VANCOUVER JULY 16, 2006

A stressful start to the day is the best way to describe the early happenings of this fourth visit to Vancouver

I have come to the realization that, while taking the ferry to the mainland is one of the pleasures of living on the island, getting to the ferry on time is not .

To get the maximum out of the day in Vancouver, one has to leave on the 08:00 o'clock ferry to Tsawwassan from Swartz Bay. That means an early start and there is added stress, because foot passenger ticket sales are stopped 10 minutes before departure. Upon our arrival, with practically no time to spare, I ran for the ticket booth. Barbara meanwhile parked the car, bought a parking ticket for $10 and then tried to join me as quickly as possible. Meanwhile, I am standing by the ferry ticket booth, being told that, they cannot sell us tickets until both of us are physically there and ticket sales would be cut off at any moment.

Nevertheless, we made it, but just in the nick of time. The source of the stress of course was our own fault in not getting up early enough.

Add to that, getting on bus 601 in the wrong direction at Ladner Exchange. When we are finally going in the right direction, there is a passenger behind us, who won't stop talking loudly on his cell phone in a foreign language . The stress level is still not improving.

On top of that, let's not forget the weather which started out with a beautiful blue sky in Victoria and is now a dark overcast day in Vancouver.

So there you have an inauspicious start to what may be our last visit to Vancouver for a number of months, since we will be moving to the interior of British Columbia at the end of the month.

That would be equivalent to saying something like "we are leaving paradise". To say that, our four month stay in Victoria has been wonderful would be an understatement.

Yaletown

Once again we passed north along stylish South Granville, cross the Granville Street Bridge and this time got off at Seymour and Davie.

In continuing with the neighbourhoods theme of the last report, our first destination is the heart of Yaletown, which is located along Hamilton St . and Mainland St. between Nelson and Davie.

The tall apartments and condos, as well as the tranquil parks of Yaletown, along False Creek, have been amply blogged in previous reports so therefore, the focus today is on this commercial section.

We find this corner of Vancouver truly of interest, since it was a former warehouse district.

When I think of a city's warehouse district, I still conjure up images of "The Untouchables" with Elliot Ness, black T's and large red brick buildings. The only thing that remains here are the red brick bricks and elevated truck loading docks which have bee turned into broad interlocking stone sidewalks. It is a pleasure to walk along here since one gets an elevated view of the street below.

Revitalized and transformed into one of Vancouver's trendiest neighbourhoods, it is still somewhat of a work on progress . I must say however, it did succeed in lifting us from our previous funk, especially now that the sun had made an appearance. The day was working up to what is a heat wave here on the west coast -- about 25 degrees.

In Barbara's case, it was helped by Bernstein and Gold, an exclusive home accessories store, where she found a Fortuny lamp, several as a matter of fact. Her exclamation of "I'm in seventh heaven" was rewarded with personal attention from the owner.

That was enough to send me fleeing for the door considering the prices of the items for sale.

When she finally emerged, with a smile on her face, the result of her close encounter with Fortuny's work, she also reminded me of the fact that Fortuny, was the inventor of the dimmer switch. That seems like a far stretch from designing these beautiful lamps.

This part of Vancouver is renowned for its boutiques, cafes and restaurants -- like many other parts as well .

It's "raison dêtre" of course is to cater to the legions of luxury condo and apartment dwellers living, like bees in a colony, in the surrounding spectacular glass towers for which Yaletown in renowned.

It is an exciting area, because it seems to be happening now, with many i's not dotted, and many t's not crossed. Nevertheless, it does appear to be in the latter stages of achieving a seamless transition between past and present.

It is well worth a visit which brings us to the end of the first half of our day.

(Continued in next report)