Back to familiar territory

I woke up bright and early in a sunny Golden, but ended up still rushing to catch the bus. Even though I always feel like I'm last there are always someone that is later than I am. There are especially two ladies that, one that keeps on reminding me of Lucy Liu (but I discovered from her hands after a day or two that she probably is 20 years older than Lucy Liu, her face has been hidden behind a pair of gigantic sunglasses the whole trip that's why I didn't realize her approximately age for a while), that have been the last ones probably 70% of the time.


Older version of Lucy Liu.

We have been rotating seats moving 4 rows back every day. Today was my turn to sit in the front which was nice since I got a way better view of the mountainous area heading for Kamloops than I would have got from sitting in the back.

The first stop of the day was at Eagle Pass and Craigellachie where the Last Spike of the trans-continental railway was driven into the ground on November 7th 1885. According to the guide B.C. may have belonged to the U.S. if this connection of the two sides of the Rocky Mountains hadn't been made (true?). Not much to see really but even though a pretty cool place just because of it's history.


Eagle Pass. I don't know if you will be able to zoom in to read the information.


I'm pretending to be Hon. Donald Alexander Smith, the man who on his second attempt drove the Last Spike into the railway.


Just had to take a self portrait because of the sunshine!


Quatchi learning about his Canadian heritage.


Quatchi in the foreground and the Last Spike in the background.

We arrived in Kamloops around lunch time and made a short stop at a Ginseng factory(?)/store before having lunch. A lot of American Ginseng (different from Korean Ginseng that is much stronger) is being grown in the Kamloops area because of the favorable climate conditions there. I managed not to buy a single product even though the mints were quite tasty.


Kamloops with hills in the background.


Wall paintings! One thing I miss when I'm in Sweden among many other Canadian things of course.

I had lunch at a coffee place on the North Shore (best coffee so far on this trip, yes it even beat Starbucks coffee...which isn't too good by the way and I have never said it is very good...I just like their mugs). My treat for the day was a Nanaimo Bar. I can't recall having eaten a bought one of those since 2002 (I made them in Sweden a couple of times through the years though).


Nanaimo Bar!

While in Kamloops, where I've been a couple of times before since it's quite close to 100 Mile (I bought my prom dress in Kamloops) I got a certain eager to shout out "Yeah! I'm in Canada!" I never did though since I don't want to spend the night in a psych ward. :)

After lunch we began the familiar drive down to Vancouver. As expected we hit traffic when we got closer to Vancouver. If Stockholm has a lot of road work going on in the summer time it's nothing compared to Vancouver. Is there a single road without it here?

i got off the tour bus at Oakridge Station and had a nice visit in an Apple Store and a Bento-box for dinner before heading to the ferry terminal to catch the ferry to Megan in Victoria.

More about that later!