Last day and the flight home!

It was raining again but I've had no complaints about the weather.  Every time I go to Vancouver I end up with spectacular weather so a bit of rain won't hurt.  I took my DSLR for one final walk along the sea wall and another trip to Stanley Park, followed by a trip to Vanier Park to see the eagles one last time.

The boats and ships were out on the water:

My eagle friend made one final appearance but was unsuccessful in catching any birds while I was there.  They scattered and chased it away:

The sun rose and the fog started to burn off:

The great blue heron decided to show off its flying skills:

Watch out, gull!

And a final trip to see my eagles at Vanier Park.  Ms Vanier, you are gorgeous!

As we were walking over to Granville Island, a crow was chasing the male back to his nest:

And that's it!  Now, a few pictures from the air:

Bye Vancouver, see you next time!

Rainy morning with lots of wildlife!

It was raining from night to morning but I wanted to take a walk. The hotel provides nice, big umbrellas so I was ready to go. I didn't take my DSLR with me, just my point and shoot, so the pictures aren't all that clear. The one thing my point and shoot has is video, and it came in handy.  You'll hear the rain falling in each of the videos.

The ships look different when they're lit up:

I was walking along the sea wall, hoping to see my eagle friend and curious to see where his lookout was now that the big tree was cut down. As I was thinking this, an adult eagle flew past me, very low and out onto the rocks by the water. Of course I was excited because I'd never seen an eagle on the rocks before and hoped I could get closer. While watching the eagle, I noticed some other animals in the water swimming in a group of 5 or 6 so I started to shoot. As I was shooting them, the eagle took off. What I didn't realize at the time was the bird in its talons! I only noticed this when I went back to the hotel and watched it on my laptop.

The swimmers were otters. They came up to the shore and then ran back down to the water again:

They were SO cute!  I decided to try and follow them because I'm a stupid human who eventually realised they were going further out into the water.  I never saw them again, but I did see a very rude great blue heron who wouldn't share his fish with crows:

Remember the eagle's lookout tree?  It was cut down because it was dead and now it's been turned into a lovely piece of furniture:

Yes, a loveseat!  Now think of the size of trees in Ontario that you thought were big.  Could any of them be as big as this one?  I thought this was great, the tree has had its purpose for decades and maybe centuries and now it has a new job.

I had one day to go and I was really missing my dogs and cats, then I saw this lucky dog walker.  How cool would it be to be able to walk around Stanley Park every day?  And with such well mannered dogs?

Just before I went back to my hotel, this group of Canada Geese walked across the street and onto the beach.  We had to stop for them and they weren't in a hurry:

Sunday: My first full day in Vancouver

...and as expected, I was up wayyyy too early. I went down to the beach at around 8 a.m. which is my favourite way to start the day. Double click on pictures to enlarge them.

I ran into a sad, crying, complaining baby gull:

Looked out at the ships:

What's that in the distance flying towards me with a massive wingspan?

Yessss! My first eagle, and definitely not my last, because...

This juvenile bald eagle showed up an hour later! The day was off to a fantastic start. I started walking along the seawall and met one of many crows:

There are tons of crows, Canada Geese and Gulls in Vancouver, in addition to eagles and waterfowl. As I started to make my way to Second Beach, I looked in a fir tree that was taller than the surrounding trees. Two years ago when I was in Vancouver I spotted an adult bald eagle in the tree as I was walking along the seawall, just before the pool. Of course, I expected an eagle to be there again. Well I thought I saw something white in the tree and immediately dismissed it as hallucination. But when I got closer:

Eagle number 3!!! I couldn't believe I saw one adult in flight, one perched in a tree and a juvenile as well. The adults are likely from Stanley Park where there are 4 known nesting pairs. The juvenile could be from there or it could be from Vanier Park or elsewhere.

I kept walking along. It's funny to look at these trees and think they are the same size as trees in Toronto. In this next picture you can see people jogging, walking and riding bikes along the seawall and they're tiny!

On the water:

Have a seat. They have tons of benches along the seawall:

So, you know how the eagle's lookout tree looked kind of dead? It's really dead!

I turned around and started walking along the beach towards the Burrard Street Bridge. That's it on the top right side of this picture, yes, a long way off. Now that I look at it I can't believe I walked that far.

English Bay with the Inukshuk in the middle and further back, Second Beach and the eagle tree:

Mini Inukshuks:

Over the bridge and into Kitsilano, my destination. A bit of scenery:

And finally, lunch! I had purchased 2 vouchers to Moii Cafe, a little place that specializes in crepes.

They were SO good! We only used 1 voucher because we wanted to go back a second time later in the week.

And for the grand finale, we went over to Vanier Park, hoping to see the eagles. They generally return to the nest in early October. Two years ago, they returned around October 4th which was shortly after I left, but this year, I was lucky:

Both of them were in the nesting tree! Before I took this picture I could only see the fluffy tail feathers of one, but you can see the second eagle in this picture. The tree was still full of leaves so they were hard to see from any other angle. That makes 5 eagles in one day, I couldn't believe it.

We went to the hotel later and decided we'd go to The Calling Public House. I bought a voucher to this pub as it was right across the street from my hotel. I took pictures of my meal but they came out looking horrible so I'm not going to post them. The food was amazing, I had mushroom soup and quinoa salad and my friend had a burger and fries.

Cheesecake for dessert:

And that was it. By 8 pm I was ready to sleep. I needed a lot of sleep because I was renting a bike the next day and I wasn't sure what I was getting myself into!