Monday - September 15, 2014
Sob! Today is the day we get off the ship - which is always a sad, sad day. It was also a sad, sad day because my dad totally lost his mind and woke my ass up around 6 am to see the sunrise. Uh...I'm on vacation. I'm not going into the office. I don't have to get up so I can fight the crowds for a delicious cronut. I don't have an appointment anywhere. There's no fire. There were also no cinnamon rolls or french toast waiting for me...so why am I up at the butt crack of dawn? Literally. Because he saw the sky pinken and wanted to share this moment with the family. My brother grumbled incoherently, rolled over and continued to drool on his pillow. I sat up bleary eyed and was like...hell no. Except then I saw Lions Gate Bridge. I don't actually know anything about this bridge other than the fact that other people like to take photos of it during sail away, so even though I was freakishly tired (because we stayed up until close to 2 am still trying to finish packing up odds and ends) I crawled out of bed, put on a robe and shuffled out to our balcony with massively bad bed head to take photos of the bridge.
By the way, the ship ended up turning in such a way that we couldn't see the sun rise anyway. Crap. But I got pretty good photos of the bridge!
On we passed the bridge, I toddled my way inside and crawled back into my warm bed. Because a body was not made to be up at ungodly hours such as this. But even though I was tired, I couldn't fall back asleep, so I sat up in bed and used the zoom on my camera (because I'm a lazy ass and didn't feel like getting out of bed again) to take a few photos of us pulling into Canada Place.
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| here's my dad watching it from inside our room. Because it was cold outside and those robes are thin! |
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| I see Canada Place! |
And we arrive (sob! - there was a lot of sobbing today. Just on the inside though). We ordered room service for 7 am today. Why? Because we didn't know if we'd see Randy (our butler) to give him his tip, so we figured we'd definitely see him if we ordered breakfast. This was my dad's idea. It wasn't a bad one - we got to see him, thank him, give him his tip, and we got breakfast delivered to our room. We sat in our room and watched TV waiting to disembark. We booked a city tour that was suppose to pick us up at 9 am, so we figured we'd get off the ship at 8:30 am.
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| breakfast is here! |
Once again my brother ordered breakfast - and once again, he ordered the same thing. But that's okay, because I like eggs, cheese, and fatty meat.
After we eat, we (I) decide to get one more group shot of the four of us in our room. Who knows when the next time all four of us can meet for a vacation would be? I'm fortunate to only live 30 miles from my parents and see them all the time, but Raymond works in China and only comes back for the holidays and whatever layovers he can squeeze out of business trips - so having all of us in one location is a precious, precious thing.
When it hits 8:30 am, we prepare to disembark. Our friends come and meet us at our room and backpacks in hand, we go down to deck 6 to exit the ship. That is, until we saw the lines. Uh...apparently a lot of people want to get off the ship at 8:30 - so we head over to the Windjammer where Leah the concierge is. Also - a perfect time to tip her! She radios people and she walks all of us to the front of the line to get off the ship - so we were fortunate enough to skip all the lines and basically just hop off the ship. And because the VIP luggage section was RIGHT there, we grabbed out suitcases and looked for a place to sit to wait for our tour guide since it was only like, 8:40 am.
I booked a Mandarin speaking guide (who's also fluent in English, because he spoke to Raymond and I in English and the parents in Mandarin) through Tours by Locals. We had booked rooms at the Hyatt Regency and check in wasn't until 4 pm. I didn't know what we were going to do with ourselves for 8 hours, and since none of us had visited Vancouver since the mid-80's, I thought a city tour would be a good way to while away the time and also to become oriented to the city. And uh, get a ride since we had a gazillion suitcases.
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| our gazillion suitcases. Yes, they're all ours (sob! - see, lots of sobbing) |
Well...they wouldn't all fit into Eddy's minivan if we wanted people on the tour as well, so he took Raymond and I along with all the luggage to the Hyatt (which was literally a few blocks away. Totally walkable...without luggage) where we checked in (our rooms were actually available too. I don't know if it's because I booked a regency club room or because I'm a platinum member), had them drop the luggage off in our rooms and we took off back to the pier to pick up the rest of our people and begin our tour.
It was...okay. It was kind of pricey, about $300 for the 6 of us. He did take us to many places in Vancouver. He took us up the mountain near $5 million dollar homes to see a pretty awesome view of Vancouver. We drove through Stanley Park and hit the major sights, stopped at Gastown for some photos, drove through Chinatown, and spent an hour at the Granville Island Public Market for lunch and for us to buy some snacks and stroll around.
Stanley Park (and views from Stanley Park):
The view from the $5 million dollar mansions!
Lunch at Granville Island:
I liked Granville Island - I know it's touristy, but it's kitschy and charming. Also, the produce looked amazing. It was also amazingly expensive. The pastries looked soooo good, but after lunch (eh) and gelato (yum), I couldn't fit in anymore (sob).
We ate in the food court. While the parents ALL got udon (except Aunt Grace, who got rice instead) - they saw the Asian food stand and made a beeline over delirious with happiness (that was, until they tasted it. Very average. And they submerged the tempura in the soup and it got soggy. Soggy tempura = no bueno) whereas Raymond went in search of Mexican food (in Vancouver. Yes he did) and I settled on calamari and chips because come on, fried food is magical. Well, this wasn't magical. It wasn't bad, it was just blah. I wished I had a bottle of sriracha because it was quite bland. But my mom and Aunt Grace ate all the fries because I'm not a big fry eater. My brother, he was sad about his burrito. I guess growing up in So Cal spoils you rotten when it comes to Mexican food - because he said the burrito made him sad. I don't think it was bad, it just wasn't authentic. But we're in Vancouver, land of dim sum; we're not in Santa Ana, which is like little Mexico.
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| amazingly tasteless calamari and chips...$12. |
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| burritos for people who've never had burritos before...$11. |
We wandered around the market after eating. Then we wandered out and took some photos that's what you do when you're a tourist.
And we travel to Gastown:
Where we can see our ship! Hello NCL Sun! Have you forgotten about us yet?
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| and we can sorta kinda see our room (that's no longer our room - more sobbing) |
After a drive through of Chinatown, which looks just like every other hokey Chinatown where no real Chinese people live anymore, we were dropped off at our hotel. I think if we did it again, I probably would have rented a car instead - a car for 2 days with $40/night parking probably wouldn't have been more than the $300 we paid. And we would have had some flexibility. Also, our rooms were ready SOOO early, so we could've just gone to our rooms at 9 am and all napped or rested (I know, we just got up too, but we're lazy people here) and then gone out and seen the city. But alas, hindsight is 20/20 - and I can't say I regretted the tour because we met a nice guy and we went to a few places we probably would've been too lazy and complacent to explore on our own.
How did I end up picking the Hyatt Regency? Easy. It was the only Hyatt in town. I'm a platinum member and I have their credit card - which means every year I get an anniversary night for a category 4 or lower. Fortuitously, the Hyatt Regency Vancouver is a category 3 - which means I not only got to use my free night, but I had the points for three MORE nights. And since they are not a believer in beds for real sized people (in what world can a room with 2 full size beds fit FOUR people??), I used my points and my free anniversary night to book 2 rooms for 2 nights. And took advantage of their e-standby upgrade option for the club rooms for an extra $50/night per room. So for two nights in two regency club rooms, I paid about $200. Which I think is a pretty good deal. Why upgrade to the regency club? The rooms are nicer (supposedly), it's on a higher floor so you have a better shot of a view (and it's less noisy, because this hotel has thin walls. I think I read some reviews that lower rooms hear all the street noise), and dude...the club. It has a pretty damn good continental breakfast (I really liked the breakfasts) - unlimited coffee...and the good kind. The fancy coffee machine that can spit out coffee, decaf, lattes, mochaccinos, cappuccinos, and hot cocoa AND juices in the fridge, beer/wine selections (for those who drink, which was wasted on us because none of us do - or can really), sodas, bottled water, and snacks. Lots of snacks. There are trail mixes, nuts, cookies, crackers and fruit. From 5-8 they serve a light meal. The first night there was bacon wrapped scallops, bread and cheese, prosciutto, and other goodness. The second night there was shrimp gyoza and more cheese and meat selections. From 8-10 they serve dessert. We didn't make dessert the second night, but the first night they had lemon tarts and carrot cake. Yum! Considering that we usually spend $4-5 per latte, and that we are caffeine addicts who must ingest no less than 3-4 coffee drinks a day (sometimes uh, more like 5-6), drink A LOT of water and like to eat...a lot - I thought it was worth the money. We fully took advantage of it. :-D
Funny elevator system. You press which floor you're going to and it tells you which elevator to take. I guess so you don't stop at 8 floors. Though we did once stop off at 5 different floors.
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| elevators on our floor |
We got two rooms. Raymond and I stayed in the room with the 2 full beds and my parents stayed in a room with one king bed. You don't know how luxurious this was after the last two weeks! Not that staying in our penthouse was hard...but the space was still limited. And we slept on tiny beds. And we were getting butt raped for wifi! So it was nice to spread out our crap since it was just the two of us and to flop onto each of our big full size beds and have only 2 people share a bathroom - as not sexy as this bathroom was compared to the one we had on the ship.
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| The view out of our window. If you really really look hard - you can see the ocean! We have a water view! (sort of) |
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| the view from the balcony of the regency club a floor below |
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| hanging out in the regency club for an afternoon snack |
After having a snack, I went to our room and threw myself on the bed. Raymond and I both ingested our crack - coffee and wifi and LIVE TV. I started working on this blog (the cruise portion) and Raymond went out shopping because he's a fashionista like that. Fortunately for him, the hotel's only a few blocks from the shops on Robson Street, so he was very happy.
After shopping for about an hour, he got tired and came back and talked me into going downstairs to look for a snack (he didn't have to do a whole lot of convincing) and we saw a table full of deliciousness...but we knew we were still going out to dinner later, so we restrained ourselves (sort of) and shared a plate of goodies.
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| our plate of goodies. Cheese. And meat. Mmm... |
After snacking, we went back to our room where we watched the Eagles and Colts game until my parents decided to go out for dinner. When we left our room it was 6 to 20 Colts (I think), when we got to the restaurant and sat down for dinner, it was 13 to 20. As we were eating our sashimi, we watched the Colts get their asses kicked in a game we thought they had in the bag. Oy.
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| dad's ramen |
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| our sushi and rolls from the set dinner. This included the miso soup and edamame as well |
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| mom's dinner. She didn't enjoy the weird shrimp dish on the bottom right. She said it was kinda sour. |
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| Raymond and I each got one of these dishes. I have no idea what it was, but it was good. |
We ate. And ate. And ate. And I had to plead with my dad to help me finish my meal (oh, the shame). But did this stop us from going to the lounge to take a gander at dessert? Please - nothing stops my fat ass from getting dessert. We each got a slice of carrot cake and a little lemon tart and of course, decaf because it's like, illegal to have sweets without coffee (okay, not really - but why not?). Being that I couldn't quite stuff that in right then, I laid on the bed, fooled around on my laptop and watched TV for awhile before we decided it was time for dessert.
We ended the day satiated on sweets and sleeping on big ass beds with down comforters while watching Seth Meyers. Not a bad way to end a day, even if we were no longer on a cruise ship.
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