Tag: hike

Sunshine Coast, BC

Place 91 – Sep 14 to Sep 18 2021: Sunshine Coast, BC ðŸ‡¨ðŸ‡¦

Kim & Curtis Hale

Day 1

We’re back! Hello! We went on a little trip to Sunshine Coast for Curtis’ birthday. You can read about it here.

On Tuesday 14th September, in the evening, we drove out to Horseshoe Bay to catch a ferry out to Sunshine Coast. Whilst it is not an island, it’s technically connected, there’s no other way to get there without a boat, so we took the ferry.

The ferry arrived late, but that didn’t make much difference to us, other than the fact we were hungry!

There weren’t many people on the boat, so it was quick and easy to get ourselves some food. We ate that and then the ride was pretty much over. (it’s only 40 minutes).

We drove off the boat and drove on to our first accomodation, which was a cute little cabin!

Here’s a low quality video of the cabin!

When we arrived, the cabin was incredibly cold as the windows were open, but after a bit of time with the fire on it got nice and toasty. We arrived fairly late, so once we got settled we watched a little bit of TV before sleeping.

Here’s another low quality video of the cabin!

Day 2

We woke up in the awesome cabin and drove down to Gibsons for a spot of breakfast.

We got a breakfast bagel each from a cafe there. The staff were wonderful (and one was British!) which made it a very nice experience.

Once we had our breakfast, we had heard that people were filming down the street for a holiday film! We went down to check that out, but not much was happening at the time, other than there being some fake snow on the floor.

We walked around Gibsons for a bit as there was a nice little marina area and the sun was shining!

After walking for a bit, we found a park to go to for a hike/walk!

We drove to Cliff Gilker Park where it said there were waterfalls and hiking trails, which sounded perfect.

The walk was through the forest with nice big trees and some really nice little wooden bridges!

We saw the waterfall, but it wasn’t really much of a waterfall, but still peaceful.

We walked around here for quite a while, mostly to just find all the bridges…we love bridges!

Once we left here, we drove to a petting zoo to let some animals, but unfortunately it was closed on that day, so we turned around and drove to something nearby that we found, called Robert’s Creek Pier.

Robert’s Creek is a small town with some nice little buildings that we looked at and when we went down to the pier we nearly got blown over it was so windy!

Wind!

We drove back to the cabin and had a look online for some places to get food and also a look for other things to do whilst we were in the area.

We eventually found a place for dinner, which was a Mexican place. Luckily, they were able to seat us once we got there (they were very busy!) And we grabbed ourselves some pretty tasty Mexican food!

We went back to the cabin and watched a bit of TV and relaxed.

Whilst relaxing, we heard some noises outside, so we checked and sure enough, it was a BEAR! We saw him right next to our cabin trying to get at the bins, but we think he scared himself away when he knocked over the bin.

It was our first time seeing a bear in the wild and it was pretty large and right outside!

Day 3 – Curtis’ Birthday!

We woke up, got ready and left the cabin to grab some breakfast.

We went to a cafe (after a bit of back and forth between two) and managed to get a seat. It was pretty small and busy!

We had to wait 45 minutes for our food, which seemed pretty long, and when we got the food it was…Alright. It looked good but wasn’t incredible. Curtis had a smoked salmon and dill cream eggs benedict whilst Kim had a breakfast bowl.

We left here and tried to go to a few cool looking spots with nice views, hikes and waterfalls, but they all seemed to be closed for some reason!

We ended up finding a park near the new cabin we were moving to, so we sat there for a bit and stared into the water.

We checked in to the new cabin and it was not quite as we thought. It looked like a cabin, but was pretty large. It was quite dark and just not as good as we hoped. But it did look cool!

Looks cool outside, right?

We relaxed for a bit once we got in. The weather had started to deteriate, which we knew was going to happen, so we prepared to just hunker down and do very little.

Kim found a really nice brewery called Batch44 and we headed there for some drinks and dinner. Kim also found out there was a quiz, so we entered that and didalright! We weren’t last, which is a win!

We headed back to the cabin and got some really good sleep.

Day 4

It was raining all day, so we just slept and stayed in, watching some TV and playing card games.

We went and got pizza for dinner. Nothing fancy but a bit of a tradition for lazy days!

There was a large wind/rain storm which blew over a power line! This caused us to have an outage and, as the power line was laying on the only bit of road in/out of the town, we were stuck in the dark!

We were able to get some candles from a neighbour and we spent the night playing cards and chatting. It was kinda nice, in a way.

We didn’t get too cold and headed to bed. We were however awoken around 02:00 when the power came back on! But we were glad that was able to get sorted.

Day 5 – The Final Day

We woke up and got some breakfast at a diner style place and then looked for something to do before we needed to catch our boat.

We found somewhere called secret beach (it was sign posted, so not very secret!) And we had a wander around on the beach and the logs that were on there.

Pretty nice place!

Kim found a nice rope swing and had some fun on that!

We took the ferry home and drove back. It seemed to take far less time!

We got home and made some dinner and then it was time for Curtis to play hockey. He’s finished his 3rd game now and is really enjoying being back out there on the ice.

Curtis has a goal and two assists already, all of which came from the last game!

And there we have it!

That was our sunshine coast trip. We hope you enjoyed having a blog to read again. We had some fun times and we were excited to share it with you.

Maybe we’ll have some other fun stuff coming up at some point, but we hope everyone is well.

Mr And Mrs Hale

Advertisement
Courtenay,BC

Place 89 – Day 1: Courtenay, BC🇨🇦 – Forbidden Plateau & ‘Medicine Bowls’

Kim & Curtis Hale

Forbidden Plateau

We work up at a good time again and Kim went out to get us breakfast.

We ate our breakfast and slowly got ready and managed to head out around 11:00.

We drove out to Forbidden Plateau which took us about 1 hour and 30 mins.

Forbidden Plateau used to be a ski resort but now it’s a short hike which allows everyone to get a great view of the water and surrounding areas. It was really quite beautiful!

‘Medicine Bowls’

We drove back down the road we came and took a sharp left to head down towards medicine bowls. This is a small waterfall with rock pools that people jump into and also just swim in. We didn’t have much interest in doing either, because it’s cold and jumping in is scary, but we walked to take a look.

We parked up in a safe location as, unless you have a truck, it’s not possible to drive the entire way there.

We walked for about 20 minutes to make it to the pools. There was a little hike involved but it was beautiful!

We really, really enjoyed this area! We were there for way longer than we expected but we just enjoyed looking at the water, sitting down and relaxing and just enjoying the quiet.

We walked back to the car and saw someone try and drive through the part just beyond where we parked where it was not really possible to drive and they scraped/damaged the bottom of their car!

Beer & Snacks

We drove form here to the nearby town Courtenay, where we had actually been before when we visited Comox in the winter a couple of years ago. We got ourselves a beer at a brewery and relaxed.

We left there and walked to a restaurant to get a quick snack. The snack turned into a huge meal and we really didn’t want that much food. We ate what we could and then we drove back to the hotel, which took about 1 hour 10 minutes.

We were tired, as expected, so we relaxed for a bit at the hotel and then went out to get some snacks and drinks for the evening.

We leave this area tomorrow and head out to a new area to do very little, though!

This Time Last Year

Mr And Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 981: Vancouver, BC – Four Lakes Hike & Cat Lake

Kim & Curtis Hale

We woke up at a decent time, slowly got ourselves ready, packed up and jumped in the car for a day of adventuring!

We drove up to Squamish to do a hike which takes you around to 4 different lakes. Overall, this was about 2 hours and about 5.5km. We really liked getting back out there and doing a hike, and managed to get down to a very cold river, too!

We made sure to keep an eye out for bears and Kim also got herself a ‘stabby-jabby stick’, as she called it, to fend off bears, should she need to. She liked looking like a dad on a hike!

We finished up the beautiful, calming walk and then drove ourselves out to another lake, named Cat Lake. Kim’s friend said she was there and that we should join them, so we did.

The road to it was a service road, so it was gravel and very bumpy! Kim really enjoyed driving on it.

We got there and it was very busy, but we sat dipping our feet into the nice cool, smooth, water. Kim eventually noticed her friend and was able to say hi, but they were actually leaving so we chose to leave as well.

We drove back home which took quite a while, about 1 hour 45 minutes, and once we got home we really needed a shower!

We had our shower and ordered some tacos, then we went to get those and ate them fairly quickly.

Once we ate, we booked some places to stay to extend our holiday we have booked as bit so we can explore some cool places!

We relaxed and watched TV for the remainder of the evening.

This Time Last Year

Mr And Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day: 423 – Vancouver, BC – Murrin Provincial Park

Kim & Curtis Hale

BIG Win!

Curtis’ hockey game last night went extremely well!

His team won 7-0…And Curtis got a goal! That’s 2 points in 3 games so far. Going well!

When Curtis drove home, he managed to scrape the rear wheel arch on a pillar whilst parking back at home. We have an awkward space in our parking lot and Curtis hasn’t had much practice with it…It doesn’t really make much of a difference, and we had one on the opposite side from the person who owned it before us, so now it just matches!

Cinnamon Buns!

We had the cinnamon buns that Kim made for breakfast this morning!

They didn’t grow as much when cooking as Kim wanted, but they were still delicious, especially with the icing and strawberries that Kim made with them!

Murrin Provincial Park

We headed out once we got ready and went to Murrin Provincial Park. This place was not far from where we went last week.

This is a lake but surrounded by hiking trails, and when we got there we weren’t really sure where we were meant to go, so we just started following a trail!

The trail turned out to be a bit of a scramble, but it was really good fun! The weather has certainly got a bit colder, which is great for climbing around and hiking.

We hiked and hiked and got higher and higher until we were right at the top, with a beautiful view of the large lake!

It was pretty windy up there, so we headed down and that began our decent.

We came across some people rock climbing, which was pretty cool to see, but we tried not to distract them so we continued down.

Eventually, we got to the bottom and it was about a 1/2 hour hike in the end which felt good, but it was time for some food!

We drove up to Squamish and got a subway and a coffee (from Starbucks).

We ate our Subway and then drove on home.

Pizza!

Once we got home, we just relaxed for a while and then when we got hungry, we walked up to our local pizza place, Pizza Garden, which makes the most incredible Italian pizza, and grabbed a 4 cheese pizza from there.

It turns out, 4 cheese pizza isn’t what we usually get, so it was a little weird but still pretty tasty!

Once we ate, we watched the film Anna on Amazon Video, then played some games and watched more TV.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 409: Vancouver, BC – Shannon Falls & Porteau Cove Beach

Kim & Curtis Hale

Shannon Falls

We got up and Kim made some breakfast, and we relaxed for a short time whilst we ate this.

We got ourselves ready and hopped in the car for a 1 hour drive.

We drove up to Shannon Falls, which is almost in Whistler!

We got there and it seemed a little smokey again, which was unfortunate, but we continued anyway.

We saw the falls from the floor and from a small viewpoint and they were certainly pretty!

We continued walking towards a hiking trail, only to be stopped by a fence as the trail is closed for gondola repairs! We were going to do a nice hike, but due to this, we just left instead.

Some Beach Somewhere

Kim found a beach fairly close, so we drove onward to that as there are apparently seals there!

It took us down a strange gravel road which lead to a ‘beach’ right by some construction and logging sites!

It really wasn’t interesting at all, so we got back in the car and drove onward to another location.

Porteau Cove Beach

We drove to Porteau Cove which has a beach and a little pier. It’s mostly for people boating, but there is a beach which you can walk on.

The beach wasn’t sandy, it was just a lot of fallen trees and some rocks, but we made the most of it by walking up and down this for a very long time!

Kim climbed a large rock, only to get worried about getting down which was some entertainment for a bit, whilst she tried to get down safely (which she did!).

We got tired, hungry and thirsty, so we slowly made our way up to the car.

We drove back home and when we got back, we had some pizza and watched the film Brave.

We played some Crash Bandicoot and watched some more TV for the evening.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Whistler, BC

Place 87 – Day 3: Whistler, BC – Lost Lake, Aussie Pie & Green Lake

Kim & Curtis Hale

Breakfast

We woke up a little later today and got ourselves ready.

We went to get crepes for breakfast, which was about a 15 minute walk.

We got that and a coffee and headed back to the hotel where we ate our crepes. Kim got a chocolate and banana crepe and Curtis had a lemon curd one.

Lost Lake

We finished our breakfast and then walked down to Lost Lake.

There was a nice long walk which was fairly flat but around a beautiful lake. This was a very beautiful, relaxing and quiet walk, there weren’t many people around!

Aussie Pie

We walked this trail for a while and then got to the lake itself which was also very quiet.

We had bought a pie on the way for our walk from an Aussie pie store to have for lunch. Curtis got a steak and pepper pie and Kim got a chicken, mushroom & leek pie.

Green Lake

We ate the pie on a park bench in a very quiet area and took in the scenery.

We then kept walking the trail and accidentally just kept walking and walking through some nice scenery and eventually to Green Lake.

We actually ended up walking for 17km today, which was FAR more than we planned but it felt really good and we enjoyed it, too.

Mexican Food

We got back to the hotel and relaxed for a little and then went out to get some food.

We got some food from a Mexican place we had seen as it was actually really good!

Curtis had a bowl with pulled pork and Kim had chicken quesadillas.

Blizzard

We went out to get Kim a blizzard from DQ down the street but it was far too full so the walk back home was messy!

We watched some TV when we got back and had a few drinks.

We have a fun activity planned tomorrow and so we will be up earlier in the morning. We also have to check out tomorrow morning.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Whistler, BC

Place 87 – Day 2: Whistler, BC – Train Wreck, Rainbow Park & Birthday Dinner

Kim & Curtis Hale

Birthday Present!

Kim was excited to give Curtis his birthday present, so she did that when we woke up.

The present was a bunch of snacks from all the other countries we have lived in or will live in, so the UK, New Zealand and Norway.

Curtis loved this gift so much and is looking forward to tucking into the snacks with Kim.

Breakfast!

We woke up around 10:00 and got ourselves ready.

We then headed down to a cafe we had walked past yesterday and got ourselves some breakfast.

Kim got herself a croissant with tomato and goats cheese along with an iced caramel latte. Curtis got a breakfast wrap and a flat white.

We headed back to the hotel to eat our breakfast and then finished getting ready to go out for the day.

Train Wreck

We drove for about 10 minutes to get to the Train Wreck, which is exactly what it sounds like! This is a train wreck from the 1950s which has been used a graffiti spot for artists as well as a trick/jump spot for mountain bikers!

We walked through a forest and across a cool suspension bridge to get to the wreck and a beautiful river to boot!

We got some great photos in and around the Train Wreck and learned a little about what happened and what they are used for now.

Rainbow Park

We left the wreck and took another drive to Rainbow Park.

We didn’t spent too long here, but we walked around for a bit and took in the peacefulness of the park and the beautiful (smokey) view.

Delicious Dinner!

We went out for a dinner at 17:00 to a restaurant not far from us.

This is the first time we have been in a proper restaurant for dinner together since COVID-19 hit the world, so it was a little strange but we were outside and very distanced.

We got some wine to share and then for food Kim got duck breast whilst Curtis got some venison!

For dessert, Curtis got a lemon tart and Kim got a chocolate fondant!

This arrived with a candle and ‘happy birthday’ on it from the staff at the hotel for Curtis’ birthday, which was very kind!

We finished our food and then headed back to the hotel. It turned out that we had been our for about 8 hours, though it didn’t feel like it!

When we got back, we watched The Social Dilemma and then played some Connect 4, which was included with Curtis’ birthday present.

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 385: Vancouver, BC – Grouse Grind, Bears & Dead Battery!

Kim & Curtis Hale

Grouse Grind

We were up at 08:30 and had some egg on toast for breakfast.

After breakfast, we got ready and then Curtis went down to the drug store to get Mars bars and Red Bull.

We then left the apartment and went down to the car to drive up to Grouse Mountain!

We got to the mountain and started making our way up. The Grouse Grind is notorious for being pretty tough, with its 2000+ stairs (plus rocks to climb up etc) & 2 hour completion time!

We started the hike and saw a squirrel right away, which was a great start!

The further up we got, the more challenging it became and we did have to stop quite a few times to regain our breath and stamina.

Towards the end, we got into the clouds and could even see them moving around us.

We eventually got to the top in just 1 hour 20 minutes, which we were very happy with!

Bears!

At the top, there are a few things to do, such as food, drink, disc golf and a bear enclosure!

We obviously had to go and see the bears, so we did just that.

We spent a while looking at the bears and they were pretty active. One of them even had a bath!

Once we were done with the bears, we walked to grab a quick beer before heading down on the gondola!

The beer was perfectly refreshing and just what we needed.

After such as awesome day, we got in the distanced gondola and made our way to the bottom of the mountain.

Once we got there, there was a Starbucks, so we grabbed a coffee and went to the car.

Dead Battery

Once we got in the car, we tried to start it and nothing happened!

Turns out, the battery had died, but we hadn’t left anything on so it must have been it’s time.

We eventually found a tow company that could come and help us, but after we scheduled with them, a couple said they would help jump start us and that worked perfectly, so we cancelled the tow truck and drove to Canadian Tire to get the battery changed!

We got that booked in and had to wait about 30/40 minutes for that to be swapped over, so we did a bit of shopping.

We got a wok which we’ve wanted for a while and then went to the liquor store to get some beer for tonight, which we needed for sure!

We got our car and headed back home.

First Ever Poutine!

We showered when we got home and then ordered some food.

We wanted to try poutine for the first time, so we ordered a burger each with a side ceasar salad each and a side of poutine and some sweet potato fries.

We watched the film ‘love Guaranteed’ which wasn’t great, but was something to watch.

We played some more Tony Hawk Skateboarding and watched a bit more TV but we were very tired after our long hike!

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 378: Vancouver, BC – Capilano River Regional Park

Kim & Curtis Hale

We got up later than expected today, around 12:00, and had a great breakfast consisting of egg, hash browns, beans & cheese on toast.

We then got ourselves ready for the day, and headed out to get a coffee.

We got our coffee and went back to the car to drive up to North Vancouver.

We got to Capilano River Regional Park, after a slight wrong turn into a cemetery, and began our walk!

We walked through the trees and eventually hit the river. We got to see it from a few different angles and then we walked further into the trees!

We got to a bridge and Curtis realised that his boss was there, so we said hi to her and she gave us some tips on where to walk to.

We walked up to a viewpoint of the Cleveland Dam (which wasn’t as impressive as the Hoover Dam, which we’ve been to, by the way!) and then after that we walked through the great fur trail, which has some very old fur trees around it!

We left this area and walked up to the top of the dam, where we could see the long way down to the river and also some mountains behind the dam, which were beautiful!

We did a bit more walking and then made our way back up to the car, which was up a very steep hill!

We eventually got to the car, had a well earned drink and drove back home again.

Dinner & A Movie

Once we got home, it was food time!

We had our leftovers from yesterday, but Kim made hers a little less spicy which made it taste much better.

We watched the film Hunt For The Wilderpeople which took us back to living in New Zealand, which was awesome, and then we watched an episode of Lucifer, followed by some YouTube.

Kim had a fun thing to do tomorrow and that’s about it!

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale

Vancouver, BC

Place 72 – Day 343: Vancouver, BC – Mt Seymour Hike

Kim & Curtis Hale

Early Wake Up (For a Saturday)

We woke up at 09:00, which is early for us on a Saturday, and we got up and got ready for the long day!

We had french toast for breakfast with cheese!

Hiking!

We drove for 45 minutes up to Mt Seymour. The drive was super easy and there wasn’t much traffic.

We got parked up and the weather became very cold, as we were on a mountain, of course.

We walked to the first trail, which was to head to Mystery Lake. This was an easy hike, but with some good elevation!

We got to the lake after about an hour and sat down, just relaxing and looking at the scenery, which was a beautiful big lake!

We left here and walked up further, eventually hitting the top of a mountain! The views were stunning and we sat and had some lunch here. We had a sandwich we bought this morning from our favourite coffee shop. We managed to find snow on the way up too!

We walked down once we were done with lunch and found a small trail to go up which ended up joining the main trail. We then found out that it was a much, much longer hike to where we wanted to go, so we just hiked all the way back down to the car.

We were out for a long while, and we drove home, very warm and sweaty, but feeling accomplished.

We showered and relaxed when we got home, which was much needed!

We went up to the drug store and liquor store to get some things we needed and some drinks.

Dinner & Fire Trucks?

We put our dinner on (baked potatoes) when we got home and sat on the balcony with a beer!

We had a really nice time just relaxing outside, but it started to get a bit windy and cold, so we came back in and luckily, dinner was ready. We ate dinner and watched some TV and then for some reason, there were 4 fire trucks outside as well as 3 fire car things.

We aren’t sure what it was for as it seemed nothing really happened, but a little entertainment for us and it seemed that no-one got hurt which was good!

This Time Last Year!

Mr & Mrs Hale