Vancouver!

We left Auntie Gayle's house yesterday around 9am, our usual departure time. We had such a wonderful relaxing time and it was kind of sad to go.

The drive from Vernon to Vancouver is breathtaking. Going through the mountains is such an enjoyable drive. It was one of our shortest trips, and we had to make our 5-hour drive into 7 (because Rachid wouldn't be home from work yet) so we dilly-dallied and stopped many times along the way... including Wal-Mart in Kelowna. When we went to the grocery store in Vernon, I saw that they had Cherry flavoured Crush. I love all things cherry, so I was very excited to see this. Newfoundland is the only province with pineapple Crush, and I figured BC had their Cherry Crush. Why I didn't buy a whole case there and then is beyond me, but I didn't... and I'm cryin' over it! We've stopped at a number of grocery stores and gas stations looking for this Cherry Crush with no luck (like I said, we were dilly-dallying).

The best part of our dilly-dallying is that we stopped at a winery in the Oakanagan. Grey Monk (translation from "pinot gris" I found out) Estates winery is in Lake Country, which is about 40 mins outside of Vernon. We went on a tour of the winery, saw how they made their wine and then got to do a tasting afterwards. The best part about it all is that it was all free! We're so used to being nickeled and dimed as tourists and finally something was free! It was all because they wanted you to spend their money in their wine and gift shop... which we did. We bought some souvenirs for Andre's family, a T-shirt for my quilt and each a bottle of our favourite wine.

We got to Rachid and Patty's around 7pm and were welcomed into their lovely apartment in North Vancouver. They told us to hold off on eating so that we could have a BBQ when we got there.We had organic burgers along with a bottle of the wine from Grey Monk. How Vancouver!

It was very nice to catch up with them. We hadn't seen them since they were in Ottawa for their wedding.

We were set up nicely on their pull-out couch. It was actually quite warm in their place but we didn't seem to have any problems with sleeping. Andre seems to have almost gotten over his cold by now.

A little friend chillin' in the shade of the grape vines at Grey Monk Estates.


Our fabulous cheese platter that we ordered for lunch (it was the cheapest thing on the menu at $17! Needless to say we shared it!).


The barrel rooms at the winery. These ones contained Port-style wine.




A lovely view of the mountains outside of a rest stop.