Mounties, maple leaves & bears

HERE we are in British Columbia, Canada!

Been doing looooads of things, can't believe we've only been here a week. It feels like a month or something.. Right now I'm writing from a little old wood cabin,perched on the edge of an ocean inlet in the town of Tofino, out on Vancouver Island.. We found a friend from the UK (James, a kiwi) was back living out here for the 2nd summer in a row, chefing at a fab restaurant in town.. So we jumped a ferry yesterday from Vancouver and have come to stay for a week.. It's insane out here, the back deck is basically in the water especially at high tide, & the cabin is what you imagine when you think of a log cabin in the woods. Totally authentic - we're absolutely LOVIN it! Black bears, cougars, orcas (killer whales) and grey whales have all been spotted in this area. I keep looking out the window hoping to see a killer whale swim past!! Bliss..

BUT Vancouver though, turned out to be a little different from our expectations. The hostel we went to the first night was right down town & over the first 4 days that we stayed there we saw more crack & heroin addicts, prostitutes, alcoholics and generally aggressive people than we've ever seen in our whole lives.. Vancouver has done a brilliant job keeping this side quiet!!

ON the positive side - we walked for miles around the city the first few days & saw the beautiful Stanley Park, walked the seawall all the way around to English Bay and then on to the 'cool' beach area Kitsilano..I think it was about 15 miles in the end and we were sunburnt and so tired! Started drinking beers along the way and got quite trollied by the end and had to stumble our way back to the city.. hehe. Day 2 we hired bikes & took them on the ferry over to the north shore to check out other areas to live.. Rode for hours then came back over the Lionsgate Bridge back to the city & managed to ride in to a street called East Hastings & in to an area that had on both sides of the road, no joke, about 1000 homeless drug-addicted zombies, prostitutes doin business down alleys & more syringes & shooting up than you ever want to see. It shocked us so much our whole opinion of this place is a little shattered.. There's definitely a huge problem here. Locals have told us that because of the mild winters, this is the only area in Canada where a homeless person can survive the winter so they have all ended up there.. and it's weird because people are living in flash places right there in the neighbouring suburbs. I guess you just stop noticing it.. ?

ANYHOO, we decided that we'd like to be based outside of the city, so are looking at new options. Whistler is one, there's a little CBD and with the 2010 winter olympics coming, there's lot happening there. There's even a few puter programming co's who are interested to talk to Rich, and other agencies that I could get work through..

So, will see what turns up! Gonna go up to Whistler from 21 - 28th July to check it out.. Who knows where we'll end up?!! I suppose that's half the fun ;o) exciting times...

PEACE ROCKS
Nic