The New Moda

As Jean and I are wont to do, we took advantage of a Travelzoo deal and booked another overnight in Vancouver. My goal was to eventually visit every “cool” (read: expensive-ish) hotel in Vancouver and while that probably won’t happen while looking on Travelzoo, I can check another off the list with our visit to the Moda Hotel. Girls weekend, whaaaaaat.


SEND OUT THE WELCOME PARTY!




Mmmm, pillow.

We started the visit off right with a trip to the Canucks store at Rogers Arena, to pick up my fixed-up jersey (way to sew a patch on crooked, Reebok). Oddly, they hadn’t fixed it, so they gave me a different one. Once back at the hotel, I tried the new one on and the crest was all lumpy, so we went back again and I rifled through the racks myself to find the perfect jersey. I don’t spend $120 for a lumpy shirt, so I wasn’t too concerned about crazy-anal I must have looked.



Of course, it being March and all, the city was beginning to feel like spring (and it being 2012, using Hipstamatic was still cool.)







Of course, we stopped by the grocery store to pick up some essentials:

(Royale is kind of a big deal in the TP world, so…)

We knew the hotel was kind of hip because they have very clean/coherent graffiti on either side of the building. No big deal.



We spent the afternoon in Yaletown, so upon recommendation of a greasy-spoon type restaurant nearby, we had dinner at PHAT (which just sounded like “FAT”, when the shopgirl recommended it. Think about it – a restaurant called “FAT”. Would you go?)


Whatever the restaurant is called (be it “FAT” or whatever), you can’t go wrong with garlic French fries and a hot dog.


It was hockey night, which meant that I forced Jean to watch a game with me. She was instead interested in sleeping (or at least trying to.) Until I invented…THE PILLOW-COPTER. It is just how it sounds – assault with a pillow in each hand, arms above your head in a circling motion. There are sadly no photos of this because I had a pillow in each hand.




Those hipstamatic filters are really something else.



For brunch the following morning (yeah, that was it – hockey and then bed), we decided to get cultural. Obvio, Vancouver is a ramen mecca (at least, in comparison with many other Canadian cities), so we decided to try Ramen Santouka.




(Had enough of the blurry hipstamatic photos yet?)
Verdict: It was aiet. Broth was very rich, but the noodles just didn’t capture me. And naruto (swirly thing fish cake) always tastes like the ocean to me.

After ramen-ing, we headed over to Gastown because we are out-of-towners and this is what we do. We had coffee at Trees Organic on Water Street and talked about how we both hoped to live in Vancouver and what the future was going to look like. Generation of dreamers – they ain’t kdding.







After buying some amazing candles at Nouvelle Nouvelle (GET THOSE TALL VANILLA SEA MONSTER CANDLES BACK IN STOCK!), we headed for home. Little did I know that in three short months, I would be moving right into the neighbourhood….

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Sleepover in Hipstamatic

Thanks to Groupon/Jaunt/LivingSocial/etc, I think I have a new mechanism to meet my goal of staying at every hotel in downtown Vancouver (west side only, plz.) Jean and I decided to splurge for our annual (?) weekend excursion into the city for some girl time, gabbing about thighs and whatnot. Our trips are always full of ambition and then we end up lazing about. But we are old ladies. It’s what we do best.

Our selected retreat this time around was Le Soleil where we stayed in a suite with a sitting room(!) and a view of the brown building across the street. Sexy.




The best part was the Keurig in the room, which we didn’t use for fear of the price of the included k-cups.

We met up with Jean’s friend Jessica for dinner at decidedly the coolest-named restaurant in Vancouver, Transylvania Flavour.



I thought the restaurant would be cave-like with a vampire theme, but it just looked like a strip-mall location turned wannabe European. My bad. Also, the owner lady was inexplicably intimidating and the food was only OK. Next!

We headed back to the hotel and went for dessert to the Copper Chimney. We got a $20 food card when we checked in so we obviously HAD to use it. I had a this chocolate thing which tasted exactly like every other chocolate thing that restaurants buy from WOW Desserts and have shipped in. Next!



We headed two blocks over to the Cactus Club on Burrard and got our sociables on.



Ugh, I hate the waiters at these kind of places. He comes by, splays himself across our table and proceeds to ask us if we are having a “girls night out” and what our plans are for after. You still aren’t getting a bigger tip. He then comes by later to ask if we want “shots” and says he’ll grab something really special and delicious just for us. It proceeds to cost me $7.00. UGHHHHHH loser.

After cleaning up my $35 tab, we head back to the hotel into our twin beds! Twinsies!





The next morning Jean and I checked out and headed into Gastown for some sustenance.







We ended up at the Red Frog which was amazingly quiet for a Sunday lunch. We had a nice sit.





After exploring some of the wonderful shops Gastown has to offer, we headed out of the city and back into the valley….these nights away are getting decidedly tamer.

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dam ships

A week after arriving back on Canadian soil, I left the country once again, but this time it was only to venture over to our neighbour to the south. For this mini-vacation, Jean and I were going to exploit most major transportation methods – automobile, train, automobile, boat, train, automobile, in that order. So first up, the car ride down into America. We left before the crack of dawn and headed down to Bellingham, stopping only to partake in the surprising fabulousity of American Wal-mart (it was clean and tidy and didn’t smell of B.O!) From there, we headed over to the Amtrak station.



As you can see, we are heading to Seattle today…so we sat patiently and waited for the train to arrive. I wonder if the train will contain smallpox curtains?



After a delay at the border, we finally received word that the train would be arriving shortly. And then it did! I was so confused though as to where we should be going…only one entrance to the train? And I have to hike my bag up these sky-high stairs? At least the conductor guy had a beard and big hat on.



So my seat just happened to be beside a crunchy, stiff smallpox curtain. No window, just smallpox. But those that did have a window seat sure did have a nice view as we glided along the waters edge.











After making what felt like a thousand stops in little poop towns along the Washington coast, we pulled into Seattle. Now, onto the boat part of our journey, which precluded some more automobile riding. Once we bolted off the train, we grabbed the first taxi we could, which was driven by a tubby geri who kept his butt firmly planted in the drivers seat as we hauled our bags into the trunk. What a lazy bum. No tip! Onwards to the cruise ship terminal!!!

We arrived at the terminal and were shuffled into the crowds, eager to board the ms Oosterdam. After all, how many people don’t want to leap on board for a one-day cruise? That’s right, we are on a one-day venture from Seattle up to Vancouver – isn’t it hilarious? Like, what’s the point? But the boat was solidly sold out and before we knew it, we were up on the Lido deck chowing down on lunch.





Once we had eaten all we could scrounge from the ridiculously busy food stations, we headed down to our room to dump our crap and see where we’d be holed-up for the next 18 hours.





We booked an inside room because we were only on board for not even 24 hours and it was dirt cheap at $66. However, it also REEKED like fake rose-scented air freshener that I called and complained about several times but they just ignored me. They kept telling me it was the “chemical” sprayed to cover up cigarette smoke. EW. But I won’t get into the whole thing here…this blog is about happy memories, so let’s go make some!

After we dumped our stuff, we set about exploring and touring the ship. C’mon…I’ll show ya!


Aft pool


Casino. I’m not supposed to take pictures in here, so of course, I did.




Culinary theatre.


Atrium.




Promenade.



The day was surprisingly warm for being so cloud-covered and so we warmed ourselves for a while outside on some deck chairs. This is the life!









After lounging about, we headed up to the library to get our intellect on. Others thought the library would be a good spot to SIT AND HAVE COFFEE BREAK NEXT TO PEOPLE WHO ARE READING (read: us.)





Eventually our departure time rolled around and we headed slowly out of port – let the duty-free shops open and shower us with some ‘dam’ gifts! Me and Jean had been seriously eyeing some $10 clutches in the gift shop.


Goodbye Seattle!


Um…I think Jean was happy that day…apparently she just hates getting photos taken?



Once we were sufficiently out to sea, I headed to a photo workshop that was apparently totally geared towards geris. I mean, when on a geri cruise, it makes sense, I suppose, but what? What I had hoped was some Photoshop tips, turned out to be Windows 7 tips? Whatevs.



After the geri lesson, Jean and I dressed up and headed down to the dining room for dinner. Since we had picked open seating, we were seated at a large table with eight other people and in no time at all, we became one big, happy family! We never exchanged names…only hopes, dreams, pasts, and presents. Seriously…I told the lovely couple for New Zealand beside me more than most of my friends know…but that’s the magic of strangers, I guess.




Beef carpaccio.


Salmon.


Yum!

After dinner, the next party stop is the show lounge – today’s show was your typical musical routines…which I slept through. I always do this – short cruises, long cruises, the musicals always put me to sleep.



We did head back to the buffet after this and lounged poolside for a while, but I DO have to actually work tomorrow so some sleep is necessary. What a bummer.

The next morning we got up for breakfast as we sailed into the gorgeous port of Vancouver, under the Lion’s Gate bridge. Just lovely!







And with that, we snuck off board the second they started letting people go. We were supposed to wait until our number was called, but when faced with a crush of bodies, who is gonna stop us? Besides, I have to get to work!

After a skytrain and car ride later, I indeed arrived back at my desk at work, the cruise now a fading memory. And fade it will, because I’m never going to sail with Holland America ever again. They can spray all the chemical they want into their rooms, because I won’t be going into them. Sayonara!

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