Monday 15th May
Our journey to Whistler from Victoria was via a bus, ferry, bus, bus and car. The weather was, yet again, glorious making for another delightful ferry crossing. In fact, it was a little too glorious. As we drove into Whistler, near 6 pm, the temperature was 31°C and our bags were packed full of clothes suitable for 6°C or thereabouts.
There was only one hiccup along this convoluted journey and it was that one of Mark’s bags didn’t make it from one bus to another. This cost us about 90 minutes and resulted in a later than desired arrival into Whistler.
There was another funny coincidence as we departed Victoria. You might recall that we had bumped into Geoff and Lorraine twice, once on a Seattle walking tour and then on the ferry crossing from Seattle to Victoria. There was a similar parallel on this crossing. As we waited, a few days ago, in the queue for the ferry from Seattle to Victoria we got chatting to 3 ladies, all originating from the Philippines who had reunited for a family trip, with one of them being from Canberra, one from California and one from Canada. I made the rather terrible faux pas of asking if they were a combo of two sisters and a mother at which they replied, with some shock and disappointment, that they were in fact three sisters. Let me tell you that immediately killed the conversation, with heads bowed all around, at which point I just wished that the Earth could open up and swallow me whole. Well, as fortune would have it, we bumped into the three of them again for the ferry crossing from Victoria to Vancouver. It was hardly surprisingly that they were not as excited by this coincidence as I was. The poor lady who I had thought was the mother, could not even bring herself to look at me. We then ended up sitting right behind them on the bus from the Vancouver ferry terminal to Vancouver airport. I’m sure they thought I was some curse that just kept following them. I don’t know who was being punished more, them or me? By the time we alighted the bus at the airport it ended up being just the five of us, marooned there. Us, without one of our bags, and them, not knowing where their hotel was. It was like some divine providence had meant that we were destined to remain together. They all finally relented to talking with me again and we eventually parted ways quite amicably. That’s my rather one but tragic coincidence story.
With our lost bag eventually recovered, we set off for the drive from Vancouver to Whistler and the scenery along our journey was spectacular. We were amazed, though, to see how much of the snow has melted in just over a week. Our apartment proved easy to find and we quickly dropped our bags and headed back out the door in search of some dinner and supplies and had a relatively early night. Our apartment block is directly opposite the marketplace which proved to be very convenient.
It was a little frustrating to see so little of the Village today but we have a tour in the morning which will hopefully tick that box.
PS: for those of you who read my previous post on Victoria you may be interested in this update. Lorraine sent me an article, via this BBC link, that you may find amusing!
Tuesday 16th May
It was yet another beautiful sunny day but, thankfully, was only forecast to reach in the low 20s rather than low 30s. The first half of the day was spent with Ryan from Whistler Valley Tours on a 3hr small group excursion through Whistler and the surrounding area. The accent gave him away immediately as Ryan just so happens to be an Aussie from Adelaide but has lived here for over 15 years and started the tour business 10 years ago.
A big claim is coming: Ryan gave one of the best guided tours we have ever been on! Lorraine and Geoff take note! He took us all around Whistler and gave us a potted history of the area dating back from the indigenous period, through the first European settlers, on to the Olympic period and up to current time and explained the logic underpinning the design of the Village. He kept everyone engaged for the whole time and spoke clearly, articulately and with passion and left us with a good understanding and deep appreciation of the area; and all within just 3 hours! This was some pretty impressive feat; and he’s from Australia! We even saw a couple of bears on our tour and Ryan informed us that there have been a lot of bears around the place this year, more so than normal, so caution on any trails or biking was required.
Some interesting bits of information we picked up on the tour:
- Whistler is named after the whistling Marmot that inhabit the area.
- Blackcomb was named by first settler Alex Philip as he thought the serrated black mountains looked like a black turkey comb.
- The population of Whistler is only 14,000 but swells to 90,000 in the peak of winter.
- The Whistler Housing Authority was initiated before the 2010 Olympics to ensure that there would be affordable housing for locals during and after the Olympics. It means that $4 million properties can be purchased for around $600,000. This enables the Village to remain populated all year around rather than with just seasonal FIFO workers.
Whereas we had felt a little confused on our arrival, with no understanding of where our apartment was in respect to the whole of Whistler Village, after Ryan’s tour we felt we had a good understanding of the whole lay of the land. I would highly recommend you take his tour if you are ever in Whistler.
We parted ways from Ryan and our small group just after midday and followed one of his many suggestions; to take a scenic walk from Blackcomb Village down through Whistler Village. It was then back at the apartment for Mark to assemble his bike and to have a short rest before we set back out to retrace some of the path from the morning tour and follow some of Ryan’s suggestions.
However, our afternoon activity was cut short, very suddenly. One suggestion Ryan had made was for a pleasant walk along a trail across a suspension bridge and out to a train wreck. We thought we would give this 1 hour round-trip trail a go and then head on to some nearby craft breweries we had been shown earlier in the day. We got about 100 m along the track which was quite densely forested and, with Ryans earlier comments about bears, I became quite scared and told Mark as much. To which he replied: don’t be stupid, there are no bears here. Well, it was only about another 50 m further along when, what do we see on the trail, but two bears AND they were running towards us!! Needless to say, that put an end to that activity and we headed straight back to the car and on to Coast Mountain Brewery where, at least, Mark got to have a calming ale. The paddle of four beers that he sampled offered up two favourites so, with these purchased in take home cans, we set off back to the apartment and for some time in the hot tub. This turned out to be very aptly named because it was too hot to get in or stay in. The flashing symbol on the non-responsive control panel read ‘OH’ which I think stood for ‘overheated’.
It was just after 6.30 pm before we headed back out again and we wandered up to the Village to find somewhere for dinner and decided on Earls which was a great option. One thing we’ve noticed in our travels, thus far, is how friendly all the young wait-staff are. They are much more engaged and chatty with customers than what we’ve experienced previously and I wonder if this merely a function of the US and Canadian tipping system? If so, it’s effective!
Wednesday 17th May
It was another glorious morning and just perfect for exploring further around Whistler, however, our experience yesterday with the bears seriously curtailed our ambitions. Mark delayed his morning cycle, so as to potentially have more cycling company on his ride, and we revised our walking/hiking plans for the day. We had wanted to do a lot of walks whilst in this part of the world; Whistler, Jasper & Banff, but have dialed this down big time and think we will have to opt for more guided activities rather than simply on our own.
Today was our last full day in Whistler as we head to Kamloops tomorrow where the temperature is forecast to be 31oC. With this in mind, we decided it was time to shed all the clothes in our bags that we had brought for the cold weather; weather that just hasn’t eventuated. There was a bit of back and forth to the post office across the road and we now have 9 kg making its way back to Australia over the next 2~3 months.
With hiking off the cards, we headed out to visit Pemberton, a 30’ drive north of Whistler. Our guide, Ryan, had told us that this was a ‘cool place to visit’ and they had this rather unique brewery called Beer Farmers. Apparently, the matriarch of the family decided she wanted to turn the family farm, which none of her offspring wanted a bar of, into a brewery so that they would all come back to the fold. The plan seems to have worked as they now have a thriving family brewery business.
We stopped first at One Mile Lake, just out of Pemberton, thinking that the relatively short 1 mile walk around the lake would be manageable from a bear point of view. I got 50m in when the vegetation density increased and refused to go any further. The memories of yesterday were too raw and I suspect will remain so for the rest of this trip.
So, back in the car and off to Pemberton we went. Our secod stop was in town at a cafe called the Mount Currie Coffee Company where we had a great coffee. I tried the Canadiano, which is a latte with maple syrup, and we both found it to be delicious and surprisingly, not too sweet. The cafe has great views across to Mount Currie but unfortunately there was a bit of fog today which hampered our vista. The brewery was about a 15 minute drive further out of town but the short trip afforded the most spectacular view as we drove through what seemed to be a narrow valley floor having steep granite mountains rising sharply at either side and would have been even more spectacular except for the annoying fog (smoke?). The brewery was picture-postcard stuff set within this valley and the surrounding mountains made a rather impressive backdrop for sitting and enjoying the various craft beers.
We then headed back to the apartment for a bit of a rest and to pack up before our last night out in Whistler. Dinner was at Carumba which was great and we’d recommend. Mark had managed to cool the overheated hot tub a bit by leaving off the lid for a while so managed one last dip.
