Teen Across Canada Blog -The Hidden Gem of Yukon

After spending 6 months (believe it or not) in British Columbia we have finally moved on. Up the Stewart-Cassiar through Prince George, Terrace, Stewart and Dease Lake, we have now reached our first territory on this trip. We are getting a clearer understanding of the difference between a province and a territory.

Along the Stewart-Cassiar highway we stopped in Stewart which is just minutes away from Alaska’s friendliest ghost town.  We didn’t need to use our passports to cross (shh don’t tell anyone!)

Another little drive up that road was Bear Glacier – a real glacier! And super close too, although it was freezing outside!

Coming into the Yukon, we bypassed Whitehorse and drove the Klondike Highway up to Carmacks where we got on the Campbell Highway to Faro. Now you might be thinking… Faro? I’ve never heard of Faro… That’s because Faro is Yukon’s best kept secret!

We arrived for the Sheep and Crane Festival the second weekend of May. That was probably one of the best festivals we’ve been on this whole trip! We saw Fannin Sheep – which are only here (nowhere else in the world!) And we saw thousands of cranes flying over our heads. With the binoculars and telescopes provided we could see both the sheep and the cranes as if they were right in front of us.

We met some amazing people. We would like to thank Sabine, who runs the RV Park and helps run the Interpretive Centre and who was an amazing person to spend time with during the festival as well as Jackie Dowell-Irvine (photo) who runs the Visitor’s Centre and the campground and is also an artist. We spent the entire weekend talking to her – she was incredible! Her paintings were hung all over the centre and we even got to take one home with us! She is quite the artist. Check out her other paintings – they’re amazing… jackieirvine.blogspot.ca

The town of Faro was originally built for 2500 people so there’s a huge school and a rec centre however only 45 kids attend the school (grades 1 – 12). 44 kids! Crazy, right? At least it is when you compare it to my high school (Pierre Elliott Trudeau High School) which has 2000 kids (grades 9 – 12) and counting. And if you really consider it, Trudeau is one of a hundred schools in Markham whereas Del Van Gorder School is for the entire town, every age. However personally, I think that it adds to the charm of the town.

During the festival Jackie, the artist, made some amazing cupcakes and another gentlemen – from New Brunswick – made these awesome bison burgers.

I’m not usually a fan of “wild” meat but he did a fantastic job! We saw a talent show put on by the school, went on interpretive walks and listened to a hilarious poem by the Chief RCMP who also happened to win the Miss Faro contest. The entire weekend was an incredible experience. We had so much fun and ended up staying an entire week in Faro!

After the festival was over we still had a few things left on our list like the Faro Silver and Lead Mine – which is the reason that the town was built in first place. We saw the hardware store where the introduction of the movie Wolverine was filmed!  Now, we’ll be re-watching the movie with new eyes.  Overall Faro was such an amazing week. The people were phenomenal, the views were vastly beautiful, the entertainment was extraordinary and the food was fantastic. We definitely agree that Faro is Yukon’s best kept secret – and the festival is Yukon’s best secret festival! We’re definitely adding this to our list of places to return to.

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Teen Across Canada Blog – North to Prince George

What an amazing journey we’ve had so far in British Columbia… Creston, Osoyoos, Hope, Chilliwack, Abbotsford, Langley, Burnaby, Vancouver, Whistler and Vancouver Island.

And it’s not nearly done! Now it is up to Prince George, in Northern BC, on route to the Yukon.

We passed through 70 Mile House and 100 Mile House, then made pit stops in Williams Lake and Quesnel before arriving in Prince George.

Prince George is the largest city in northern BC. It is known as the “Northern Capital” of British Columbia.  On our first night we went to visit the Prince George Astronomical Society Observatory. They were super nice and taught us about the planets, the moon and our solar system. After our lesson we went up to the observatory to use the telescope and see the moon. A little fun surprise… we got was to see Jupiter! How awesome is that? We could see the planet as well as its four moons. Our moon was huge, bright and beautiful. We could clearly see the craters and basins on the moon. It was so amazing to see it and feel so close even though it’s 370,300 km away!

We learned that Jupiter can be seen with the naked eye for the next few months. Sure enough the next night, we could see it right next to the moon. You know that it’s Jupiter and not a star because stars twinkle and planets don’t. Now we are more and more aware of our solar system and what’s happening in the sky at night.  We also learned about red lights and why they get used instead of regular lights when stargazing. Red light does not degrade a person’s night vision like “white” lights do. Essentially, you can keep your night vision while also being able to see thanks to red lights.  (Check out the video we captured.)

We would like to thank Maurice, who was kind enough to give us the presentation of our solar system and Glen Harris who took hours from his time to show us the moon, Jupiter and a presentation of the Moon. He answered all of our questions and was so amazing to talk to.  Glen came back the next day, at our RV to give us a Star Finder tool. How thoughtful is that? Thank you lots Glen!

As for museum visits, we attended #ExPlace (Exploration Place) and learned about dinosaur finds, the wildlife of the area and the Canadian Games that took place in the Prince George in 2015.  We went to the Railway museum and then had a pleasant surprise with Shaw TV conducting an interview about our journey… how fun!

Teen Across Canada Blog – TOP 10 things I noticed in Vancouver

Looking back upon the lower mainland and specific to Vancouver, the Top 10 things that caught my attention are:

1. Vancouver and most of BC, is a very healthy place. There are hundreds of health food stores, lots of vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free and raw options in restaurants and grocery stores.
2. Everything is crazy expensive! I thought Toronto was expensive but it’s cheap compared to Vancouver. Gas is twenty cents higher – so at least we didn’t move much with the RV or that would have been extremely costly. A condo in downtown Vancouver that’s worth only a couple thousand dollars is 2 million dollars! It’s beyond me how people afford to live there.
3. There are bike paths everywhere! If you love biking then you should definitely visit Vancouver. You can bike wherever you want to go. Stanley Park is one of the best parks to walk or bike and it is easy to get from North Van to downtown via bike. (We know, we did it.)
4. There are tons of buses all over the city. Many of them run on electricity which is amazing and go anywhere from the suburbs to downtown to UBC to Simon Fraser.
5. Everywhere you go – downtown – it smells either like weed or smoke. People smoke a lot, more than Toronto and there is a lot of people smoking marijuana. I didn’t even know what it smelled like until we came to Vancouver.
6. There are a lot of “adult stores”…  sounds weird I know. Almost on every street there are huge neon signs pointing to the building and saying that. There are also a lot of marijuana stores, not only in Vancouver but all over BC – on the island as well.
7. There are a lot, A LOT, of homeless people. The worst street is E Hastings St. It’s extremely sad to think of how many have no home, no food and barely any clothes in Canada. I knew there were homeless of course, the metro in Montreal and the subway in Toronto are filled but I didn’t know that there was this many!
8. Vancouver isn’t actually all that clean. There is garbage on every street, on rooftops and all over the parks. It is very dirty which is somewhat disappointing.
9. Driving in Vancouver sucks and I don’t even drive! Pedestrians walk in front of the cars even though the car ways a thousand times their weight. Bikers are on either side of you, sometimes even in front or behind. You always have to watch where you’re going. And let’s not forget one ways. There are so many one ways it’s hard to get to the next block.
10. Good luck finding parking – BUT I do like that they have “PayByPhone”. It’s an app that you get where you can renew and pay for parking on your phone. You don’t have to keep running back to the meter, just add more time.Going downtown in any city, you usually know that it will be hard to find parking so you leave early. If you want to find parking in Vancouver you’re going to have to walk a few blocks, not necessarily a bad thing though.

Vancouver overall is a very green city. They promote biking and walking a lot which is amazing. They also have tons of electric car chargers everyone so it’s easy to drive an electric car. They have tons of Car2Go and Evo which are cars that you can drive anywhere in the city and leave them there so you don’t have to worry about having your own car but you can still drive if necessary.

 

Teen Across Canada Blog – The World of Nanaimo Bars

Imagine this, a Nanaimo Bar Trail.

A tour that is self-guided with 34 different places to try Nanaimo Bars. For those of you who don’t know what that awesome treat is, it is a three layer dessert. Traditionally, the top layer is chocolate, the middle is a custard and the bottom is a crunchy coconut and chocolate cookie.

On this trail we tried traditional ones and spin-offs (check out our facebook.com page for some great shots).

1. Bocca Café: They made three different types; peanut butter, original and sea salt caramel. I don’t even like peanut butter and that one was my favorite. It was so good! Mom loved the sea salt caramel one too.
2. Cherub Chocolate: In honor of Easter being so close, they made mini chocolate Nanaimo Easter eggs as well as Nanaimo truffles. Both were so good, I would definitely go back.
3. Chocolaterie Bernard Callebaut: They made one called Nanaimo-Mites which is a little chocolate covered Nanaimo Bar. It was pretty good, very cute and bite sized.
4. The Grand Hotel: This one was a Martini so I couldn’t drink any of it but here’s what Mom and Dad have to say about it. “It was unique…strong… stirred, not shaken.”
5. Java Expressions: They make mini ones with a bunch of different flavours. This time they had raspberry, lime, chocolate truffle and salted caramel. I absolutely loved the lime – I didn’t expect it to be that good at all. The raspberry one was amazing it was made with real raspberries too! I could have eaten hundreds of those two!
6. Javawocky: They made a traditional Nanaimo bar. It was very good with a thick layer of the base.
7. Longwood Brew Pub & Restaurant: Amazing! They made Nanaimo Bar cheesecake and it was incredible! I could’ve eaten hundreds of those! Everything smelled amazing as well.
8. McLean’s Specialty Foods: They made a traditional Nanaimo bar (kind of boring compared to the other more exotic ones we’ve eaten). Theirs was made with tons of coconut and personally I’m not a big fan of coconut so it wasn’t my favorite however it was still delicious and one of the best traditional ones we’ve had.
9. Minnoz Steak & Seafood: OMG! They made the best Nanaimo bar cheesecake. It was so delicious, I would go back there one hundred times just to eat that alone!
10. Modern Café: This one was a Bar-tini so I couldn’t drink it (again) but here’s what Mom and Dad have to say about it. “Smooth…a little bit like a B-52.”
11. Mon Petit Choux: They made a gluten-free bar which was surprisingly good… I’m not usually a fan of gluten free because I find it has a funny taste but they did a pretty good job.
12. Ohana’s Café: They made traditional ones and probably one of the best ones. I loved it and drinking it with chocolate milk was like heaven on earth!
13. Perkins Coffee: They made a traditional one that was very good.
14. Pirate Chips: They made a fried Nanaimo Bar! Whoever invented it should get an award because that was incredible. Fried Nanaimo bar with whipped cream, chocolate and ice cream?! Amazing! Nothing more needs to be said…
15. Powerhouse Living Foods Co.: They made a vegan, raw cake. At first I was a little skeptical but they wowed all of us. It was probably one of the best ones on this trail. We ended up buying two.
16. Real Food: They made a Nanaimo Bar cake and it was absolutely delicious! I loved the look, the taste, the texture… mmm.
17. Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory: This was one of the first ones we tried out; it was a chocolate covered bar and surprisingly good.
18. Serious Coffee: They made a traditional one which was very good.
19. Smokin’ George’s BBQ: Incredible! They made 2 different Nanaimo Bars; a bacon maple and a bacon dulce di lecce. They were so good and I loved how they made the bottom layer with pretzels instead of nuts.
20. Tea Desire (Country Club Ctr): Amazing! I don’t even like tea and this was the best one I’ve ever had. It was a Nanaimo bar tea which looked like a Nanaimo bar! Definitely a place I would go again.
21. Nanaimo Museum: Amazing museum! So much to learn about… My favourite thing was learning about the bathtub racing – it’s really interesting!  We sat on a Nanaimo Bar ottoman.

We did visit the following places but the results were not so positive…

1. Noodlebox Port Place: They make Nanaimo bar spring rolls but were all OUT! Everyone recommended them to us and said if you could only eat one, eat that one! We never got to taste it, so I was sad about that but that gives us another reason to go back!
2. A Wee Cupcakery: Closed.
3. Cinnamon Joes: Closed.
4. Jakeob’s Ice Crean Parlour: Closed.
5. Riso Foods Inc.: Closed.
6. Two Chefs Affair: Closed
7. Yellow Point Cranberries: Closed.
8.  ACMe Food Co.: Closed
9. Livingside Forest Oceanside Campground & RV:  Closed

So we couldn’t get to taste any of these. I wanted to taste them because they had a Nanaimo Bar Milkshake and a Nanaimo Bar ice-cream. KIYO Salon & Day Spa was one that we never actually went to but still looks fun for a day spa adventure if anyone would be interested.

Overall that was such an amazing experience and such an awesome idea! I loved it and would definitely eat most of those again! I’m excited to go back and try the ones that were closed because they looked amazing!

Teen Across Canada Blog – Part 2 Remembering the Island

Our journey around the island would not be complete without talking about the Best Places to Eat on Vancouver Island According to Me! (pics are on our website – TeenAcrossCanada.com)

Victoria

Ithaca: This, in my opinion, is the best Greek restaurant ever. We had an assortment of things and everything was to-die-for! We had a meatball appetizer which had a cheese-lemon sauce and was so delicious. The best things we ordered were a lamb pita, shrimp and a roast lamb. However everything we ordered was so good I would recommend this restaurant to everyone.

Thrifty Foods: This is not actually a place to eat but it is one of the best grocery stores. It is clean, friendly, reasonably priced, fresh and carries amazing food. We bought everything for Mom’s birthday dinner from there and were totally pleased. Their bakery has amazing bread and croissants, their seafood section carries fresh and delicious shrimp and lobster and their produce was local and amazing.

Little Tokyo: This is in a plaza near Thrifty’s. We ordered a ‘Sushi Deluxe’ which came with some miso soup, four California rolls and four Canadian rolls. The second time we went back we had a spring roll. Everything was delicious and the service was amazing. They were super nice and made everything right in front of us.

Fry’s: It’s a little bakery that makes awesome soft pretzels. We tried a blueberry Danish and a chocolate croissant too and they were just as good. We got a loaf of bread for dinner which went awesome with our meal.

Fuego: It’s an authentic Mexican restaurant that was so delicious! We had a chimichanga, enchilada and nacho soup. Definitely one of my favorite Mexican restaurants. The server was friendly and it was reasonably priced.

Tofino

Tacofino: This is the best Mexican place ever! We went back more than once it was so good. It is a small food truck that makes a few different Mexican platters. We tried gringas, which we had no idea what they were. Turns out they’re tacos with a flour tortilla usually filled with cheese, “al pastor” meat and pineapple slices and then grilled in the same manner as a quesadilla. We tried a bean one which has cheese and beans and tomatoes, a chicken one (with chicken, cheese and tomatoes) and a pork one (with pork, cheese and tomatoes). We had a vegetarian, vegan, beef and chicken burrito. Everything we ordered was amazing, I would go back just for that.

Chocolate Tofino: This is probably one of the best chocolate places ever. They hand make everything in the store. They made amazing ice cream, the best I’ve ever had. I tried the strawberry, which is now my new favorite, a mango, a Dutch chocolate, a vanilla, a sea salt caramel and a maple walnut. Every flavor was to-die-for; I would go back there just for that. We tried almost every chocolate there and they were all delicious. We even got a whale chocolate and the proceeds went to save the whales.

Common Loaf Bakery: This bakery is in town and their pastries are made fresh every day. They make amazing brownies, croissants and muffins. They are right in town and in the middle of everything.

Qualicum Beach

Qualicum Foods: This isn’t a restaurant or bakery or café, it’s a grocery store. Surprised? I know. We ended up grabbing dinner on the go from here and it was probably one of the best dinners. We had Chinese food (sushi, rice, noodles, lemon chicken…) and everything was amazing. The store itself was very nice, everything in order and super clean. They had an awesome selection in the deli, the bakery and the produce section.

Parksville

Coombs Old Country Market: This is more commonly known as Goats on the Roof. It is a market place that has goats on the roof to eat the grass so no one has to mow it. It has been going on since the mid-1970s. We got these pretzel buns which are amazing and tried a ham and cheese croissant which was way better than I thought.  The gelato too was delicious.

Cumberland

Cumberland Village Bakery: They make croissants, donuts, muffins, bread and turnovers from scratch using real ingredients. I really loved the apple turnover and croissant and the bread was amazing to eat with dinner.

Duncan

True Grain Bread: They have amazing soft pretzels and assorted pastries. They also make an eccles pastry which was surprisingly good. I could’ve eaten tons of their pretzels. Their bread tastes awesome and they have all different flavors.

Nanaimo

Noodlebox Port Place: They have pad Thai and stir fry and everything in there smells delicious. The atmosphere in the restaurant is awesome and everything looks so good. I just wish we could’ve tried the Nanaimo Bar spring rolls. If you’re craving Chinese that would definitely be the right place to check out.

Pirate Chips: The second we walked in, it smelled like heaven. They make burgers and fries and let’s not forget that fried Nanaimo Bar. I would definitely eat there all the time!

Powerhouse Living Foods Co.: They are an all vegan, all raw restaurant. We tried a smoothie and the Nanaimo cake and both were amazing. It was definitely a delicious way to be healthy.

Smokin’ George’s BBQ: Fun fact – they were on You’ve Got to Eat Here (the TV show).  We had pulled pork, ribs and sausages and it was delicious. Their coleslaw was even amazing. If you don’t like a vinegar taste though, that may not be the right place for you.

Real Food: They make amazing cakes and their sandwiches and soup looks so good. They make everything fresh and right in front of you. I would definitely eat lunch there every day if I could.

Teen Across Canada Blog – Part 1 Remembering the Island

We’ve had a crazy past few months and are on our way up to the Yukon!  Before we get to far north, let me tell you all about Vancouver Island. I loved it and can’t wait to return someday!

For my mom’s birthday she and dad went out all weekend to leave me to make a birthday dinner for Sunday night. Since my mom likes to try a bunch different things, we made her all of her favourite foods in small quantities.

The next day we went down to the wharf again to go whale watching. We took Eagle Tours and went on a wildlife and nature tour. Although we didn’t end up seeing any whales (too early) we saw a huge colony of seals and sea lions. We saw eagles as well.

We went to Sooke to explore where we ended up going to all the beaches up to Port Renfrew.

On our way we stopped at Spirit Bay where we were taught about how the native land is being used to make eco-friendly homes based on their conditions. It is a beautiful and amazing place to retire to or vacation to. We spent the rest of the day exploring the large attractions. At a park we saw three large attractions which turned out to be children’s playground equipment. There was an octopus, a salmon and a dragon. At a Marina there was a giant killer whale at the entrance and a fun surprise – three harbour seals!

We went to the Craigdarroch Castle which had five floors and was huge! It took us hours to walk around… hard not to get lost that’s for sure.

We walked down to the Robert Bateman gallery where some of Robert Bateman’s original paintings are on display. There were a bunch of small exhibits, a short video and a timeline of his family, his work and important dates in his life. The most impactful exhibit was where he showed how humans affect the life of animals. For example one painting was of a duck in an oil spill with another stuck in plastic can holder. There was another one of a polar bear floating away on a small piece of ice indicating global warming. We went on a tour of the Parliament. It was really cool to see the inside and learn about its history.

We went over to the Royal British Columbia Museum, next door. It was probably one of the biggest museums we’ve ever been in during this trip! We couldn’t even explore the whole thing and we were there a long time.

Overall Victoria is an amazing place and I can’t wait to visit again. There is so much to see and do we could easily spend another 6 weeks there and still not see everything.

Teen Across Canada Blog -At #ExPlace in #cityofpg

Prince George (#cityofpg) is such an awesome city!  We went to the tourism centre to see what was going on in town and the woman there was super nice and made sure we had the tourism coupons to attractions in the area – including #ExPlace! She even helped us plan our trip up north. So we went to the Exploration Place which was so cool.  (Watch the video below)

We weren’t sure what to expect but it was a really nice surprise.  There was an exhibit on dinosaurs, showing a ton found in Alberta.

Then there was an exhibit on Prince George’s history which was super interesting. My favorite parts were learning about the Outrigger restaurant owned by May and Jack Lee, a Chinese couple who just moved to Vancouver. 

I also liked the part where they had a replica of the jail cell… Don’t want to be stuck in there, though! There was a small room for videos and we watched a few different ones. One was about interviews with people living in Prince George and why they love their city. There was an exhibit on the Canadian Winter Games of 2015 hosted in Prince George. It was so well done, we felt like we were actually at the Games.  The final exhibit was filled with animals. They had about 10 baby chicks that were so cute and so fluffy! There was a magpie (bird) that was walking around freely and picking things up off the shelves. He was so fun to watch. They have stuffed animals as well like moose, bear, goat, ram, bison and so many more! The two guys that worked there, Chris and Rylan, were so helpful and told us so much about all the animals in BC and the magpie.

The receptionist was so awesome. She is from Victoria and absolutely loves it so we were talking about our adventures and sharing our travels with her. She was super nice and extremely helpful! Prince George has been amazing to us and we love it here. It is such an awesome and practical town to live in… They have everything here. Can’t wait to see where our adventure will take us next!

Teen Across Canada Blog – A night with the stars in Prince George

What an amazing journey we’ve had in British Columbia… And it’s not nearly done! Now we are in Prince George, in Northern BC on the route to the Yukon. Prince George is the largest city in northern BC. It is known as the “Northern Capital” of British Columbia.

On our first night we went to visit the Prince George Astronomical Society Observatory. They were super nice and taught us all about the planets, the moon and our solar system.

After our lesson we went up to the observatory to use the telescope and see the moon. A little fun surprise we got was to see Jupiter! How awesome is that? We could see the planet as well as its four moons. Our moon was huge, bright and beautiful. We could clearly see the craters and basins on the moon. It was so amazing to see it and feel so close even though it’s 370,300 km away!  We learned that Jupiter can be seen with the naked eye for the next few months. Sure enough the next night, we could see it right next to the moon. You know that it’s Jupiter and not a star because stars twinkle and planets don’t. Now we are more and more aware of our solar system and what’s happening in the sky at night.

We also learned about red lights and why they get used instead of regular lights when stargazing. Red light does not degrade a person’s night vision like “white” lights do. Essentially, you can keep your night vision while also being able to see thanks to red lights.
We would like to thank Maurice, who was kind enough to give us the presentation of our solar system and Glen Harris who took hours from his time to do a presentation of the Moon. He answered all of our questions and was so amazing to talk to.

Glen came back the next day, at our RV to give us a Star Finder. How thoughtful is that?

Thank you lots Glen!

Teen Across Canada Blog – #tagwhistler is it!

While we were up in Whistler, we went Zip lining with #tagwhistler.  I’ve never gone zip lining and the first time I went, it was on the second longest one in Canada!

I would like to say a huge thank you to The Adventure Group at Whistler for helping us organize and experience the zip lines. It was probably one of the most fun adventures we’ve done.

(Watch this video and share it. What a great adventure!)

First we took a bus to get to the base of Cougar Mountain where the adventure starts. It
was a 14 minute ride where we passed beautiful lakes and the amazing mountains. When we got there, we met our guides, Joshua and Christopher.

We tried on helmets for the ride up. Then we put the harnesses on which were slightly uncomfortable and made it seem like we were wearing a huge diaper! We sat in a huge and totally cool 4 x 4 and drove 20 kilometers up the mountain. It was such a fun ride, it made me want to go ATVing (hopefully we can do that soon). It went from 26° to 0° – mud and dirt to snow and ice all within 5 minutes.

We walked for about a minute to our first zip line, Z1. It is the highest zip line in Canada at 642 feet up and 1.3 KM long! It was a little scary at first but once you were on, it was awesome! The only thing that threw me off guard was the wind; I didn’t expect it to be so strong. So when I got off, my eyes were watering like crazy but it’s all part of the fun! There were only 8 people in our group and we always went two at a time so we didn’t have to wait long at all.

When everyone was done, we walked another couple hundred feet to Z2 – like I said, they’re great with names. That one is the second longest in Canada. Although currently it is the first because the longest is closed for the season. If you look to the left when you go down, you can see a little garden gnome. No one is sure how it got there but it is always funny to look at.

Another couple hundred feet and we were at Godzilla. This one was tough to get up because you had to walk up a mini 35° suspension bridge; again, all part of the fun! This one was short but incredibly fast and on such an angle that it reminded me of the Leviathan at Canada’s Wonderland. On that line, you would reach your top speed in exactly 3 seconds. That one was probably my favorite.

The last one… the Lover’s one. It’s called that because the two people going at the same time are so close that they can hold hands.

Chris and Josh, the guides, were so awesome.  They were incredibly helpful and super fun to talk to. Chris is from Australia and had such a cool accent and Josh is from London, Ontario but has parents in Saskatchewan. They were amazing and remembered everyone’s name. It was one of the best excursions I have ever been on and I would definitely recommend it to anyone and everyone. I would for sure go back to do it all over again!

Teen Across Canada Blog – YEAH #WBTurns50

We went up to Whistler (#WBTurns50), a world renowned skiing village… boy did we go beyond! (#WBGoBeyond) I thought I knew what skiing villages were, after all I had been to Blue Mountain in Collingwood, Ontario and a few other mountains in Quebec but now I understand why Whistler is so famous.  I feel like saying ‘ski village’ is an understatement, it’s more like a ‘ski city’… It looks bigger than some of the towns we visited in Newfoundland!

 

Whistler is known for holding the winter Olympics of 2010 and I’m actually surprised they didn’t hold any Olympics sooner. It is very well developed and has the capacity for large groups of people. We got to see a few mini Olympic monuments like the giant rings!  When we went it was 26°! That’s warmer than we’ve had the entire trip, even last summer! (Watch this video below)

People were out in t-shirts and shorts, skiing, snowboarding or just walking around. It was such a beautiful day and everyone we met said it was perfect for spring skiing.  We were able to have an awesome time experiencing Whistler – even though we didn’t end up skiing or snowboarding – thanks to Whistler Tourism. They were amazing, helpful, extremely generous and incredibly kind. We got passes to take the Peak to Peak which is a gondola that goes from one mountain to the other. The view was phenomenal and I think not possible to see unless you take a gondola or a plane. The pictures we took don’t even do it justice.

The Peak to Peak breaks three world records; including the World’s highest lift of its kind, the World’s longest lift unsupported (free) span for a lift of this kind and the World’s longest continuous lift system. It goes 7.5 meters per second and takes 11 minutes from one peak to the other. The highest point when crossing is at 436 meters(1 427 feet)! Each cabin can take up to 28 people (24 sitting down and 4 standing up) and there are 28 cabins. That means that in total it can take 4 100 people every single hour! The total distance is 4.4 kilometers one way.

It was such an amazing ride! On the way back, we went on the silver gondola which had a glass floor so you could see down. Not really recommended if you’re afraid of heights but definitely worth doing at least once. You can see skiers and snowboarders and in the summer apparently bears are visible as well.

If I were a skier Whistler would definitely be number one on my list!