Since the world is continuing to open up, we decided to head North from Seattle and check out Vancouver again!

It is a gorgeous and relaxing drive from Seattle up the I-5 freeway, but the border crossing waits can be brutal. On a mid-day Saturday, it was almost an hour and it is hard to determine which line to take and which will be fastest. Very inconsistent timing for all the checks that occur.

Of course, it is a great city to go walking, running and biking – especially Stanley Park and we did all three!

So what did we do outside of all the great local restaurants? We rode the bikes a lot and checked out some of gorgeous scenery.

One morning, during low tide, it was pretty cool to check out the huge numbers of purple starfish. It might be me, but I am not sure I have ever seen purple starfish before. and definitely not in North America.

Vancouver is not just a weekend getaway city, it is fun to see all the shipping and boating that occurs throughout the day that you can see from the waterfront hotels.

We decided to get a 2,000 view of city and take a Seaplane to check out the entire area.

Harbor Airlines has some fun and reasonable priced options for quickly hopping on a plane and checking out the sites.

The suspension bridge is sometimes more amazing from above than it is from below.

and some some great views of the city where everyone goes to shop and check out all the restaurants.

The islands and ocean paths are just amazing to see from above,

If you not taken a seaplane ride before, these are highly recommended and lot of fun to experience for a reasonable price… and amazing views that you can see above!

Some of the restaurants we checked out on this trip:

• Shanghai River (Richmond) for lunch
• Joss
• Cactus club
• Lift
• Jingle Bao for Dim Sum

After this, we headed east to Fraser Valley. Check out our next fishing adventure!