Lynn Canyon

I signed up for the suspension bridge for the spouse tour. I met so many wonderful ladies on the trip. I heard there were 3,000 men in vancouver for the convention and 2,000 of their  wives roaming the city. I met one on this trip by the name of Karen from Ontario Canada. Her and her husband go snowshoeing in the winter in a bird sanctuary in her area. She was my kind of lady! She could appreciate the great outdoors with me.

Stanley Park

We stayed at the Westin which was on the edge of Stanley park. We were about 20 walking minutes away from the Convention Center and about a 5 minute walk to enter Stanley park.
Stanley is a 1000 acre park that had a few restaurants and horse carriage rides. You could rent a bike and take trails through Stanley or take the trail that led around the perimeter of Vancouver. There were two trails side by side. One for bikers and one for walkers and runners. We saw many dogs out walking with their owners. Only 1/2 of them were on leashes. They didn't stray.

One of the neat things about Vancouver is you could have the best of both worlds. You could be hiking thick in the evergreen forest on Grouse Mountain or in the city in 20 minutes.

Granville Island Farmers Market

We got to Granville kinda late that night. They were going to close at 7:00. So we walked around and found this little play area where you could feed the ducks and let your little ones play. By this time, every little kid we saw reminded us of how much we missed our boys. What I liked about this little area was that they had a coffee shop right beside it. What a perfect pair. Mom gets coffee and little kids can play.  The market was BEAUTIFUL. I bought Indian eggplants and teeny tiny little limes. They were so little they were the size of grapes.

This is the bridge that was above a nice resteraunt we ate dinner at. We ate seafood alot. It never failed their were always prawns and clam chowder on every menu we saw. John ate clam chowder 4 times that week I think. The best was at Ivan's in Seattle.

















How is this for choices. I think I would have a hard time deciding, it all looked wonderful.

vancouver 2011 Convention Center

This is the Convention Center that housed the Winter Olympics in 2010. It was where John had his meetings during the day and then a couple of gatherings at night. At lunch time, the guys were released to go. There would be a waive of men flooding up the escalator right around noon. I met John a couple of times and we hit a sushi place, which I was told by a local that I had to try before I went home. And she was right. It was the best sushi I had ever had. What I appreciated about Vancouver was their attempts to be environmentally responsible. The roof of the building was green, as were many others in town.

vancouver 2011

I describe Vancouver as a city of glass. With the tall glass building set on a back drop of water it appeared glasslike on a cloudy day. It was amazing the cloudy day didn't effect their mood. They were still out walking and jogging like I would see on a bright and sunny day here.
It was very clean and the people were so kind. I didn't miss the sarcasm I hear daily in America. Or the rolling of the eyes when something doesn't go exactly how they wanted it to go. Or when someone is taking longer then what they thought for something I didn't hear the impatience from the person behind. Lets just say I think we have lost something and experiencing another way was refreshing!

Brain Plasticity

Excuse me people but this stuff is so interesting. All of the following taken from Infants, Children, and adolescents. by Laua E. Berk pg 170

"In the first few years, the brain is highly plastic"

"Brain injuries that occured in infancy show fewer cognitive impairments than adults who recieve later-occuring injuries in adulthood."

"Animal research reveals that pasticity is greatest while the brain is forming many new synapses; it declines during synaptic pruning."