After returning to the hotel last evening, we finished getting organized and ready for our first full day in Vancouver. We slept extremely well. Our room is on the 23rd floor so we did not hear any street level traffic and we have run into very few people on our floor. The bed was comfortable. Keith was up first and read and wrote before we had breakfast. The layout of our room is perfect. Keith can use the living area and the bathroom is located in a common area so it does not disrupt anyone's sleep. Since the club lounge doesn't open until 6:30 AM, we asked for extra coffee for Keith and he utilized the coffee maker in the room. In addition to breakfast available in the Club Floor Lounge our room package includes a buffet breakfast in the lobby restaurant. Since we are not big breakfast eaters, we opted to eat at the Club Floor Lounge. Believe it or not when we booked the room it was a lower price to select the room that included the breakfast buffet than one that did not. We each had cereal and fruit. The honeydew was the best melon that we have had in years. Each day the breakfast in the lounge features two different hot items. Today they had eggs benedict and pancakes. They looked great but we passed on them. While eating breakfast we saw the arrival of two cruise ships. One was the Island Princess and the other was the Holland Volendam. After freshening up we went on our first long walk in Vancouver. We did so little walking these past two days that it was great to be out for a nice long walk. There was a light drizzle so we each carried umbrellas and wore waterproof jackets. It was mainly a light mist. We walked over to Stanley Park which we had visited on our second trip to Vancouver in 1998, again in 2002 and in 2012 when we were here on a stop on-board Crystal Serenity. On our way over to the park, we passed by the restaurant that we dined at this evening. In spite of the mist, for the better part of our walk, we enjoyed beautiful views of the bay and the landscape as we made our way to and from Stanley Park. One of the attractions that Vancouver is known for is its beautiful parks. Stanley Park is slightly over 1,000 acres. It is surrounded by Vancouver Harbour and English Bay. The park has close to one-half million trees with several dating hundreds of years. The park also features an aquarium which opened in 1956. We didn't visit the aquarium as we have visited there on two previous occasions. Many animals live in the park including 200 species of birds, including several species of water birds. There are no large mammals inhabiting the park. Rather, the mammals include rabbits, squirrels, raccoons, and coyotes. We went by the totem pole area. Shortly after returning back to the hotel we went out again. This time we walked over to Gastown. We returned to a clothing store where we bought some items when we were here in 2012. We were looking for a couple of specific items for Anne Marie that she plans to use on the Northwest Passage portion of the trip including waterproof pants. They didn't have them and recommended a North Face clothing store about fifteen minutes away. We purchased one of the items at The North Face shop they recommended and then right nearby was a Nordstrom's where we found the other item there. We also needed to purchase one additional piece of luggage and we did this at another department store. This is needed as ordered several items from the company that Crystal had recommended for gear for the Northwest Passage voyage which is being sent directly to the ship. We each had salads for lunch which we picked up from a restaurant called freshii which features salads, wraps, burritos, soups, juices, smoothies, and even frozen yogurt. This turned out to be a great decision. This evening we dined at Cardero's Restaurant & Marine Pub. We walked over to the restaurant which is almost one mile from the Pan Pacific Hotel. The weather was just amazing. The sun came out and the temperature was moderate and we could see all around us. The restaurant offers beautiful views of the harbour and is known for its seafood. We were seated at a four person table right by a window. We could see the two cruise ships leaving, various sea planes as well as the beautiful yachts and sailboats. The interior of the restaurant was beautiful and the service superb and the food was memorable. We each had a salad; Anne Marie a Caesar Salad and Keith a Mediterranean Salad. We were served humus with a very tasty bread complement from our concierge and the restaurant. For our entree we each chose the seafood special which was wild sockeye salmon. We were pleased with our selection. Afterwards, we walked back to our hotel. Lots of people were out and about. We ended up logging slightly more than fifteen miles today. We are having an absolutely wonderful time in Vancouver. Keith & Anne Marie
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