August 26, 2011  Being in Canada is nice in that the people are friendly and the scenery is fantastic – communicating is a pain in the butt though.  The cell phone roaming charges are $0.79 per minute and the internet is more than $2 per megabyte which is very expensive considering how much we use it.

Our first trip in the morning every morning so far – has been to pick up voice mails and make any phone calls that need to be made.  We are using a pay phone and a prepaid calling card that I have had since our European trip two years ago.  That probably makes me a cheapskate but I hate having to pay so much extra just because we crossed some imaginary line especially when we pay for more than 800 minutes per month.

After picking up voice mails and making some reservations for Chilliwack and Vancouver we headed out for some sightseeing and a little walk.  Chilliwack is a town on the way from Vernon, BC to Vancouver, BC and one of Carol’s Mom’s neighbors lives there.  We know him and he is a very nice guy – former RCMP officer – so we are going to visit him for an evening.  Vernon is where our former neighbors, Neil and Brenda, spend their summers and the site of our next visit.

Our walk was just around the Cascade Pond just outside of town.  After that we decided to head back up Sulphur Mountain – the site of our gondola ride – for a visit to the Banff Upper Hot Springs on the same mountain.  On the road up the mountain we noticed an “Administration Building” surrounded by “Cascade Gardens”.  I couldn’t help myself taking photos of some of the unusual flowers – about 50,000 plants that reach their peak right about now. After the gardens we spent about an hour soaking our tired, old(?), bones in the hot water – life is good.

Another visit to town for some WiFi and a haircut for Carol – as usual, she hates it – and then back ‘home’ for an early evening.  We have been sleeping long and well with the cool night air and the late sunrises due to high mountains all around.