Tag Archives: Vancouver

Vancouver to Seattle, Washington.

Posted on July 13, 2013 | Leave a comment

From the itinerary, “Our wonderful cruise ended at 9am as we arrived in Vancouver and hopped on a bus to take us to Seattle. We visited some special exhibits at the Century 21 Center (which I don’t remember) and took a ride up revolving Space Needle in Seattle.” I think just the restaurant revolves, but maybe we ate there (I can’t remember), I do not think the observation level revolves, I was up it a few years ago and I don’t recall the floor we were on rotating…

From my journal –

1 pm – Finally got to the motel, but one we were off the bus we found out it was the wrong one.

4:30 pm – Went to the World’s Fair grounds which was pretty dull and there wasn’t much going on [probably because the World’s Fair was decades before!]. Went up the tower (Space Needle) and took lots of shots.


Mr. Kuhn left his and Jim’s luggage back at the ship. Jim needs his luggage since it has his pills. [Jim was a guy in a wheelchair on the trip with multiple special needs, he wasn’t a senior and he wasn’t a kid.]


8 pm – Have had a headache and a sore throat but I’m feeling a little better.


9 pm – This Hotel (a Motel 6) isn’t bad for so cheap. It coast 79 cents to get a key that turns on the TV [I don’t remember that at all and I don’t think I ever saw it since]. We did get a “magic fingers” bed massage for 25 cents. No phones in the room, but I guess it does the job.

Jim and Mr. Kuhn must have gotten their luggage later but I didn’t journal that. I think Jim had the same last name as Mr. Kuhn but wasn’t a relative, or something oddly coincidental like that (maybe slightly different last names and they were related?).

Seattle Panorama July 1981

Seattle Panorama July 1981

Space Needle

Seattle Panorama July 1981

Seattle Panorama July 1981

The above are a few different panoramas of the Seattle, Washington skyline. I assume I took all of these from the Space Needle at the old World’s Fair Grounds (the middle one is of the Space Needle from the ground). These were made from scans of the slides I took on the trip and joined together with the AutoStitch Panorama app on my iPhone (although the second one from the bottom looks a tiny goofy in the middle, I wonder if these two pieces really go together). These all enlarge to huge so if you want to see more detail, just click. Obviously, the tall one in the middle is the Space Needle from ground level.

If you’re reading this post out of context, this is me re-journaling a trip to Alaska from when I was a kid. You might want to click the “trip to Alaska” link and go to the bottom and read them in order. I’m posting each entry on the same day that it happened years ago.

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To the University of British Columbia

Posted on July 5, 2013 | Leave a comment

Today we left Kamloops and headed over to Vancouver. It was a pretty normal day and I talked to my mom on the phone; multiple other days I’d made notes that I couldn’t reach her (where were you mom?!?) I probably wrote it down so I didn’t get in trouble for not calling, answering machines were still pretty new sparse back then. Plus, I helped some of the seniors with their luggage; while that was something listed as something we would do, it wasn’t an everyday thing (I even mentioned whose luggage it was).

On the way to Vancouver

Taking a break on the way to Vancouver
Taking a break on the way to Vancouver

From the trip itinerary it says we’d see Fraser Canyon, Hell’s Gate and the Alexandra Suspension bridge on the ride (but honestly I really don’t remember any of that, I’ll have to see what I have photos of).

To protect from Avalanches?
You’ve got window glare (sorry!) but I wanted to show those structures to prevent the road (or rails) from avalanches (I guess?)

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Train

We stayed at the University of British Columbia (the rent the empty dorm rooms out like a hotel) and it really made an impact on me. I liked the campus and I really liked the way that the dorms were set up. I even went over and got a course description guide while I was there.

The dorms are rented out in the summer and the rooms are really tiny ($9 adults and $7 for kids). The bonus of this was that for the first time all trip I’ve had room of my own, so this was extra enjoyable to me! I’m an only kid so sharing a room, let alone with strangers wasn’t really something I was used to.

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Walter Gage Residence at U of BC

So the way our dorm, the Walter Gage Residence, was set up was that each floor had four “wings” and each wing had eight rooms: a bathroom, a living room/kitchenette, and six small (private) bedrooms. It seemed to me the building was kind of new at the time. I even sketched up a diagram, I’ll take a photo and add it.

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The layout was great (this is one of the four wings), you had “roommates” but you had your own room and a common area. You can see the building is kind of square so the drawing isn’t to any kind of scale.

Room layout
This the single room layout and that’s the door at the top. You can tell that I really liked the room setup here, I even added the shelves and lamp.

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This is from Roger’s Pass which we would have passed through today (I think). It came in a nice sealed case.

I mentioned in my journal that I’d gotten a lot of those commemorative coins, which is what I was thinking the other day, but I think I only have three of them. I’ll have to look in other places but all of this Alaska trip stuff has been in the same box for years.

Here’s the important part: We board the ship headed to Alaska tomorrow!!!

If you’re reading this post out of context, this is me re-journaling a trip to Alaska from when I was a kid. You might want to click the “trip to Alaska” link and go to the bottom and read them in order. I’m posting each entry on the same day that it happened years ago.

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