer on it constitutes a trailer park!

Saturday

One of the longest, fullest days of my life started with the realization that I had misplaced my wallet. Not good. Especially as I needed to take a plane from Castlegar to Vancouver. A very stressful hour or so later, I found my wallet mysteriously in my raincoat pocket! That done, breakfast! And a market! (Which, according to Chelsea, is a true Nelson experience!) A few more hours spent wandering the streets of Nelson, during which I discovered a Shambhala Center! Then, on the drive to Castlegar, we visited Chelsea's mom's garden, and ate more ice cream, yum! A plane ride, and then I'm in the car with my aunt, getting a ride to a wonderful supper: prawns, tuna sashimi, corn, salad, rice, and fresh peas! Feast! And rhubarb tart with ice cream (again...) for desert! Then, it was onwards and upwards, home to drop off an embarrassingly huge amount of luggage, and off downtown to visit Kathleen at work. It had been about a week since I had last seen her, which seemed like forever! After this, I watched part of the sunset (too tired to stay for the whole thing) and took a nauseatingly long bus ride home. And finally... sleep!

Car camping

Before my California trip, most, if not all, my camping experiences involved either a car or a canoe (I won't go into this particular type of camping here since it usually happens at camp with a lot of other trippers, and involves portages, bug bites, and lots of muscle, and really shouldn't be considered in the same category as "regular, i.e. road access" camping). When preparing for said California trip, I was justifiably a bit anxious about the whole camping while hitch-hiking idea. Luckily, everything went smoothly, and I found the whole experience exhilarating, and really not all difficult. I had come to conclude that though a car would have been appreciated, it really wasn't all that necessary. Seems that I had forgotten the joys of having a car; which, during my latest trip to Nelson, I was reminded of...

New conclusion: Camping with a car definitely has it's perks! Here are a few of them:

• You can carry a canoe atop it
• You can hide your food in it, and sleep without fear of bears
• Actually, you can put all your stuff in it, and sleep without fear of rain getting everything soaked
• You don't have a sore back from carrying all your stuff around with out all the time
• You can justify bringing a pillow camping to yourself
• You can have a cooler and ice, so you actually can have milk, cheese, and cold beer!
• Liberty! If there's a road, you can go there! No fear in the mornings as to whether you can find a spot to sleep for the night
• You can carry 5 books for a 2 night camping trip, no sweat!

So, for my next cross country camping trip (I'd like to go West - East across Canada and then East - West across the States), I'd like to have a volkswagen camper in tow... which means, I need to try to get that driver's license!

Dream car: A Volkswagen Hybrid Camper Car [Notice the background and the surfboards!]

So... can I come to Nelson with you?

While taking on "soon to become" routine bike ride to Stanley Park yesterday, I turned to Chelsea and asked, quite casually, and a bit jokingly, "So... can I come to Nelson with you?"

Then, a couple hours later, I bought a plane ticket from Nelson to Vancouver for next Saturday!

There are a few reasons that I decided to tag along on this trip: first and foremost, I want to be surrounded by nature once more, but also... I'm already tired of math and I'm attracted to the idea of paddling a canoe, sleeping in a tent, visiting a trailer park, getting out of the city, and just being spontaneous and taking advantage of the fact that I'm young and really don't have any responsibilities tying me down!

Today, we bought tickets from Vancouver to Nelson (11 hours by bus...), and talked about this whole thing until I became quite excited about the whole situation. Wednesday, 6:35pm, we'll be leaving the Coquitlam bus depot, going on an adventure; Saturday, 16:54pm, I'll be arriving in Vancouver airport, hopefully energized... and ready for a good night's sleep!

Family Time

Last Thursday night, I was lucky enough to go to a family supper, out here in Vancouver! My uncle Greg was in Canada because of the superior medical abilities of our maritime doctors, and he had a layover in Vancouver (on his way back to Japan), so he was staying at my great aunt and uncle's. My grandmother from Victoria will be setting off on an Alaskan cruise tomorrow, and she decided to fly in early in order to see my uncle as well. So all five of us ended up eating some yummy Chinese food, before going back to my great aunt and uncle's for cake (Greg and Grandma's birthdays are in a few weeks) and ice cream. I'm also very happy to report that Grandma is staying with me, and it's a lot of fun to visit Vancouver with her!

Before moving out here, I never really considered myself a "family person". I mean, I've always enjoyed Christmas gatherings, and I love my parents and brother, of course, but being raised in North America always made me think I was more individualistic than anything else. But then I moved to Vancouver, and though I'm still in Canada, at times I feel very far from family. There seems to be something strangely comforting in being surrounded by people with the same nose or, in my case, with the same cheeks! So I guess that absence does make the heart fonder, at least where family is concerned!