csammisrun

It became a common refrain in the weeks leading up to the wedding:

“What are you looking forward to most?”
“Vacation!”

We’d been planning the honeymoon almost as long (if not longer) than everything else and both of us desperately needed a vacation. I hadn’t had any non-family-related time off since about 2004. We spent the wedding night in a hotel by the Kansas City airport then bright and early the next morning we were on our way!

We flew into Seattle, arriving in the early afternoon. Apparently the weather had been a little iffy earlier that day but by the time we left the airport in our rental car it was sunny in the high 50s.

Heading north on the I-5 towards Canada.

This very fine day turned out to be a trend. The weather was actually amazingly cooperative most of the trip. We rented a convertible and had the top down fairly often, albeit with the heater blasting. People looked at us like we were nuts but saying “we’re on our honeymoon” excuses a good deal of peculiar behavior

Our righteous steed: a 2010 Ford Mustang. Would’ve been more fun with a stick shift but what can you do.

At the border crossing into Canada. The border guard was very nice and asked if we realized that it only gets colder as we go farther north.

We drove up to Vancouver where we stayed at the Sunset Inn and Suites for two nights. The hotel is situated in downtownish Vancouver on the West End, a location defined by wall-to-wall ethnic food restaurants. We rented bikes and rode around Stanley Park, went to the Museum of Anthropology, and generally walked around and ate plenty of Asian food.

The early morning view from our 10th floor room.

Biking around Stanley Park (All pictures and a movie from Stanley Park).

The Museum of Anthropology at University of BC Vancouver (All pictures from the MoA).

We ate Thai (Thida Thai)…

…Chinese (Han’s Wun-tun House)…

…and Japanese (Benkei Noodle House).

Two shawerma places right next to each other. We could eat here forever

We left Vancouver on the third day and took the ferry to Vancouver Island. We visited Butchart Gardens and then drove down to spend the night at Victoria.

One of many wallpaper-worthy photos of Butchart Gardens (All pictures from Butchart Gardens).

The next morning, we took the ferry out of Victoria to Port Angeles, Washington. This was quite a bit harder than leaving the country in the first place. The customs line boarding the ferry took an hour and a half, and the customs agent on the other side didn’t believe us when we said we were on our honeymoon and that we didn’t bring anything back. USA #1!

Goodbye Canada…

This bird probably didn’t get grilled about his lack of declarations. Speciesist profiling, that’s what it is.

This is a good place to take a break – this post could get enormous and impossible to load. “Honeymoon Part Two: The Americaning” coming soon!