More walking...

We were attempting to be out the door nice and early this morning, maybe 11am, to climb up Grouse Mountain on a trail known as The Grouse Grind. This is meant to be a gruelling climb up the mountain which is supposedly like climbing up stairs for 2 hours (the fact that it's only a 3km track might give you an idea of how steep it is!). We got ourselves all pumped up for this extreme experience, we had our backpacks with water, lunch, hats and jackets and were ready to bounce out the door when Whit went to turn off the computer. She accidentally scrolled down on the webpage and their lay some words in fine red print that stopped us in our tracks. 'The trail is currently in full closure for the winter.' So that kind of hindered our leaving the house a bit.

Instead we decided upon another day of some epic walking. No buses for us! After some quality salt and vinegar chip devouring/Sense and Sensibility viewing we took a walk to MEC (Mountain Equipment Co-op). This was a rather eye opening yet devastating visit. Walking through the city block sized store, we couldn't help but notice how everything was hundreds of dollars cheaper than it would be in Australia even if it was on sale! I nearly cried.

On the upside Whitaker bought a sleeping bag for a well spent $140 dollars...plus tax of course.

By the time we got home we'd clocked over 4km and it was 3.30pm. Last night Jute had told us that New Moon (the new movie of the twilight series) was being filmed at a school 'around the corner'. This we would come to realise was a 4.5 km trek each way. Unaware of this we again set off for a test of our physical limits (I refer here to that little mountainous bike ride around Saltspring Island you may have read about). On the way we took a walk down Commercial Drive which is full of shops and places to eat. The best of which we found to be the $1 store, where absolutely everything is $1! Including Mars Bars, Snickers, Kit Kats, shampoo, colgate toothpaste, EVERYTHING. So we've planned a shopping trip there tomorrow to stock up on all the important stuff (mainly candy bars). We quickly regretted leaving our wallets at home for this particular walk.

After an hour we finally reached the school, although there weren't the tents and vans that Jute had mentioned, it was a thursday afternoon after all... but we did still have a look around the school. It is set right near the Vancouver mountains which provide a pretty epic backdrop to the place. I don't know how the students there get any work done.

So then came the walk home. It was 5.45pm by this point and we were both fairly sick of walking and pretty eager for some dinner. I proposed we try and be home by 6.30 which Issy swore wasn't going to happen but we set off at a very swift pace unwilling to try shortcuts as we had no phone or money, or sense of where we were, past the few streets we had walked to get there. After nearly collapsing on the walk and fantasising about food, Edward Cullen and not having to walk anymore, we stumbled across Windsor st (our street!). We had 5 minutes to reach home by our deadline of 6.30pm so we broke into a run and sprinted down the street. Amelia was walking into the house at the same time that we ran into view and looked a little confused as we huffed our way through the gate and collapsed in the house. By now they understood our reluctance for paying for buses, so no questions were asked.

Hi, Whit here. Alex is just having a shower so I'm finishing up. After our solid 13k day we had a delicious BBQ meal of hamburgers and chicken wings to refill the tank. Alex and I are in awe of the wonderful Canadian hospitality we continue to recieve... though I suppose Jute and Meels are technically Aussies... but either way we are super lucky and very grateful!
Catch you all tomorrow for my Canadian birthday!!

Here are the photos:

Christening the new sleeping bag

A busy Vancouver intersection... complete with mountains

Alex and I tried to be subtle taking a picture of the Twilight school, so we took this picture first

Templeton Senior School, where the Twilight film was made!!

Alex in front of TSS

Me putting my Hedgren bag to good use!! Thank you Andersons