Ice, ice and even more ice baby

In Vancouver we stayed with a lovely couple called Alex and Justyna, they made us feel really welcome by picking us up from the bus station and making us bran muffins. They took us out to a crazy japanese tapas style restaurant where all the chefs and waiters shouted at each other, the food was great but it wasn't the best place to hold a conversation. However, it was a really fun place and we shared the "surprise" soup which contained a boiled egg, a big bit of swede or radish, a bit of fish marinated tofu and some weird rubbery thing we could not identify. 

Fantastic market on Granville Island

View of Vancouver from Granville Island.

Ralph rang the Vancouver aquarium and arranged to meet one of the directors to discuss their Oceanwise food sourcing program run with restaurants and their annual coastal clean up program. This was really interesting and has given him some ideas about the 'Our Rivers' campaign back home but sadly did not result in a free ticket to the aquarium.

The aquarium does some great conservation work and the interpretation and demonstrations were really good but we both couldn't help feeling that all the enclosures were quite small. We probably spent three quarters of the visit watching the sea otters. They are amazing, much bigger than we imagined and with back feet like that of a sea lion.

Super cute sea otter holding his favourite piece of plastic in lieu of a stone.  They aren't allowed stones in the aquarium as they bang on the glass of their enclosure and break it.  This means that the staff have to shell all their food for them which seemed a shame to us.  They did however give them a ball to play with which they swam round underwater with, held to their chest with one paw.

Beluga Whales

The aquarium was also home to a crazy 4D cinema, It showed a 3D version of the Blue Planet but every time a dolphin splashed into the water you got sprayed with a fine mist of water and when a whale took a breath you were blasted with a hot fan. Also I looked ice cool in the special glasses.

or like Gok Wan (don't tell Ralph I said that)

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sculpture at aquarium entrance

Alex and Justyna also took us to an amazing ice cream place which offered over 200 different flavours including wasabi, garlic and chilli chocolate - all of which you can try before you buy. The wasabi was surprisingly nice, a bit like creamy horseradish, but settled for a taste rather than a whole scoop.

Not everything in town had been fixed since the riot and some of the windows in down town were still boarded up. They were covered in graffiti and bad poetry, all condemning the violence and questioning why it had happened - I think people in Vancouver really care about what people think of them, take note Biggleswade!