Seattle – Vancouver – Victoria 6-day Trip (1)

临出发前一天的晚上，接到航空公司的电话，说原本早上6点30的飞机，要被延误到8：45。这是我有史以来第一次高兴的知道飞机被延误了。一直担心自己太早起不来，现在可以放心了，也不用为送我的朋友起一个大早而内疚了。更让人高兴的是，昨天一早，老板告诉我，由于俺勤奋工作，为CEO做了一个份外的项目，所以，决定给我发BONUS以资鼓励，于是，这次旅行的费用也就有了着落。看来，这次会是一次很愉快的旅程。
老爸老妈在家修整了一个月之后（一个多月前的黄石之旅，把我们都累坏了），也为这次的温哥华之旅而兴奋。

Day 1: It took us around 1 hour to check-in the baggage and go through the security check, then get on board. The flight was around one and half hour from SJC to SEATAC. Afterwards, it took us around 40 minutes to pick up our baggage and Alamo rental car from the SEATAC. SEATAC is pretty big, and you need to take the train from the terminal to the baggage claim. I-5 north part in Seattle is under construction and it took us almost half an hour to pass the Seattle. After that, we continued on I-5 around 1 and half hour and then reach the border of US and Canada. The gas price in Canada is pretty expensive, so we decide to fill up the gas at the last exit before the US customs. There were so many cars waiting for crossing the border and the line actually passed the last exit. However, it only took us about half an hour to cross the border and the immigration officers of Canada were quite efficient  After questioned about a few simple questions, we need to park the car and then went into the immigration office to get my parents’ passport stamped. But it was a quite easy process also. We lived in Richmond which is less than 30 minutes away from the border. After check-in the hotel, we went to a Chinese shopping center where I exchanged my US dollar to Canadian dollar at 1 to 1.05 without any fees. It is a very nice rate. (FYI, the place is called Kingmark Currency Exchange). After enjoying some nice Chinese food, we directly headed to Canada Place. The weather wasn’t that good, cloudy and rain occasionally.

Vancouver in the night from Stanley Park

We stayed there for about an hour, then headed to Stanley park. It was around 6:00PM. But there was lots of traffic in the area (Vancouver Downtown). It took us almost an hour from Canada place to Stanley Park. It was aweful. Maybe because it was the Friday night, so everybody was heading to Stanley park to have a romantic night  It was proved late on when we saw lots of couples stay in the Stanley park to enjoy the night view of Vancouver.