Forest and foreshore

We all slept rather better, and opted for the all-you-can-eat breakfast in the Irish pub attached to the hotel. This set us up well for a walk around Stanley Park, a forest area to the north west of central Vancouver. It has apparently the longest uninterrupted shoreline path in the world, and is heavily used by cyclists and inline skaters. This we discovered after being nearly run down by cyclists because we were walking in the cycle path. Lesson learned. The walk started at the slightly famous Sylvia Hotel, an old (by local standards) building encased in wistaria.

The route took in stunning views of bulk carrier ships and piles of solid sulphur on the dockside opposite, while floatplanes did a brisk trade in joy rides from the harbour. Information boards explained what sea life we might have seen 100 years ago before the waterway was industrialised. We had to content ourselves with the usual cormorants and gulls. However the display of totem poles, mostly quite recently carved (in 1987) was most impressive.

Thoughts turned to lunch, which we took in a restaurant in remarkable gardens. Even at this late season we ate outside, despite a few raindrops at the end. After this, further walking was indicated, and we struck inland to the wonderful forest. It's never far from a road, yet always looks primeval, with young trees growing from the rotting remains of big old fallen ones.

We took a taxi back to the hotel, where Charlotte was faced with packing for her return flight to the UK. After last night's anguish ("I can't fit everything in"), somehow the bags were closed. We all made our way to the airport for a tearful farewell - she will be sorely missed, and has been great company and a source of expertise for wildlife and the blog!  We are not sure how we are going to cope!  We end the day trying to pack our bags to a different protocol which brings new issues and we just hope we can be ready for 05:30 tomorrow to catch the Rocky Mountaineer train.