Vancouver Choo-Choo
I took advantage of a rare work-free weekend to ride the Amtrak train up to Vancouver to visit my sister last Friday. It was the first time I had taken the Amtrak and although it takes close to 90 minutes longer than it would to drive, I enjoyed not driving. The only thing that sucked was that the train leaves King Street Station in Seattle at 7:30 in the morning which meant getting up a lot earlier than I'm used to.
My mom was also visiting last weekend so both she and my sister picked me up from Pacific Central train station when I arrived in Vancouver. We then went to Joeys for lunch and were treated to a view of hazmat teams cleaning up a meth lab in the neighboring building. We left there and headed up Robson Street where they shopped and I followed along. Eventually we made our way to a bar and met up with one of Kristin's new friends from Vancouver for a few drinks. Exhaustion set in that evening so everyone called it a night relatively early. I stayed up long enough to see it snow hard, a good thing since barely a trace remained by morning.
Saturday we decided that the weather was going to be good enough to participate in the Vancouver Sun Run so we headed down to B.C. Place and registered. A bit more shopping afterward including a stop at Granville Island, followed by lunch back at Kristin's apartment while watching the Water Horse DVD my mom brought from home. During the movie we were distracted by a potentially sac religious scene unfolding on an adjacent balcony—a 40-something woman making out with what honestly appeared to be a 70-something priest. He wore a necklace adorned with a cross and all black clothes with the exception of a white collar. Their lip lock concluded with the woman in tears and they eventually moved indoors where Kristin swears she saw him removing his belt before going out of sight. Free of the distraction, we resumed watching the movie which left my mom in tears. Then it was off to Earl's where we met up with Kristin's friend David who treated us to dinner.
Sunday was race day and a cold one at that. We left Kristin's apartment a bit over an hour before the 9 AM start time. Of course with almost 60,000 participants they had to stagger the start. Kristin was in the "green" group, my mom and I in the "white" since we were walking. I eventually crossed the start line about 30 minutes after the race began and completed the 10K in 1 hour and 15 minutes. There were so many people that everyone was nearly brought to a halt at several bottlenecks. Kristin complained about the number of slow runners and walkers that she had to dodge along the way, mainly because they should have entered themselves in a slower group. I even struggled to get around people and I was walking. After the race we got sushi at a nearby restaurant called Honjin. The last stops were to drop my mom off at the airport and me back at the train station.
How's that for a full weekend? Now I'm sore, exhausted, and facing a week on the night on-call shift...
My mom was also visiting last weekend so both she and my sister picked me up from Pacific Central train station when I arrived in Vancouver. We then went to Joeys for lunch and were treated to a view of hazmat teams cleaning up a meth lab in the neighboring building. We left there and headed up Robson Street where they shopped and I followed along. Eventually we made our way to a bar and met up with one of Kristin's new friends from Vancouver for a few drinks. Exhaustion set in that evening so everyone called it a night relatively early. I stayed up long enough to see it snow hard, a good thing since barely a trace remained by morning.
Saturday we decided that the weather was going to be good enough to participate in the Vancouver Sun Run so we headed down to B.C. Place and registered. A bit more shopping afterward including a stop at Granville Island, followed by lunch back at Kristin's apartment while watching the Water Horse DVD my mom brought from home. During the movie we were distracted by a potentially sac religious scene unfolding on an adjacent balcony—a 40-something woman making out with what honestly appeared to be a 70-something priest. He wore a necklace adorned with a cross and all black clothes with the exception of a white collar. Their lip lock concluded with the woman in tears and they eventually moved indoors where Kristin swears she saw him removing his belt before going out of sight. Free of the distraction, we resumed watching the movie which left my mom in tears. Then it was off to Earl's where we met up with Kristin's friend David who treated us to dinner.
Sunday was race day and a cold one at that. We left Kristin's apartment a bit over an hour before the 9 AM start time. Of course with almost 60,000 participants they had to stagger the start. Kristin was in the "green" group, my mom and I in the "white" since we were walking. I eventually crossed the start line about 30 minutes after the race began and completed the 10K in 1 hour and 15 minutes. There were so many people that everyone was nearly brought to a halt at several bottlenecks. Kristin complained about the number of slow runners and walkers that she had to dodge along the way, mainly because they should have entered themselves in a slower group. I even struggled to get around people and I was walking. After the race we got sushi at a nearby restaurant called Honjin. The last stops were to drop my mom off at the airport and me back at the train station.
How's that for a full weekend? Now I'm sore, exhausted, and facing a week on the night on-call shift...
posted by Ryan at
2:59 PM
1 Comments:
Hey man, long time. Thought I might be able to track you down via treatortrick. Drop me a line when you have a chance... astorquiajasons@qwest.net. I'd be interested in hearing what you're up to these days.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home