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greenbagjosh · 1 year

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Vancouver and Chilliwack April 2003

22 - 24 April 2003

Hi everyone! This weekend 20 years ago, I visited Vancouver, BC, Canada, for the second time. I spent two nights in Vancouver's Davie district, sort of west of downtown Vancouver. It was also the first time I rented a car on my own, in a foreign country.

Salut à tout le monde! Ce week-end, il y a 20 ans, j'ai visité Vancouver, BC, Canada, pour la deuxième fois. J'ai passé deux nuits dans le quartier Davie de Vancouver, un peu à l'ouest du centre-ville de Vancouver. C'était aussi la première fois que je louais une voiture par moi-même, dans un pays étranger.

I flew on Friday 22nd April from SFO airport's Terminal 3 by United Airlines. I had booked a first class seat with a 500 mile coupon. The flight took off about 5 PM nonstop to Vancouver. I think I arrived about 8 PM. When I landed, it was in the US terminal where prechecks going back take place. I had to go through Canadian customs. They asked their nosy questions similar to the last time I was there, April 2002. I was admitted into Canada, then I went to baggage claim and retrieved my suitcase. I went through the "Nothing to declare" green lane.

Once I retrieved my suitcase, I went to the Hertz car rental desk. They had my car ready. It was a 2003 Oldsmobile Alero (in Europe this was sold as the Chevrolet Alero). This one had a 3.4 liter V6 engine, 4 speed automatic transmission, and an AM/FM/CD player radio. I did not really need a map for the most part, as I had been to the youth hostel on Thurlow and Burnaby Streets once before. Parking it would be a challenge, but the hospital nearby had parking.

I drove up Grant McConachie Way to Granville Street. After Granville Island, BC route 99 split off into Howe and Seymour Streets. I went northeast on Seymour Street, to Davie Street and turned left. I went to Thurlow Street and turned left, then turned onto Burnaby Street. Back then, there was no plan to build what is known as the Canada Line. I noticed that some of the signals, that had flashing green signals, which meant mainly the same thing as a steady green. When the light was to change, there would be four seconds of steady green before the light went yellow. When the red cycle was over, the light would flash green again and repeat the cycle as necessary. That is something that happens in British Columbia, I have not seen that in other provinces in Canada.

I checked into the hostel, and deposited my bags in my room. I had a single room, right next to the elevator. My room was not ensuite, there was a shared bathroom down the hall. I had to park the car at St. Paul's Hospital. The car park allowed long term parking, so it was okay to park there overnight. Parking in Vancouver is much more difficult that most cities in the USA. I think it was about $20 US to park for two nights. Once I parked the car, I walked to Thurlow Street, then Davie, and to Bute Street. I remembered Hamburger Mary's (now it is called Mary's on Davie), so I went there. I thought about going to Denny's but I passed on that. In Canada, the apostrophe of Denny's is the red maple leaf. McDonald's has something similar in its corporate logo, with a red leaf in the center. I ordered a large hamburger but was unable to eat it all for some reason. I left enough fries as well. The waiter gave me a hinge container, I think a 9 by 6 by 3 inches (22 by 15 by 8 cm) and I took my food to the hostel. The hostel had a communal walk-in refrigerator, and they provided a permanent marker to mark whose food belonged to whom, and what their checkout date was. If there was food in the refrigerator and the guest had already checked out, it was put on a special rack for "free food". The hostel did not provide breakfast back then, so people had to cook their own. After I went to my room, I went to sleep. It was not high season, so it was fairly easy to fall asleep.

On Saturday 23rd April, I woke up, took a shower, went down to the kitchen to collect my hamburger and fries, then walked to the hospital to get the car. I stopped at a Blenz coffee shop, to get some coffee. Blenz is a coffee chain in British Columbia similar to Starbuck's, has few, if any, locations outside of British Columbia. I drove along Davie Street to Denman Street, up BC route 99 to Stanley Park Drive and the totem poles. The previous year, 2002, I had visited the Indigenous Art Museum at University of British Columbia where they had a massive collection of totem poles. The ones at Stanley Park were okay, not particularly spectactular. I liked the view of the Vancouver skyline better. I was able to see Canada Place across the harbor. The weather was nice then. I bought a few gifts for my family at the gift shop. I finished my hamburger, fries and coffee before driving onwards.

After leaving Stanley Park on the north side of the island, I went north on the Lions Gate Bridge to North Vancouver. I ended up in the Capilano Indian Reserve. I turned right on Marine Drive and drove east on Third Street and eventually Main Street. I crossed back into Vancouver by the Trans Canada Highway route 1 which went through Burnaby and Abbotsford. The speed limit was 100 km/h. All highway distances were in metric. After Abbotsford, the speed limit increased to 110 km/h. I planned to go only as far as Chilliwack. Chilliwack was named from the indigenous word Ts'elxweyeqw. The highway was very nice. I played a CD in the CD player. It was mostly of music I had recorded from November 2002, including a few German songs. It felt odd to play German music in Canada.

Once I arrived in Chilliwack, it looked very similar to a small town in the USA, with the main difference being, instead of the Stars and Stripes, it was two red rectangles, and a big red maple leaf on top of the white rectangle. I stopped at the McDonald's on Luckakuck Way, and ordered a hamburger and a small Coke. The hamburger tasted just like the ones I had in the USA. I drove to downtown Chilliwack and wanted to see the murals. One of them stood out to me and it was the decades from 1930 to 1990 or so.

About 2 PM, I drove west on the Trans Canada highway to Vancouver, turning off at Hastings and driving on to St. Paul's Hospital to park again. I walked to the hostel and asked for a day pass. They sold me one for $8.00. I went to the Shoppers Drug Mart, nearby and bought a 2 liter bottle of Sprite Ice. Sprite Ice is basically Sprite with mint flavoring. I rode on the line 6 to Seymour Street, transferred to the line 4 or line 7, and went to the Granville Skytrain station. Back then, Skytrain did not have fare gates. Skytrain stations Granville and Burrard, both have the eastbound platform on the lower level and westbound platform at the upper level. I took the Skytrain to Gastown, which would require a walk from the Waterfront station. I walked a few blocks along Water Street to the whistling steam clock. I watched the clock strike 3 PM. I wish at the time, that I had a working video camera. That would not happen until a year later.

I walked to the Victory Square Cenotaph at Victory Square, and drank some of the Sprite Ice from the bottle that I had in my bag. I walked down Cambie Street and BC route 1A to the Stadium-Chinatown Skytrain station. I took the Millenium Line to Loughheed Town Center. I remember the Millenium line only went as far as Braid, but on 31st August, the line was expanded to Commercial/Broadway. I spent about an hour in the Town Center. It was not much more different than the average shopping mall in the USA.

Due to its location, it was hard to accurately keep track of time, and the sun set later than in California. I took the Skytrain from Loughheed Town Center to Granville, took a bus to Robson Street and then fou a place to eat for supper. It was a Japanese curry restaurant. I ordered a donkatsu curry with udon noodles. It tasted excellent. I had a bubble tea, I think, matcha flavored. Then I walked back to the hostel.

When I was at the hostel, I took my radio and recorded some music. The radio I had was not the Aiwa HS-JS 479 that I brought the previous year, but it was a portable one with digital tuning and 2 inch / 5 cm speakers. Its cassette playback had the "Q-Sound" function to play prerecorded cassettes. I recorded some French and also some English programming. On one of the French stations, I recorded "Tous les palmiers" by the Quebec band Beau Dommage, and "Un homme et une femme" by some unknown duo, definitely not the original ones from the 1960s, definitely not Mireille Mathieu either. I went to bed soon after that.

Sunday the 24th April, I had to wake up and get breakfast. I had a coffee and pastry at Blenz Coffee on Davie Street. Then I checked out of the hostel, took my luggage to the car, and drove south on Granville Road to the airport. However there was one problem. I needed to fill up the tank, and I was not able to find a reliable gas station. I had to drive to Richmond, just a little south of the airport, to find some place that sold gas. Gas in Canada is more expensive than it is in the USA, and is sold by the liter. I drove along Number 2 Road, then Francis Road to Number 1 Road and found a Petro Canada station. I put in about 20 liters, which was not bad for a V6 and maybe 200 km of driving. I drove back to the airport and checked in the car. I noticed a few totem poles before going into the airport terminal.

Checking into my flight to Seattle and then San Francisco, I was not allowed to hand in my checked bag until I cleared the USA customs. I had to give my passport at customs before dropping my bag off. After dropping my bag off, I went to the gift shop and bought some salmon and maple syrup. The flight to Seattle was on an Embraer E120 twin propeller plane. It would be about an hour away from Seattle, and land in Concourse N. I would not need to collect my bag until I arrived at San Francisco airport. I would have to wait until about 2 PM to board the flight for San Francisco.

At 1:30 PM, the flight to San Francisco would board. I had an economy class seat. The flight home was not too long. I arrived about 5 PM. Somehow the flight had misplaced my checked bag, so I had to fill out a form for them to deliver my luggage to my home. I took the Line 292 back to Hillsdale and Norfolk Street in San Mateo, and walk the rest of the way home. It was not too far to walk. It must have been 7 PM when I arrived home. I made some supper, probably spaghetti or something, watched some TV and went to bed.

The next day I drove to work, worked from 7 AM to about 4 PM. I had some maple sugar candies to share with colleagues. My suitcase did turn up at home, a little bit after I had left work for the day.

My next overseas journey would be in late July 2003. Hope you will join me then!

Also, in May 2003, my car (at the time it was a 1997 Jetta with diesel engine) was all paid off and thus free of finance, and I received the title, what a nice early 31st birthday present.

Good night! Bonne nuit!

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sentinelchicken · 2 years

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Got to check off a box on my avgeek card on this current work trip by finally getting to ride one of the rarest Boeing 737 variants currently in US commercial service, the 737-900. It was on Seattle-Spokane run. ⁣ ⁣ The Boeing 737-900 should not be confused with the more common (and better performing) 737-900ER. Only 52 737-900s were built, less than the 737-600 (of which 69 were built). Alaska launched the 737-900 program in 1997 with orders for 10 aircraft with a first flight on 3 August 2000 and first delivery to Alaska Airlines 15 May 2001. ⁣ ⁣ Compared to the 737-800, the -900 has a 5 ft 2 in/1.57m fuselage plug ahead of the wing and a 3 foot 6 in/1.07m plug aft of the wing. Though stretched, the -900 has the same exit configuration as the 737-800 and is thus limited to the same number of maximum passengers as the -800, 189. ⁣ ⁣ Why was this? ⁣ ⁣ The original idea was to get the same number of passengers as the 737-800 but with more legroom as a minimal change derivative, but changes in the airline marketplace have meant that capacity was more important than comfort. Alaska’s -900s can only do ¾ of the way transcon and can’t do West Coast-Hawaii. They are now used primarily for trunk routes that don’t require range, like SEA-GEG, I was on a near-full flight. The European inclusive tour operators drove the design of the -900ER as they wanted better performance and more capacity. Alaska has 12 737-900s, I was on N303AS. ⁣ ⁣ By comparison (as of 2Q2022), Alaska has 77 -900ERs, 57 -800s, 23 MAX9s, and 14 -700s. ⁣ ⁣ #avgeek #aviation #airlines #aircraft #planeporn #SEA #Seattle #GEG #Spokane #SeaTac #Washington #airport #planespotting #instaplane ⁣ ⁣ #Boeing #737 #Alaska #AlaskaAirlines #N303AS⁣ #instagramaviation #splendid_transport #instaaviation #aviationlovers #aviationphotography #flight ⁣ ⁣ #AvGeeksAero #AvgeekSchoolofKnowledge #AvGeekNation (at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport) https://www.instagram.com/p/Ce2ackMLYlS/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

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