Continuing on from the Rockies, we moved our focus to another beautiful part of Canada, British Colombia. Our first stop was Kamloops, not really worth a stop but worth a drive through for no other reason but the to have Kam get a photo with one of the Kamloop signs. As we moved away from the Rockies, almost instantaneously the terrain dramatically changed. Instead of impressive peaks, glowing blue glaciers, and tree lined lakes, there was patchy scrub, dry sand-like soil and limited foliage. Most unlike Kam herself, Kamloops was nothing to write home about. We got the required snap and left.

Kamloops itself may have not been magnificent, but we soon found out the rest of BC certainly was. Minutes from leaving Kamloops city, we spotted a black bear poking his head up on the side of the main highway, in what seemed to be a very unusual place. As we rounded the corner, and dropped down the mountain, we found out why the bear was there. We were lucky enough to see hundreds of salmon making their annual pilgrimage upstream to spawn. It was an amazing and unique sight to see hundreds of the large fish almost hovering in the water. It was easy to see that this would be a perfect spot for a bear to fatten up before hibernation. We found a lovely picnic spot and enjoyed lunch as salmon were playfully leaping out of the water.

Our journey was now on to Squamish, a place we had never heard of, but through the wonders of the internet, I got a great deal for a brand new 4 star hotel. IT was time for us to live it up. We chose to stay in Squamish as it is dubbed the “outdoor capital of Canada, if not the world”. Our journey would pass through Whistler, a place which we have heard non-stop amazing things about. Unfortunately, as we approached Whistler, the rain started, and by the time we reached “the outdoor capital”, the outdoors had well and truly closed in. Cloud cover so low, we could barely see the car in front of us, rain thumping down, and the wintery temperatures; I was glad we weren’t camping tonight!

The deal I picked up online was for 2 nights in a 1 bedroom apartment with a full kitchen, living room, and even a balcony. The hotel was salubrious to say the least, we had access to the swimming pool, the hot tub, gymnasium, and could watch any movie from the DVD collection on either the 32″ flat screen in the bedroom, or the 42″ in the living room. This was GREAT; not just because we had all these luxuries, but because we had no excuse but to stay indoors and take advantage of them.

So we cooked…

We drank…

We ate…

We watched…

We soaked…

And despite being in the outdoor capital of Canada, not once did we venture outdoors. So bad was the weather, that even though we had big bay windows in the apartment, it wasn’t until the day that we checked out that we realised there were actually beautiful mountains surrounding the hotel. It was a perfect stay, and even though we didn’t see or experience Whistler, or Squamish, it was beautiful and a perfect place to recharge the batteries!

Despite being only 45 mins from Vancouver, we decided we would board a ferry and head to another of the most beautiful parts of BC, Vancouver Island. Although we were happy relaxing for 2 days, Kam and I had a little bit of cabin fever and it was time to get back into the great outdoors. We drove our car onto the ferry and headed from Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo. Kam and I relished the opportunity to take our car across water, and decided to wear the hefty price tag for the bragging rights. We were also told by a fellow traveller that from Campbell River in the far north of the island, and only possibly accessed by car, there was amazing whale watching tours. We thought that this was too good an opportunity to pass up, and headed towards Campbell River.

When we arrived we checked ourselves into some budget accommodation, and started researching for a whale watching trip the next day. All the tours from Campbell River were really expensive (around $140-190 per person), but we were lucky to find one tour that left from Telegraph Cove, at a much more reasonable price of $90/p. The tour was shorter than the others, but to be honest, Kam and I were happy enough to spend 4 hours on a boat (as long as we saw some whales).

We arrived to Telegraph Cove, a quaint little fishing village dating back to the late 1800’s. Each building was decorated with a plaque explaining the history of the building, its people and the area. Kam and I found it so interesting, and the village alone was worth the visit (however the pub was closed which didn’t fare too well with us). Just as the boat returned from the morning journey, the weather cleared and the sun came out for the first time in 4 days. We had a great boat with a really funny captain, and an extremely knowledgeable marine biologist onboard. Within minutes we had spotted porpoises swimming next to the boat, and only a few more minutes passed before we saw our first whale.

The wildlife spotting didn’t stop there. We saw humpback, after humpback, breaching, billowing water through their blowhole and flicking their tail. It was amazing. We had so many around our boat that at one stage we were struggling to work out which corner of the boat to look at, as 3 whales were within 15m of our boat. In order to calm the excitement we headed through a series of small islands between Vancouver Island and the mainland. We were pointed towards a bald eagle waiting on a branch of a tall tree on one of the small forested islands. We really didn’t think it could get much better, but just as soon as we were alerted to the eagle, our captain announced rather nonchalantly “And on the island to the rear of the boat, you can see a bear”.

We went on a whale watching trip and saw a BEAR! It was so brilliant, he was perched on the edge of a small cliff of an even smaller island, plucking berries from an overhanging branch of a tree. It was so cool! We safely got right up to him before he was scared off by the myriad of camera flashes. What none of us could believe is that he actually swam to this island to get food, and given the amount of water he had to travel, it was pretty impressive! The trip was rounded out by more whales, more porpoise, seals, a pair of bald eagles, and much more. We had all been hoping for orca, but we never expected all wildlife we did see. We felt so lucky and very happy we made the trip up to Telegraph cove.

Our trip to Vancouver was a little short-lived, not through want, but due to circumstance. I managed to organise 2 tickets for Kam and I to see our new favourite sport, Ice Hockey, played by the true professionals – Canadians (rather than the much loved, but lets face it, rookie Canberra Knights). We were off to the Canucks! We boarded the ferry to the mainland and set ourselves up in a hotel a short distance away from Rogers Arena. Kam and I were so pumped, and even though it was only a pre-season game, the quality of hockey was sure to be just a little bit better than the Canberra Knights. As we approached our seats it seems that the eBay special literally couldn’t have got us any further away from the action. Very last row in the nosebleed section, but Kam and I were going to make the most of it. We chanted, we sung, we cheered, and yes, we… us 2 Aussies… in the back row… got on the jumboscreen. Us “camera whores” managed to woo the roving camera man with our majestic dance moves, and air guitar routine! It seemed like we were up on screen for about an hour, but Sweet Child O Mine is only a 3 minute song, so they either played it 20 times or I may have been mistaken. Either way we were awesome, and even got compliments throughout the evening for our dancing/guitaring prowess. Awesome!

So, although the game was brilliant our team didn’t win. We are now officially Canucks fans, and have the paraphernalia to prove it. Unfortunately, the weather prevented us of seeing more of Vancouver, which seemed to be a city that both of us would have liked (especially Kam, who constantly informed me that it was home to her beloved Bryan Adams).

We said Adieu to Canada for the last time and headed back to the States for our last leg of the tour. Thanks Canada, we honestly had an absolute blast! Seattle here we come!