22-07-2013 Monday - Quarry Rock, Downtown, Baseball game

John got up early & went for a walk out to quarry rock - had a bit of a tumble on the way.  Mick (rightly so) then gave him a lecture on the perils of going off on his own - particularly as he was having to walk through areas where there had been black bear sightings. Mick is one of a group of people who get notified if there has been a sighting of a bear and he then goes and puts up signs in that neighbourhood warning people to be extra vigilant - especially about their rubbish.  This means the bears and humans can co-exist unless one has become too used to humans and goes to attack and it then has to be put down.

Deep Cove - early in the morning.





The start of the Baden Powell walk to Quarry Rock. The tree roots are very close to the surface as Vancouver is normally quite wet (not while we have been here, so far beautiful sunshine and mid-to-high 20's each day) so the roots don't have to go too deep to get the water they need.











A picture of the "forest"/"bush"









View from Quarry Rock - with Deep Cove on the right. It was worth the blood, sweat and (tears?).














Andrew dropped us off at Longsdale Quay & we caught the Seabus over to Vancouver 'downtown'.


"Sort" of where we went - GPS was having trouble in the city.









A raft of logs in the harbour.












Part of the city from the water.




















We started off visiting the Gastown area and saw the Steam Clock which spouted steam from the top and whistled at certain times.



















The statue of "Gassy Jack" in Gastown.




















Then we moved on to "Chinatown" - The Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden





We then went to the Skytrain (like Sydney's now defunct Monorail except two tracks) platform to work out how to get to the science world.  We worked out the train on the platform was the one to catch. Steven got onto the train and Dawn was about to go through the doors when they closed and all she could do was say "Steven.......".  The funniest part was when we caught the next train going to the same final destination and were looking at the map on the train when a guy asked if we needed help and we were explaining our son had got on the train before us, he looked worried until we were able to point to Steven as we came into the station and say 'it's okay, he's a big boy'.


Telus Science World





Steven's "glowing" personality.




















Steven's close encounter with a T-Rex










The "new" animal we made:

African American Yellowtail Tarantula











Optical illusions.

The Harbour Centre - looking out on the city





Views below:

We then caught the underground train to King Edward station and walked to Nat Bailey Stadium.


We met Andrew here and went to a baseball game between Canadians & Eugene (USA)

There were quite a few 'strike-outs' but even more catches at first base as the batter ran for it- the ball can certainly move fast and even though ran fast it wasn't always enough.


A bit of excitement when the bat broke.

Ball, & bat pieces labelled (click on photo to see larger version).

"Your out of here" - he was tagged out.












The pieces of the bat being collected by the bat/ball boy.

During the play we had our own waitress - we just had to hold up menu and she came and took our order for refreshments and hot dogs (we had to order a hot dog at a baseball game!).

The final score. Canada wins 4 to 2.