Danielle is Here!!!!

No sooner had Matt left us, then our next visitor arrived!!! Danielle! Hence such a hectic last few weeks! Awesome though!!!! She flew in on friday, and we whisked her off to a BBQ at Kate's....taking advantage of the hot weather! This was perhaps a little ambitious, and poor Danielle did her best.....but conversing when you have jetlag and have been up for over 24 hours is not the best, so we soon headed home and got her to bed! For most of her time here Danielle amused herself, walking miles to see all the sites of the city and enjoying the amazing summer weather! I was at work most days, so we met every evening for meals in a variety of restaurants, and walks along the shore to see the sunset! Mark proved a great tour guide too and took her site seeing on the weekend! (including for the typically Canadian pancake breakfast!!!) Tuesday brought my days off, so we excitedly decided to hit the shops girlie style! We didn't quite make it though....we ate far toooo much for breakfast, and it was too hot!!!!! we ended up meeting Darth Vader, and drinking cocktails in Moxies before heading home!!! Wednesday was much more lively! We were up very early as we had a whole day's site seeing to achieve! From start to finish it was excellent! We popped into a local shop for flipflops....as you do....and ended up spending hours in there, trying on almost everything and feeling like princesses....it was very pretty womenesque!!! The assistant was lovely! We returned home to change and deposit our purchases then headed out a little later than planned to start our site seeing!!! We went to Lighthouse Park, and wandered through the forest and down to the rocky shore for our 3pm lunch! Lovely! Then it was back on the bus and over to Capilano Suspension Bridge....this took us over an hour, and we had to change buses 3 times....but the drivers were very friendly and helpful and we made it in the end!!!! We had such fun at the bridge, filling in our passports to show where we had been, doing the treetop walk, and listening to a chinese woman that started singing....amazing! We purchased some fudge and returned to the bus stop to head up Grouse Mountain....by now the time being around 8pm! We waited 45 minutes for our bus, and amused ourselves eating our fudge!!! It was a glorious sunset and a gorgeous evening.....and the view of the city was breath-taking! Grouse Mountain was also very interesting...the snow now starting to melt, and where i had skied only a month before, was gravel and grass! Some snow remained though, and after falling in with my flipflops we put on our trainers!!!! The bears were out of hibernation, and we saw one which looked like it really had just woken up....it was amazing! We then headed inside for tea...determined to eat, even though we had filled up on fudge!!!! We got the last gondola down, and ended up sharing a taxi to the seabus terminal with a french man (as the busses had stopped!!!!). Then seabus home! We were absolutely shattered, but what an excellent day!!!! Danielle then headed off to Victoria for a few days, returning friday for a last look at Vancouver! Sunday we were up very early to get her to the Rocky Mountaineer station for her trainride to Banff - 5:30am!!!!! We had a great time though, waiting for the train, taking pictures and generally laughing!!!! I think Danielle lowered the average age on the train by a few decades, but she would be looked after for sure! I was standing outside the train to wave her off and managed to get noticed by quite a few train guards......i think that is the way to do it girls!!! When the train left i ran alongside waving, much to everyone's amusement...until i reached all the staff on the platform waving flags as the train passed.....i stopped there and joined them! I think i will be in many people's holiday albums as everyone on the train was taking pictures of us!!!! hehehehehehe It was lovely having Danielle here, we had a really nice time, she did loads and we had some lovely girlie chats! We also made lots of plans for when I get home!!!! She is now in the Rocky Mountains, and i hope having just as much fun!!!! FOR SURE!!! - Canadian phrase!) Oh, and i learnt how to take black and white pictures on my camera, Danielle fell in love with margaritas, and we carried paper shopping bags!!! xxxxxx