Arriving at Vancouver Airport was a bit strange. The flight from Whitehorse to Vancouver was in a reasonably crowded Canadair jet, so there were presumably about 50-60 people onboard, but everyone else seemed to have a connecting flight, so when I went to the baggage carousel, I was the only person standing there, which never happened to me before.
After ten minutes, the baggage carousel started, disgorged a single bag and stopped again. It felt a bit like getting an exclusive treatment, but on the other hand, the situation was somewhat eerie.
This was my second visit to Vancouver and my first visit was a long time ago (18 years earlier, to be exact). But at least there were still curious squirrels in Stanley Park.
There were also squirrels near the Capilano Suspension Bridge.
The Capilano Suspension Bridge and the area around it was a bit of a disappointment. But that might have to do a lot with the fact that I visited it at the end of the trip - at the beginning, it might have been exciting.
Essentially the attractions there are the suspension bridge itself and a 'Treetops adventure'. The other attractions like the 'Canyon lookout', the 'Living Forest', the 'First Nations' Cultural Center' or the 'Totem Park' seem more like add-ons to fill up space in the tourist brochures.
But the Capilano Suspension Bridge suffers a lot from being a minor attraction that tries to sell itself as a big one. Actually it's quite well done and nicely integrated into its forest setting. And I understand that keeping it going and pristine while not damaging the forest itself is costly. But then there are lots of suspension bridges around the world which are just part of the path and which you can just cross without paying anything. And crossing a bridge and walking along a wooden path (albeit above the ground) just seems not be worth 30 C$. So while just the bridge and the tree walk would be a fun experience for, let's say 10 C$, adding some pseudo-attractions, cafe, gift shop and 'life-size photomurals', doesn't really make it worth three times that amount. (What the place really needed was a flying fox / zip line across the chasm. I would have gladly paid another 50 C$ for that...)
But at least the place gave me a good laugh.
At the entrance of the 'Treetops adventure' was the following sign:
When I did see that sign I laughed out rather loudly (drawing a couple of confused looks from people in the vicinity). But it demonstrates why my perception of this place suffered from visiting it at the end of the vacation.
Only a couple of days earlier, I had been squeezing through a crack in an iceberg and camping on the frozen Beaufort Sea, sleeping in an unheated tent at -17°C, with 30 dogs outside. And I had considered that a nice and friendly environment. ('Extreme nature' would probably start with a blizzard at -40°C.) So calling a well maintained path in a patch of fir forest in the suburbs of Vancouver 'Extreme Nature' just seemed very, very silly. (But probably wouldn't have at the beginning of the trip.)
And while the treetop walk was sort of nice, there wasn't really much to see, since it was quite a bit low for being a 'treetop' walk. While the walkways are (supposedly) 30 meters above the ground, they reach only about to a third of the trees, so you can't look across the treetops, but see about as much of the forest as you would see from the ground level.
So the best thing about the place is probably the view of a nearby waterfall...
Much better value for a lower price of admission: The World of Science
It may not be extreme nature, but the exhibits are quite clever.
Next day it was time to visit the Aquarium. I had been there on my visit eighteen years ago, so maybe the beluga whales were even the same animals that I had seen back then. (Though probably not. While they have a whale at the aquarium that is 38 years old and two that are 19 years old, it's most likely that the whale shown is either Qila (who wasn't born back then or Aurora, who would have been a small, greyish whale back then and not the pure white whale on the picture.)
But be that as it may, one beluga whale that I clearly hadn't seen before was Tiqa, who was less than a year old and still looks mostly grey.
It was fun watching the whale 'herding' seagulls. There's a small 'island' in the beluga whale pool, which two seagulls had taken as a resting place. The whale seemed to be quite curious and then approached the seagulls from one side until it started to move away. Once it did so, the whale came up from the front, causing the seagull to move back to the side. So the whale approached from the side again, making the seagull move again... Except being annoyed, the seagulls were quite cool about it, just moving when the whale got really close. They try to fly away, just moved a couple of steps aside when the whale came up too close.
Something else I hadn't seen before were the dolphins. Back in 1991 the pool had contained orcas. So unless they had lost a lot of weight and bleached their backs, they are no more orcas at Vancouver Aquarium.
The aquarium also has a nicely lit presentation of jellyfish.
Before heading home, I also did a 'harbour cruise' of the Burrard Inlet, which had sightings of a few harbour seals (expected, since they usually lounge around at that spot) and a Bald Eagle (which is common in that area, but isn't quite as predictably seen).
