We got up early. Really really early - like 3:30 AM took my last home shower to wake up a bit before we traveled.
We got to the airport about 4:15 - the counter didnt even open until 4:30. Finally we got our tickets - checked our bags and got through security. Got on the plane and flew to Atlanta in about 27 mins of air time.
We got into the airport and headed to the concorse with our connecting flight. There we saw the Budweiser brewhouse, but Jon wanted to get his friend in Vancouver some cigarettes from the duty free store. We headed down to the last concourse to visit the duty free shop. Kimberly found a Starbucks and decided she needed a coffee. We got that then went to find the duty free shop. Prices were fair in there. Jon got his friend a 200 pack of cigs. Then we returned to budwieser which wasnt actually fully open, however they did have an overpriced omlette station open, so we ate some omlettes.
Next we headed on over to the gate where we ran into a bunch of the family. Seemed like half the plane belonged to our family.
First thing I noticed when I sat down was that my seat screen was in a never ending kernel panic - while most of the other screens were blank, so I figured no big deal they all seem broken. Well that was NOT the case. Just as soon as they announced they would be showing a video, almost all the screens started booting up, while mine just stayed with the never ending kernel panic. ( and kept with that for the next 5.5 hours )
We watched a couple movies on Kimberly's screen - starting with 'Drillbit Taylor' and then 'definitely maybe'.
We landed in Vancouver, and went through customs - which seems to have neglected to stamp either of our passports. Then we exited out into the lobby got about $60 changed to canadian $. We got out to the front of the airport and stood there debating the best way to get Jon, Teri, Kimberly, and I to our two different hotels.
After figuring some rates we decided to get a limo, which speedily took Kimberly and I to the Sutton Place Hotel. We got out and the limo left to take Jon and Teri to their hotel.
Our hotel was pretty fancy. As soon as we got out of the limo they guys grabbed our bags and put them on a kart. We went and got checked in - which took no time at all, so then our guy directed us to our room 821. The room was pretty fancy.
We got settled a bit and then decided we should go down to chinatown and look around - maybe get some lunch.
So we started out walking down toward the bay (north) and then took a right turn down hastings street. Everything was going pretty good until we walked out of the "nice" part of town into the less nice part of town. Kimberly saw some people doing drugs and stuff. We finally got down to the street we were supposed to turn down to get to chinatown and a guy walks up next to us, holds up a gallon size (or whatever size they are in canada) ziplock and says "what do you guys think ? I just bought this for 3 dollars) -- it was a good size bag full of weed. He kinda showed it off a minute as he walked along with us, and then we diverged paths. We walked around china town a bit, we went into some of the open air markets and looked at the spices. We went into a grocery store type market deal and got Karin some ramen noodles in a Chinese looking package. While we were checking out we asked the lady -- who didnt speak much english -- where was a good place to eat. She asked us what we liked. We tried to explain we had not really had real Chinese food, just American version of Chinese food, and we did not know what exactly we might like. So she finally directed us across and down the street to HON's House of noodle. We walked in and it looked promising. It had kind of a cafeteria layout with big tables and chairs, the sign said to please wait to be seated, and spend your US dollars here.
We waited to be seated and we got seated next to an old Chinese lady whom was eating soup with chop sticks -- how on earth she was eating soup with chop sticks I cannot begin to explain, but she was doing it and it was just neat.
We inspected the menu for a good long time and an older waitress came by to ask what we wanted, again we explained not knowing anything about real chinese food. Basically she said you (pointed to Kimberly) want this one (pointed to item on menu) and you (pointed to me) want this one (pointed to another item on menu) ... We ordered those items and they were GREAT. Kimberly got sweet and sour Mango pork, I got black pepper chicken. It was all delicious.
We walked around a bit after we were done eating. We went to the Chinese Heritage Museum (which had lots of pictures, and a calligraphy exhibit upstairs) and walked through the gardens, all very pretty, and neat.
Finally we headed back down to our hotel. Stopped by a drug store to pick up a few items since I had conveniently left my TSA liquids bag sitting on the counter in the bathroom at the house when we left.
We had arranged to meet up with Jon and Teri, and Corey and Nadia for dinner. We walked around the hotel a bit to kill some time before then. We say that there was a free wine tasting on the wine merchant part of the hotel. So we swung through there where they sampled us about 4 glasses of wine for free ( thats like a half bottle each or some thing...) We both liked the "Conundrum" brand white that they were serving. They were charging a steep $39 a bottle (at least we both felt that it was steep...) ((seems the
website MSRP is $24 a bottle))
Finally we meet up with Jon and Teri, and we go down to the Steamhouse brewery to eat. Kimberly and I ordered a pitcher of their witbier, while Jon, Teri, and Corey decided to take on the "Tower of Beer" -- A 3 liter massive vessel of beer - it even had its own tap.
Kimberly and I - still kinda full from the excellent Chinese food decided to get an order of Nachos to eat. It was huge.
We ordered up a 2nd pitcher of beer - probably not necessary. We eventually got it all consumed though.
It was a fun evening, and an interesting brewery. Reminded me alot of our own Downtown Grill and Brewery.
Our new Canadian friends got us safely delivered back to our hotel, and we pretty much called it a night since it was about 10 PM local time I think, which was like 1 AM our time, so we had been going for about 22 hours at this point. Tired...
