Day 10 - July 19, 2010 11

July 19, 2010
11:59 PM

Next stop, Nanaimo.

We woke up and breakfasted again at our Vancouver hotel. Our server was an extremely friendly older lady who remembered us from the day before and treated us incredibly well. We packed up, checked out and went to do a few things we wanted to do before moving on to Nanaimo.

We visited China town. It was extremely authentic looking. In a small perhaps 4 by 4 block area you got the feeling you had been transported to an entirely different city. It included everything including an outdoor market with live fish being quartered while you wait. A movie called Fringe was being filmed in the same area.

We then drove a few more blocks and were in gas town. This was a warehouse looking district reminding us of Old Market Square in Winnipeg.

Next we once again went to Stanley park to check out the aquarium. Due to the length of the line to get in, and our needing to move on, we decided to skip the aquarium on this trip.

Next down to Horseshoe Bay to catch the Ferry to Nanaimo. We arrived at 1:20 and were told we would make the 3:10 ferry. We waited listening to music and generally resting until 3:10.

We got on the ferry and explored the 2 passenger decks during the ride over. The ferry we fully equipped with a couple of restaurants, a video games are for the kids and both a fully enclosed and a sun deck for passengers. I was surprised with the speed that vehicles were load and unloaded from the ferry. The BC government has added a naturalist talk to each of the ferry rides. She was an animated speaker to told about many of the animals in the Georgia Strait. Very interesting.

We arrived in Nanaimo and searched out a hotel since we had not done a pre-booking. We then decided that a swim was in order before supper.

Based on advice from the front desk person we drove 10 minutes or so north to a lake called Westwood. This was an extremely
clear lake which got deep quickly. The water was surprisingly warm and there was a floating dock. We all had great fun swimming and diving until 8:30 or so.

We then got a general feel of Nanaimo by driving around looking for a place to have supper. We were feeling uninspired so B decided to pick the number 21. We would go to the 21st restaurant listed on the GPS for the area. This worked out well as the food was excellent at Little Georges.

We have arranged an extra night's stay in Tafino (our next destination). We will be leaving first thing in the morning to drive to Tafino.