Vancouver to Toronto

After weeks of talking about it i've finally decided to plan an very rough route from Vancouver to Toronto. No one knows who'll make the final 7 (or if we'll get another car), or what we'll be buying/renting, but tell me what you think of the route and we'll work the rest from there.

The miles are based on a 2 year old Road Map and they didnt give you distances interstate so some of them are a wild guess :)

Day 1. Vancouver, BC to Banff, AB
Highway 1 - 550miles

Day 2. Banff, AB to Calgary, AB to Glacier National Park, MT
Highways 2 and 5 - 200miles

Day 3. Glacier National Park, MT to Bozeman, MT
Highways 89, 15, 90 - 350miles

Day 4. Bozeman, MT to Yellowstone National Park, MT
Highway 89 - 80 miles

Day 5. Yellowstone National Park, MT to Mount Rushmore, SD
Highway 212 - 450 miles

Day 6. Mount Rushmore, SD to Sioux Falls, SD
Highway 90 - 330 miles

Day 7. Sioux Falls, SD to Des Moines, IA
Highways 29 and 80 - 300 miles

Day 8. Des Moines, IA to Iowa City, IA
Highway 80 - 114 miles

Day 9. Iowa City, IA to Chicago, IL
Highway 88 - 210 Miles

Day 10. Chicago, IL

Day 11. Chicago, IL to Indianapolis, IN
Highway 65 - 180 miles

Day 12. Indianapolis, IN to Fort Wayne, IN
Highway 69 - 128 miles

Day 13. Fort Wayne, IN to Cleveland, OH
Highways 24 and 80 - 250 miles

Day 14. Cleveland, OH to Niagra Falls, NY
Highway 90 - 250 miles

Day 15. Niagra falls, NY to Albany, NY
Highway 90 - 300 miles

Day 16. Albany, NY to Boston, MA
Highway 90 - 180 miles

Day 17. Boston, MA to Cape Cod, MA
Highway 6 - 70 miles

Day 18. Cape Cod, MA to Montreal, QU
Highways 6, 93, 91 - 250 miles

Day 19. Montreal, QU

Day 20. Montreal, QU to Ottawa, QU
Highway 417 - 120 miles

Day 21. Ottowa, QU to Toronto, ON
Highway 201 - 230 miles

Day 22. Toronto, ON

Day 23. Toronto, ON to New York, NY
BUS $50

Day 24. New York, NY

Day 25. New York, NY

Day 26. New York, NY to Seattle, WA to Vancouver, BC
FLIGHT $150, BUS $40

Total cost including spending money, accomodation, rental, flights and car should be about $2,500 Canadian.

Simon

Daniel Sedin...

Yesterday Ellie and I went to vancouver's only Swedish bakery, and who did we run in to other than Vancouver Canucks left winger Daniel Sedin! He's part of the Swedish Sedin twin combination so it makes sence for him to be sat outside a Swedish bakery. Ellie and Dan (as we like to call him) chatted for a few minutes while I stared into space trying to pick up the odd word. He seemed a top bloke tho, and we felt honoured at meeting the hockey equivilent of Phil Neville. Next week im off to Ikea in search of Sven Goran Eriksson.

Soccer? Pah! Thats not what we call it round here mate

As part of our ongoing cultural exchange, myself and a 8 strong army of Brits decended upon West Point Grey Community Centre for a good old fashioned game of football. Of course, from the 20 or so players about 15 were Brits, its what you expect, we did invent the game after all. Infact, if you include the swedish guy and a girl who was quite possibly spanish there were probably only 3 real life Canadians present. But in a departure from our usual ways we decided to mingle with the multinational crowd, before testing out our physical, long ball, Greham Taylor style of play. They all seemed to be good lads except for a few exceptions, i'm sure we'll enjoy the run around every week. Better still, my local "Darby's" give 2 for 1 pitchers of beer for sports teams, excellent.

I'll leave you with this message from the Iraqi Information Minister:

Not much to report

But before I start here's the quote of the day from none other than Mr Thomas Owen of Cornwall:

"To the United States two hundred miles is no distance but to britain it is a long way, whereas two hundred years is a long time in the US and no time at all in Britain" - very true

Another one along the same lines from Ted a Canadian I worked with at the shaughnessy restaurant:

"I was in York visiting York Minster when some American guy said, 'woah that building is really old, is it pre War?' A nearby Englishman said, it's pre America!" - true story

Anyway whats happening in Vancouver...Not much really! Back to working 35hours at *$'s coffee shop and back on the look out for bar jobs. The lads have started playing football every tuesday night which is a laugh except the canadians make you play with hockey goals and only let you on the pitch for 7mins at a time, fools! Its good fun tho.

(the Vancouver Kings Head Inn (not shown here)

Went to a couple of good pubs this week including the Kings Head Inn, an english theme pub complete with english beer such as Becks, Stella Artois and Kokanee. Ok not particularly english then but good all the same. Elwoods and the legion also get a notable mention.

And for good measure I'll leave you with a photo from Tofino stolen from Gavin's webpage:

(the four in Tofino, prizes for naming who's who)

Simon

I would drive 500 miles...

Well, i just got back from a driving holiday to Vancouver Island and it was great! After a long december it was nice to get away for a couple days and see some more of BC. And like the proclaimers we too drove (not walked thatd be silly) 500 miles (but not 500 more).

Myself, Gavin and Paul were the designated drivers, with Andrew and Becca the tag alongs :) We started the journey by renting a 1998 3.5L V-6 145HP Ford Taurus. The car was pretty fun to drive and a bit of an all round beast! This thing was about as wide as 2 nissan micras which made inner city driving fun! We set off from downtown Vancouver and boarded the ferry..

(our car)

The ferry ride went pretty smoothly and we even took time to explore the luxurious "sun deck"

(me trying to look nautical and holding on so I wasn't blown overboard)

We arrived at the port city of Nanaimo, this place is pretty much your standard port, and as the locals told us there was nothing good there we drove straight through on our way to the tiny town of Tofino in the North West of the Island. The roads were really fun mountainous trails with "Slow down!" signs around every turn. Amusingly, we thought we had a duff map that only featured the major roads until we realized there are no other roads of Vancouver Island. Once we reached Portville there were only two possible destinations, which meant not even we could get lost (on the way there at least).

(The middle of nowheresville, still time for a quick leak [Andrew] and a fag [Gavin] though)

We arrived at the hostel in Tofino before the light faded and were supprised by the standard of the place. It was spotless, there was a sauna, free pool and table football, and even a lovely fake log fire overlooking the pacific. Not bad for $21 a night. The main reason to go to Tofino is to see Long Beach (they also have short beach, small beach and big beach imaginatively). But after an hour and a half of driving country lanes in the dark we could only find "The Wickaninnish Inn at the Point". Ah well, at least they had a little beach for us to run around on

(Not one of Canada's best known landmarks)

We then retired for a quick game of pool and an early night

(some of us went for earlier nights than others)

We got up at 6am (actually I dragged them up) and set sail (drove) to Amphitrite Point Lighthouse and walked a little of the Wild Pacific Trail

(it seemed funny at the time :) )

(anyone fancy a swim?)

We did manage to get some great pictures of the lighthouse and the pacific. The storms at sea are pretty violent and hugely impressive to watch.

We then set out in search of long beach and when we found it we werent disappointed. The beach is too vast to even see the other side and we even went for a wade in the water. The pacific ocean is pretty cold in January :)

After this we set off for the long drive to Victoria, capital of British Columbia. To be honest, we were all pretty exhausted by the trip so only stayed in Victoria for a couple of hours. We found it pretty boring but I'd like to go back in the summer perhaps and give it a second chance. It seemed like it was trying to be England, we even had afternoon tea and scones (i had 6 cups, excellent).

(English style tea shop complete with those funny horse shoe things you find in pubs and pictures of the royal family)

(Random pictures of Victoria)

We then took the car home on the ferry and said our goodbyes to the Island

(The car, not as cramped as it looks here)

It just goes to show how different it is in Canada. We drove 500miles/800km which is the majority of the length of England, but in Canadian terms this is a small trip, we only covered about 20% of the length of our province, BC! It was lots of fun tho and hopefully theyll be plenty more adventures to come, next up, California with Ellie, I can't wait!

Simon

Happy new year!

So here's some photos from Christmas...

Bull Junior and Senior have a game of darts before being beaten by the unbeatable S.I. combination who recorded their first victory in 3 months that day.

the gang

Did you hear the one about the Englishman and the Scotsman?

Everyone was so drunk in this picture that Gavin still appears upside down in our minds