Bear habitat on Grouse Mountain - Image Courtesy of Grouse Mountain

Last Saturday, I went to Grouse Mountain with my friends Andreas and Tomomi, the Swiss man and Japanese woman respectively. Since the weather had been pretty good since last Wednesday, I organized a travel group to go for a trip. The reason why I went to Grouse Mountain was because my host-family recommended it, as they knew I wouldn’t be disappointed if I went there, and they kindly lent their binoculars to me. The following day, I asked my two friends to join with me, and they accepted my idea happily. Unfortunately, one of my friends turned down my proposal because of his business, however I was satisfied enough that I could travel with my 2 friends without any assistance. Before going to the mountain, my friends and I had to search for some information for our itinerary. It was not easy work for me because I have a bad sense of direction. Nonetheless, it was such an enjoyable time researching in order to prepare for the trip.

On Saturday, we met each other at the intersection of Georgia St. and Granville St. We ran into the CAs who were supposed to guide new ELI students on a downtown tour. At the beginning of our day, we had a little bit difficulty finding the bus stops which we should have gotten off at. However, we found a number of people with snowboarding equipment at the bus stop that we were at, and we’re able to get to Grouse Mountain without confusion. Our hike was enjoyable not only because it was on a beaten track, but it had been quite long time that we had had a nice clear sky. There were so many people took advantage of the fantastic weather. I saw Vancouver through the binoculars which I brought, took some pictures and bought a ticket to the Eye of The Wind, which is wind turbine to generate power for the Grouse resort and not for public.

We were so fatigued after the trip because of different air pressure, intense sunshine and starvation. All of us fell asleep on a bus returning to downtown. In downtown, my friends wanted to try Korean food so I took them to a Korean restaurant which was on Robson Street. Andreas was a novice for using chopsticks, so he was pretty slow eating his food but he tried and tried as hard as he could. I didn’t think it was an incredibly delicious restaurant but my friends enjoyed the Korean food relatively more than I did. After that, we parted to go home. It was by far the best day ever in Vancouver. It was worth going out and we promised each other to go on another trip. What a nice day and a trip!

Itinerary (noun): A planned route or journey.

Fatigued (verb): Cause (someone) to feel tired or exhausted