Birch Bay and Vancouver

Birch Bay

Sally and Tom are on the move again. With our time up at Deception Pass State Park, we are now traveling for the month of July. Our trip is planned around some personal activities. The first of those activities is to go north to Vancouver British Columbia. This is an old haunt, as Sally worked there for a year once. We moved the RV to a small town called Birch Bay (which is on Birch Bay.) It is quaint. The residences remind us of Florida in the sixties and seventies, before the big condo boom. As we toured closer to the border with Canada, we did notice that development has begun to replace the quaintness.

Not replaced yet - bakery and ice cream at the heart of Birch Bay

Speaking of the border, just north of Birch Bay is a town called Blaine Washington. T is a major highway crossing for Canada and the U. S. It is also the home of the Peace Arch, a monument celebrating the joint friendship of the two countries. It was dedicated just after World War Two. The park there is beautiful, with flowers, statues and the Arch itself.

Peace Arch Park - in both both Washington and BC

The Arch - right on the border

We took the train up to Vancouver on the 3rd of July. The first day of the month is Canada Day, so we were trying to avoid the crowds moving on that day, and came back on the 4th. We thought by the time we got back things would be settled. The train moves along the ocean front. Luckily we made our reservations in time to get the ocean side on the trip, both ways. The arms of the Pacific are filled with glorious views.

All aboard!

Vancouver is a beautiful city. It is in the midst of an upgrade for the 2010 Winter Olympics. It serves as Canada’s West Coast hub for financial centers, utilities, shipping and tourism. It is a major cruise ship embarkation center. Whale watching, glaciers and other interesting nature scenes can be observed on an “inside passage” cruise. The inside passage refers to deep waterways protected from the wave action of the Pacific Ocean. Islands and reefs block the turbulence caused by weather on the ocean. We did not anticipate so many people taking the train up to Vancouver for their cruises, but it created an interesting mix of people with which to travel. The hotel where we stayed the night was also full of cruise line folks. (You can tell them by the amount of baggage they carry.) Friday is a transition day for the cruises, so we had people coming and going.

House boats in the harbor in Vancouver

Under construction

Two of our planned stops were for eating (of course). Rodney’s Oyster House was (and is) a favorite of ours. They have fresh seafood and a wait staff that has a lot of personality. Sally had scallops prepared in a potato crust and Tom had raw oysters from different areas. Some of his oysters were from Prince Edward Island, Vancouver Island and Washington State. We made an event of afternoon/evening, staying there for over and hour and half chatting with locals (one said Tom has a great American accent) and the wait staff.

At the bar in Rodney's

We came back to the hotel and used the amenities there, the whirlpool, steam room, sauna and pool. We relaxed right on into a comfortable evening. The next morning we walked around the waterfront and enjoyed looking at the boats. We have entertained the thought of a house boat (notice the pictures) as a place to move into if we hit the lottery. It is ok to dream.

The other restaurant we planned to stop at is a Japanese spot close to the hotel. It is here that Sally discovered she could order her own sushi. It is a lunch favorite in town. After the meal, we still had a few hours to wait on the train, so we decided to take in a movie. We haven’t been to a cinema theater since Maine, two years ago. We saw Get Smart. Having seen the TV show and read the reviews, our expectations we pretty low, but it was the only movie that fit into our time table. We were pleasantly surprised and enjoyed the movie, but we recommend waiting for the DVD. It should translate well to the TV screen.

The trip home on the train was enjoyable. It takes about two hours to travel from Vancouver to Bellingham, our destination. We like the train over air flight because you can spread out. The seats are wider and the leg room is tremendous. We had some small children on the ride home. There was ample room for them to play without interfering with anyone else. There is a dining/snack car with food and drink and tables. You can walk the aisles to loosen up. We are for high speed trains.

We returned to the motor home about eight thirty. We saw along our route many people preparing for fire works displays. The area here is dry, so the only fire works allowed are on the water or on the beach. Birch Bay does not have a community fire works show, but they allow individuals to produce their own. And produce they do. We think that several individuals are contesting with each other for the better display. The fire works started about nine and ran until mid-night. Some people spent huge amounts of money. We are about a half a mile from the beach, yet we could see the “rockets” glare over the tree tops. It was quite a spectacle.

A very low tide in Birch Bay

This post was long, but we seemed to have really filled our few days here. Tomorrow we move, maybe we can rest, who knows. Let us hear from you. Remember to look up and behind you occasionally, you never know what you’ll see.