Vancouver, BC (Canada)

[CFLSW Inspection Trip] It wasn't my choice but my Boss told me we needed to get out to Whidbey Island this week. I always like to travel - especially anywhere in the Northwest - but I was still adjusting to the Central Time Zone.  This made things interesting... After driving to DFW Airport, I met with our mini-Inspection Team (only five people - including me - this time). Our Alaska Airlines flight departed Texas at around 1400. This was the first time I've ever flown with this carrier and the experience was better than what I've been seeing with American Airlines.  There was more leg room, they offered rental of a mini-TV for $6, the choices for food seemed better and prices seemed more fair. They even gave us bags of pretzels (that sure is a blast from the past...) and served drinks twice. They only odd thing was watching the amount of effort they made for us to sign up for a credit card...  We landed at Seattle-Tacoma at around 1500L (early) and I said goodbye to the rest of the team. The reason for this was that our travel office thought it was a great idea for us to wait an hour, change to another airplane, fly to Bellingham and then get a rental car. None of that made any sense to me and seemed like a lot of wasted time.  Plus, that city isn't even that much closer to Whidbey Island.  So, before departing on this trip, I'd cancelled the flight and got a rental car from Alamo at SEA-TAC (picked up at 1605).  My original intention was to get together with my cousin (Courtenay) for dinner, but that didn't work out. As a result (and since I didn't have to ride any busses to get my rental car), I was on the road by 1615. Traffic on I-5 was immediately a factor (I knew it would be), but I still made it to Mount Vernon by 1715 (still ahead of my teammates, who'd just boarded their Bellingham-bound flight back at SEA-TAC). The weather was so great during my drive, it occurred to me that today would be a good day to Vancouver!  With that decision made, I continued north.  There were mountains and tall trees all the way - nice scenery. Traffic really thinned out north of Bellingham and I "virtually waved" to my Navy buddies as I passed the airport. I arrived at the US-Canada border by around 1830 and the crossing was pretty easy. The sun was going down over Vancouver Island as I drove up BC-99 into the city - it was all very pretty. I didn't realize the amount of time it would take to get from the border to downtown... By the time I arrived, it was clear that not having a map would make it difficult to find anything. I drove around for about an hour - checking out neighborhoods and attempting to get a feel for the city that just hosted the Winter Olympics. Different highlights included: flashing green traffic lights, "tweeting" crosswalk signals, busy night clubs and quaint restaurant areas, tons of college-age kids walking and biking everywhere. Off in the distance - from nearly every vantage-point - I could see mountains with lighted ski runs. As it got dark, I realized that I might have trouble getting back easily, so I gave up and headed back to the border. Before crossing back into the US, I checked out the Peace Arch and shopped in the Duty Free Shop. Crossed back into the US around 2100. The drive back towards Whidbey Island was OK - especially after I discovered that my rental car had Satellite Radio... Got on WA-20 near Mount Vernon and had no problems (just some slower traffic) getting to Oak Harbor. Fortunately, I remembered where we stayed with our team last time we came for an inspection (see SEP 2008). Checked into my room at the Navy Lodge just before the front desk staff was going to close for the night (2230). Spent the rest of the evening getting ready for work - bed around 2330.  What a day!