Engagement story

We're engaged! It happened on 22 September, 2010 which was also the autumnal equinox, yay! We wrote the story from both our points of view -- Laura's being the main plot and my story as "behind the scenes". My story ended up being much longer but to be fair, the proposal required a lot more work on my part!

Laura's Story:
I knew the proposal was coming soon. I just did not realize how soon! Henry and I had been talking about doing a civil ceremony in Ontario in Summer 2011 (in case we needed to be married for visa purposes) and then doing a wedding in BC in Summer 2012. This was until he comes up to me and says, “Maybe we should move the wedding up to Summer 2011, since in 2012 I will be finishing my masters and we will be moving!" I then exclaimed “2011… Oh my gosh! It takes a year to plan a wedding! I would only have 10 months! If you want to do that then propose to me so I can start planning!”

Henry decided he liked the idea of a summer 2011 wedding more and more. So he told me he would propose to me soon. One day as I had an opening shift at work, Henry had to go to the bank (across from my work). Since he knew I was at work and could not leave the store he took the opportunity to look at rings. I was aware he was doing this, and it became very obvious when he keep making surprise visits to my store to ask me questions about what type of rings I like. Since I did not know what he was talking about, he decided he would show me pictures of different ring types when I got home that night.

So that night after Henry showed me different types of rings he decided to go back to the mall because he wanted to take another look at what Ben Moss had. Since he was going out I sent him to pick up a few items (such as crackers). So when he came back from the store he told me he did not buy anything from Ben Moss. Which I assumed meant that he did not buy a ring anywhere. He worded it in a sneaky way!

Since I cannot stand surprises (I am the kid that opened all their x-mas gifts way before), he decided to try and drive me crazy. Henry told me that there was a hint to the ring, and he left it in the car. I figured it was just a business card or something silly but I could not resist finding out. I grabbed Henry's keys and went to the car, which I proceeded to tear apart. After awhile of not finding anything, I moved Henry away from the car and shut the doors (I was still inside). I then locked myself in the car, and dangled Henry’s car (and house) keys in front of him. I had to shake the keys three times before he figured out that I had him trapped! I was able to get the location of the surprise out of him (it was in a bag in the trunk). I opened it up and found a diamond warranty from People's. I was surprised since I did not think he got anything so soon.

We went back up stairs and I asked him when he would really propose. He told me very soon, which I figured would be in a week or something. Henry said he was feeling hungry and asked me to make him my special cheese and crackers (with the crackers he just bought). I joked with Henry and asked him “What did you do? Hide it in the cheese?” Then I go to open the cracker box and I see a weird grey thing in the crackers. I was thinking “What the hell is this thing in my crackers, did we get a bad box?” I pulled it out and it was a ring box. Then I went “oh my gosh” turned to my right and saw Henry down on one knee. He told me that he loved me and that we are so great together, then he asked me to marry him. I said “yes!”. Then I asked “wait a second did you actually want cheese and crackers? Are you hungry?” He said, “Nope”. I still cannot figure out how he got from his chair in the living room to on his knees beside me, without me seeing him.

I knew it was coming and Henry still managed to surprise me, which is the craziest part! I was completely off guard and it was very sweet.
 
Henry's Story:

At this point in our relationship, we had been together for 5 years (anniversary was last week) and we had both discussed where we wanted to go with our relationship. Obviously, we were serious and committed to each other or I would not have asked her to move all the way to Kingston with me! So while it was something we both knew was coming, my goal was to surprise her and/or give her a fun story to tell.

Finding a ring was pleasantly painless. It only took me several hours over two days to finish shopping since the only jewelers in Kingston were downtown and at the mall. With everything condensed in two places, it made my life a lot easier! I looked at a few places downtown after school on Tuesday but didn't really find anything that felt right.

On Wednesday, Laura had an early shift at the mall and I had an appointment at the bank to figure out my tax free savings account so she took me to the mall instead of school. After finishing at the bank, I spent the morning shopping for rings at the many jewelers in the mall. Laura knew what I was up to (it's hard to hide things when you live together and share a car!) but I didn't mind since she wouldn't know what I would eventually decide upon anyways. Over the next few hours, I went to each jeweler, described what I was looking for and picked one or two favourites from each. The jewelers were generally very nice (I guess it's their job!) and wrote my favourites on their business card so I could keep track of everything. One place was really pushy with their sales though -- I felt like I was listening to an infomerical!

Laura and I had set a budget before I left so I had some guidance in finding a ring. Within our budget, each ring was generally great in one aspect, good in others, and not-so-good in the rest. So I had to find out which aspects were important to me and Laura (ie. quality of gem vs. size, etc.) . After collecting cards from each place, with several different types of rings, I left to think them over.

Despite arriving at school just before lunch time (and then having lunch!), and despite being preoccupied with thoughts of the rings, I still managed a semi productive day at school. After finishing her shift, Laura picked me up from school and we went home. I wanted to find her a ring that she would love while still keeping her in the dark of the specific ring I would eventually buy, so I showed her some generic ring images from Google to find out her preferences. I kind of felt like an optometrist (which is better, one? or two?). In an attempt to be sneaky I threw in some "placebo" images of ring types that I didn't see.

After dinner, I thought about what I have seen and heard today and felt more overwhelmed than informed! But then as I flipped through the cards, I remember one ring I really liked and it matched Laura's preferences. However, I wanted to go back to Ben Moss (the first jeweler) since I didn't really know what to look for the first time. Also, we needed to buy some crackers for Laura's lunch the next day so I figured I would go take another look.

I made it to the mall an hour before closing and went back to Ben Moss. But I didn't see anything that "felt right". So I went back to People's and took another look at the ring I had in mind earlier. It was just like I remembered it! I actually wasn't planning on buying a ring that night (but wasn't planning not to either) but it felt like the right thing to do. I don't make many big decisions impulsively but I decided to buy the ring right then. It turns out that it wouldn't be my only impulsive decision that night! But actually, it was a pretty safe decision since there was a 100-day return policy.

As I left the mall, I felt pretty good since ring shopping was over! (It was kind of fun but very time consuming). Then I realised... d'oh, I don't have a backpack...how am I going to bring the ring into the apartment without Laura realising what I had bought!! I decided to think it over while I bought the crackers (my original mission). My desperate backup plan was to drive to my office and lock the ring in my locking file cabinet. I figured that if no one knows where I hid it, it should be safe until the next morning. But I still wasn't comfortable with that. Luckily, when I bought the box of Breton crackers (and taco mix since it was on sale), I noticed, hmm it's width is approximately the same size as the ring box! When I got back to our building, I tested this theory while parked in the parkade.

It fitted perfectly! So I removed the bag of crackers from the box, put the ring box at the bottom, removed a handful of crackers from the bag and stuck the bag back on top. Perfect! I just hope Laura doesn't notice that the box had been opened. The ring box also came in a black bag that said PEOPLE'S in big letters and it came with the lifetime protection plan paperwork. I couldn't bring that in the apartment either! I decided to turn the bag inside out (so it just looks like a plain black bag), put the paperwork inside and left it in the trunk along with the other car-related stuff (flashlight, rags, etc.). My plan was to pick that up the next morning before heading to school and then hiding it in my office.

So with the ring safely inside the crackers, and all evidence hidden, I went up to our apartment hoping Laura won't notice the cracker box had been opened. Luckily she was on the phone with her mom so it was easy to stick the crackers quickly in the cupboard. Now all I had to do was keep quiet and take the ring out of the cracker box in the morning when I left for school (while Laura was still asleep).

But I couldn't keep completely quiet -- I decided to tease/torture her a bit and said that there is a hint to whether I bought any rings in the car if she looked carefully enough. She went down to the garage with me when I took down the garbage and looked in the car. She overlooked the bag for awhile as it was with the "car stuff" but she eventually forced me to tell her that it was somewhere in the trunk (see her story above). I had originally planned for her to find the bag/paperwork so she knew I did have a ring. But we were having a lot of fun with the "scavenger hunt" that it just felt like the right night to propose. Two major impulsive decisions in one night!

So after she found the "hint", she was really excited and we went back upstairs. My plan was working -- it felt like the big adventure of the night was finding that paperwork and her knowing that I've gotten a ring from People's. I then asked her to make us some cheese and crackers as a snack to celebrate her scavenger hunt success. I was extremely nervous as she got the ingredients -- what if she doesn't find the ring! When she opened the box from the bottom end, I was about to panic! (I thought she would open it from the top, remove the bag of crackers and see the ring box). Luckily it still worked because she opened the bottom and found a grey box, and in that moment of confusion, I was able to get down on one knee and ask the question! She was so surprised!! And she said yes! Mission Accomplished!

First week

It's been a busy first week of grad school for me and work for Laura. So far, our schedules line up pretty well -- Laura starts work at 8:30 so she drops me off at school around 8am. She then picks me up after her shift, usually around 5 or 6 in the evening.

There were several orientation events for school; lots of instruction on how to be a TA as well. I didn't meet many new graduate students in astronomy until Friday (the Physics Department Orientation day) but I did meet some other people (English MAs, and a Biology student from UBC too). There was a boat cruise/tour of the harbour and islands on the first night which ended in an impressive thunderstorm. I also won a free Queen's t-shirt that day. Now that almost all of the administrative things are finished (e.g. I have my student card so I can take the bus), I am looking forward to starting classes next week. So far, I've been mostly reading papers and meeting people in the department.

Laura is learning things fast at her new job in the mall.

Overall, we are adjusting to "real life" in Kingston well. The weather has definitely cooled down a lot.

August in review

We decided to occasionally update the blog from now on, despite the trip ending, to keep our families in touch with our adventures in Kingston! Since we have neglected this all of August, here is a super long entry!

The first few days, we didn't have a car so we did almost all of our grocery/furniture (2 small bookshelves from Zellers) shopping by walking or taking a bus. We only had to take a taxi once -- to pick up a kitchen table set from Wal-Mart. We also ordered a couch and a bed. We built the furniture while waiting for the delivery people.

On August 4, we were surprised to learn that our car was ready for pickup! Way faster than expected. Turns out that my old supervisor at Chrysler made some phone calls to help us out.

My parents arrived in Kingston on the evening of the fifth. They made it all the way here in only 6 days, with only my dad driving! They had rented a huge van from National which easily carried the other half of our stuff. In fact, it could have fit everything from our car as well. Apparently, with National's membership card (free), they got the one-way rental (drop off in Toronto) for a week for only $1000. Take note, anyone who may want to do this in the future! We took my parents out for a late dinner at (in our opinion) the best pizza place downtown. They bake the individual sized pizzas in a big stone oven. Very tasty. We went there on our first visit to Kingston and twice on our second visit in June to find apartments.

The next day, my parents took us to Toronto to go to IKEA. We had stuff picked out online while we were still on the trip and floor plans of our apartment to make sure things fit. We got very delayed in traffic, had a late dim sum lunch and dropped off some things for my friend who will be moving to Toronto later this month. We then spent four hours and a large portion of our furniture budget at IKEA. In total, we ended buying 13 pieces of furniture as well as cart-full of little items like cutting boards, etc. We completely filled up the van (less space since Laura and I also had to be there). We dropped by my aunt's place in Toronto quickly before heading back to Kingston. We got back really late -- 11pm. We unloaded the van and moved all the stuff up to our apartment as quietly as we could and my parents drove back to Toronto despite our protests. They needed to be back in Toronto that night for logistics reasons and didn't arrive until 3am!!

During the following week, my parents visited a ton of friends and family in the Toronto area, some they haven't seen for a very long time. Meanwhile, Laura and I built IKEA furniture for several days. The daily schedule was to build something in the morning, have lunch, then go out to buy whatever remaining things/groceries that we forget (to avoid the hottest part of the day since we had no fan yet), make/eat dinner, then build a couple more things. It took us about 4 days to finish everything. We did really well on most items! We made a couple of mistakes but we either found a way to fix it, found spare parts from another piece, or the problem did not seem to affect the integrity of the item (we hope!!). We had superglue on hand as a backup but we only had to use it on one set of shelves.

We even tried some bubble tea at a "fusion" place near the University/downtown and while the milk tea wasn't very good, the green tea bubble tea was great. It was almost Vancouver-quality, but the tapioca was a bit hard. Choices were limited though, it was only black tea, green tea, or milk tea with standard fruit flavours. No slushies or pudding or jellies!

My parents returned to Kingston on Friday August 13 with a supply of asian foods that we couldn't get in Kingston (or were much overpriced here), especially a nice rice cooker. Some items, such as our fan, were donated by my aunt and uncle (they had extra fans when they switched to air conditioners). My awesome parents also picked up a bike from a fellow UBC graduate doing a summer NSERC in Toronto. It will be useful until the snow/ice/cold comes and especially next summer since our Queen's bus pass only works September to April. On Saturday, my parents took us to Costco (they had a membership) and we got a lot of supplies. Costco had a referral program going on so we also got our own membership and some Costco Cash Cards, which basically means a cheaper membership. We probably won't be able to go to Costco much since it's really big stuff for only the two of us but with the referral deal and some items such as bottled water we should be able to get what we paid for membership back at least. They sell gift cards to a good restaurant downtown -- you can buy two $50 gift cards for $80. So that's pretty good.

Afterwards, we drove about 30 km east of town to Ganonoque and went on a short cruise tour of the Thousand Islands with my parents. The islands and cottages were very pretty! We looked some of them up -- some of them are selling for 18 million dollars (the cottages, not the land)!! Apparently, back in the day, when the government "leased" the land from the aboriginal peoples, it took them about 50 years to finally sell off all the islands to interested buyers. Some of the islands sold for only one or two dollars. Also, according to the tour, some of the cottages/islands are still inhabited by the same family that originally bought these islands. Photos at the end.

The next morning, we had breakfast with my parents before they drove back to Toronto to catch a flight home. The last two weeks of August were much more relaxing. We had our internet and TV set up about mid-month as well as an indoor parking spot. We shopped around for auto insurance, finally finding one that recognized our safe driving experience instead of charging us higher premiums for being young/male. We also spent the equivalent of a full day waiting in line-ups at various ServiceOntario offices to get our OHIP, driver license, and vehicle registration. And, we officially changed all our addresses to Ontario!

Laura's birthday was also in August and we celebrated with lunch at our favourite pizza place and dinner at Red Lobster. It was also a nice break for me since I didn't have to cook that day, for once! Oh, and we also picked up ice cream log cake from Dairy Queen. It lasted us for over a week! Laura's birthday present from me was the complete box set of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Amazon said 1-3 days but it turned out to take something like 10 days!

We did go back to Toronto one day at the end of August to visit Jen, a friend from UBC who was in Toronto for a summer project. We took the opportunity to go to T&T to pick up some food we can't get here and to also finish our original trip properly. It was fun to drive over the hill that killed our car last time and make it into Kingston properly!

So far, we really enjoy living in Kingston. We are very happy with our apartment and we love the atmosphere of the city. We don't really like big crowded places so Kingston is nice and small but it's still big enough to have almost everything we need (except Asian foods). There is a huge shopping plaza that is even bigger than Ironwood in Richmond and has pretty much every store that exists in Richmond. The mall has the 3 major department stores (Sears, Zellers, the Bay) and many smaller shops that we recognize. There are also some extra things like an outdoor movie theatre that shows a movie in front of City Hall every Thursday night in the summer (just bring a chair -- but we don't have any chairs that we can take!) and outdoor skating in the winter. I am looking forward to our time in Kingston!

My parents took a boat tour of the Thousand Islands with us.

An interesting cottage on one of the ~1800 islands.

This island/cottage was my favourite out of the ones we saw that day!

Final night of "trip"!

Day 26 -- Kingston, ON

Today we shopped for the last few things we will need to clean up our apartment tomorrow, including a vacuum cleaner on sale from Wal-Mart. We also found a nice wall clock for only $3! We priced out some more sofas and phone/internet/TV plans. In the end, we decided to not get a home phone and use our cell phones instead. It would be cheaper to add long distance minutes to our phone plans than to purchase a home phone plan with long distance, caller ID, etc. We figured out which internet/TV package we want but we won't worry about setting that up until we are more settled in.

We also looked at IKEA items online. We tried finding some furniture on craigslist but Kingston is pretty small, so there are only 1-2 listings per day (and 8 listings for all of July under "free"). Also, now that we don't have a car, it would be hard to go pick things up! From the online IKEA catalogue, we should be able to get our items quickly when we get to an IKEA store!

Tomorrow, my supervisor has generously agreed to help us move our things from our hotel to our apartment (only a few minutes away) so we won't have to worry about not having a car. Thanks Martin! We have a big day of cleaning and unpacking ahead of us! Also, we may be very sad to be without Internet (unless someone left their network open!).

This would officially be the last entry of this trip though!

The path that we took. Click for larger view!

Shopping + Car Repairs

Day 25 -- Kingston, ON


The traveling part of our trip is now over but I think I will keep updating this until we are at least settled in (or run out of internet service) to update our families back home. Our "trip" technically doesn't end until we move into our apartment on August 1 though!

Today, our goals were to find out what was wrong with the car, to get a rental car, and to at least place an order on a bed.

We found out news about the car around noon. Unfortunately, it's a pretty major problem. In short, the air compressor (for our air conditioning) seized up. It is part of the system that recharges the car battery though, so when it stopped working, our battery stopped charging. We need to basically replace our air conditioning system and the parts need to be shipped from Toronto. Since the long weekend is coming up, repairs won't start until middle of next week at the earliest! It is also a big repair bill but we decided that it's still worth it to keep our car. My parents will help us out with the bill -- thanks Mom and Dad!

Having these problems just before a long weekend makes things a bit worse. We had originally planned to use our car to drive around to price out mattresses and buy other essentials. We tried to get a rental car this morning but without a reservation and being a long weekend, everyone was out of cars! So we are still currently on a wait list for a car rental this weekend.

We survived today without a car though with some good old fashioned manual labour. Luckily the dealer where our car is being repaired is only about a kilometre or two from our hotel so we moved a couple of boxes from our car to the hotel manually. We also took the bus to several furniture/mattress stores that were close together and walked to other places. We can probably survive tomorrow without a vehicle either but it would be nice to have one for the move-in on Sunday. If we are lucky enough to get one tomorrow, we can use it to move in on Sunday. Otherwise we may have to use a taxi. We might try to rent one middle of next week to go to IKEA too.

After looking at several places, we narrowed it down to Sears and Mattress Mart. After considering deliveries fees, metal frame, etc. the Sears one was slightly lower in price than Mattress Mart. However, Mattress Mart was able to deliver on Sunday afternoon, right after we move in. The guy at Mattress Mart agreed to not charge us for the frame and to include a set of sheets, 2 pillowcases and 2 pillows so we sealed the deal! We also found a nice sofa at United Furniture Warehouse but we have not committed on anything yet.

We also had a shopping list of cleaning supplies that we would need for move-in day. Our hotel is near a shopping centre which includes Canadian Tire, and they had a sale on so we got almost everything on our list. We left some items to get at the dollar store that we will be going to tomorrow. Laura managed to somehow arrange everything in a cloth shopping bag and a bucket we had bought and we carried it back to our hotel.

At the end of the day, we were pretty tired from all the walking around in the hot weather and lifting. Laura got a bit red from the sun because she didn't use sunscreen, despite my warnings! We thought we deserved a break so we ordered pizza for dinner and saved the leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

A not-so-grand finale

Day 24 -- Kingston, ON

Google Earth measurements (straight line between locations)
Distance from Vancouver: 3540 km
Distance from Kingston: 0 km

Distance Driven Today: about 350 km
Total Distance Driven: about 6236 km

Today, after driving over 6000 km, our car decided to give up only 30 km outside of Kingston!! So frustrating to make it over 99.5% of the way only to be towed across the finish line! When our car is fixed, we will drive back out and finish the trip properly!

The battery light came on and then things like our radio and air conditioning started to fail so we turned them off. Right after, we had to go up a big hill and I noticed the gas pedal seemed to have no effect so I turned on the hazard lights and pulled over to the shoulder. Luckily, the car did have enough momentum to go up to the top of the hill safely. We turned off the car and checked under the hood -- there was a slight burning smell. After waiting a few minutes, I tried to start the car (didn't expect it to work) and nothing happened. So, I called CAA and asked for a tow. The tow truck took us into our hotel in Kingston, let us unload the stuff we needed, and then took our car to the dealership down the street. The car got there just before they closed so they will have to look at it tomorrow. Hopefully, it is just the battery and the alternator that needs to be replaced. These two components are also two of the oldest parts of the car and would probably need replacing in the near future anyways.

In hindsight, we should have pulled over when the battery light first came on, it probably would have saved the battery since now it seems to be completely drained. But full power lost happened really soon after the light came on so maybe it would not have made a difference. We are hoping that the car can be fixed before the long weekend (i.e. before the end of the day on Friday) so that we can use the car this weekend to shop for essentials such as a bed and for our move-in day on Sunday. If not, we would have to rent a car.

The car broke down about 30km west of Kingston and at around 4pm. When we drove past the sign saying 160km to Kingston, I joked that it would be okay for the car to break down now since CAA tows distances up to 160km!! We ended up at our hotel just before 6pm so we walked over to the bus loop, bought some prepaid bus fares and took the bus to the shopping centre to have dinner and to price out some mattresses. We found a good deal on a nice mattress that was half firm (for me) and half plush (for Laura) because it was the floor model that they were trying to get rid of. We put a hold on it but we will look around more tomorrow to make sure we aren't rushing a big purchase. Hopefully we can get the bed delivered by middle of next week so we only have to sleep on the floor for a couple of nights. Ordering a bed is our first priority tomorrow!

Also, please look at yesterday's entry (scroll down) to see the pictures we've now added for Niagara Falls!

The "Flying Saucer Restaurant" in Niagara Falls; we had to take a picture of it before we left.

I think the Queen's initials in the lamposts on the Queen Elizabeth Way are a nice touch!

Canada's largest city!

We think this is a good new law for Ontario.

An interesting design -- Pegasus-Deer?

Niagara Falls up close!

Day 23 -- Niagara Falls, ON

Google Earth measurements (straight line between locations)
Distance from Vancouver: 3410 km
Distance from Kingston: 245 km

Today, we went to see the falls! We started with a bus ride from our hotel (we didn't stay on the waterfront) to the falls. We were lucky because there was a bus day pass left in our room by whomever stayed there last. After looking at the falls for a bit, we went on the Maid of the Mist for a close-up view of the falls. The American Falls were really nice and pretty but the Canadian Horseshoe Falls were really misty so it was hard to see them in detail. But as the boat got closer, we all got incredibly soaked! It was so much fun! It felt like we were under a giant shower.

In total the boat trip took half an hour and gave us a great experience of the falls. Afterwards, we walked towards the Canadian Falls to the "Journey Behind the Falls" tour which is an elevator ride down to almost the base of the Horseshoe Falls. At the bottom, there were tunnels that takes you behind the falls a little bit and you can look out tiny holes to see the falls. It wasn't spectacular, since it is just like looking out the window on a really rainy day. Except the water is coming from Niagara Falls! However, the really cool thing that was also at the bottom was the Observation Deck, a viewing area near the bottom of the falls. I really enjoyed standing there, closing my eyes, hearing the roar of the water and feeling the mist and wind blow against me. That was my favourite experience of the trip! Laura preferred the Maid of the Mist because the Journey Behind The Falls promotional photo looked like you could go to a cavern behind the falls, but that was not true. I thought that the Maid of the Mist was more fun overall than the Journey Behind The Falls but standing next to the falls was better than any single moment on the Maid of the Mist.

After being completely soaked twice (we dried off quickly in the hot weather, except for our socks and shoes), we had some frozen yogurt and walked back to the bus stop. The frozen yogurt was very very melted -- it was like drinking out of an ice cream cone. We bussed back to dry off and make dinner plans. We were early so we took another walk around the outlet mall across from our hotel but while we were inside, a huge thunderstorm started. It was really pouring, as if someone was dumping water from the roof. We decided to drive to dinner instead of taking the bus down to the falls (free parking with dinner).

Luckily, by the time we got to our dinner reservation at 8pm, the weather cleared up. We had dinner on top of the Hilton (33 stories up) so that we could see the falls being lit up (9pm) and fireworks (10pm). We had a nice and long dinner to enjoy our last night "on vacation". Tomorrow, we will be in Kingston and getting ready to move in!!

The American Falls from the Maid of the Mist

Canadian Falls from the Maid of the Mist

Laura after the Maid of the Mist soaking

I also got very wet!

"Journey Behind the Falls" Observation Platform

View from our restaurant

Falls get lit up at night

There are also fireworks!

Everyone loves Marineland!

Day 22 --Niagara Falls, ON

Google Earth measurements (straight line between locations)
Distance from Vancouver: 3410 km
Distance from Kingston: 245 km

Today, we went to Marineland! We had the tune from all those commercials we heard in our childhood (e.g. http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=r1XOzE15iPk&feature=related) stuck in our head the whole day and even now. Finally we got to go to Marineland after years of the commericals!

We saw killer whales, belugas, dolphins, sea lions, and walruses! We also went to "Deer Park" which was a large fenced field where you can walk amongst the deer and buy deer feed. Our favourite non-aquatic animal was the bears! They were just sitting in the water while people threw marshmallows, corn pops and peanuts at them! They also had bison and deer. Marineland is kind of like bits of the Greater Vancouver Zoo, Playland, the Vancouver Aquarium put together with a little bit of a mini Universal Studios feel to it (especially the main show).

It was really really hot today too but we were careful with sunscreen so we didn't get burned! (except for the parting in Laura's hair) After Marineland, we swam in our pool to cool down then went to a Japanese restaurant for dinner. We read online reviews and someone who used to live in Vancouver recommended it so we decided to try it. It was pretty good, though a bit more pricey than Vancouver sushi. Then, we went to the outlet mall that is across the street from our hotel. There was a "Stokes" (kitchen store) that had many items at clearance prices with an additional 20% off everything if we spend more than $50. We found a nice tableware set (plates, dish, bowl, cups for 4) and a spice rack (12 spices included) on sale as well as some small things like baking pans, jars, and oil bottles.

Tomorrow, we will finally go to see the falls up close!

Killer Whale Jumping/Splashing Show

Sea Lion at the main stadium show. We saw it twice (second time
without taking pictures or video so we could enjoy it more).

Bottlenose dolphins!

This looks like so much fun!

The walrus ends the show!

Deer Park

This bear never got off that rock. It would just stand on the edge and grab at food in the water.

Mommy (bottom) and Baby (top) Beluga

Niagara!

Day 21 -- Niagara Falls, ON

Google Earth measurements (straight line between locations)
Distance from Vancouver: 3410 km
Distance from Kingston: 245 km

Today, we drove to Niagara Falls from Mississauga. We started with visits to four wineries and buying 5 bottles of wine. We now have a good collection for our apartment! One of the wineries made wine from fruits other than grapes. We really liked an apple wine that tasted like drinking an apple pie!

We also looked around the Niagara-on-the-Lake region because it's really beautiful there. The whole area seems to be small little towns and vineyards, just like the Okanagan. Afterwards, we played some mini golf and had dinner at Red Lobster. It was our first time at Red Lobster and it was really good.

After dinner, we drove down to see the downtown and falls area at night. It was really crowded and filled with bright lights. We could see part of the falls from the road but we will have a day dedicated to that later this week. We just wanted to see the area at night and the town and falls lit up. We were unable to go and look at the fall because it was too hard to park.

Niagara Falls!

We're not sure, but it was parked at a gas station. 

(Dukes of Hazards car?)

Niagara on The Lake

Even the Shoppers are built nicely!

Wine Country!

A car from the Yukon!

Toronto and chinese foods

Day 20 -- Mississauga, ON

Google Earth measurements (straight line between locations)
Distance from Vancouver: 3350 km
Distance from Kingston: 263 km

Today, we were at Canadian Tire right when it opened to get an oil change for our car and to get a replacement windshield wiper blade. Yay!

Then we drove into Toronto's Chinatown to meet with Jen and Jeff from UBC (they are in Toronto for an NSERC USRA). We had a Dim Sum lunch at Bright Pearl. It was fun and delicious and it felt like home to be in a Chinese restaurant again where the waiters ignore you, and everyone is talking loudly.

Afterwards, they went to a bakery and a grocery store with us in Chinatown. We got some baked goodies and some essentials like fish sauce and wasabi peas!

Later, my cousin Yen picked us up and we went to Chinatown again for dinner at Sang Ho. I remember eating at this place in the past with my family when we visited Toronto. It was also really good. Afterwards, we walked around Chinatown some more then went to Panorama, a bar on the 51st floor of a building downtown for drinks and a great view of the city.

Replacement wiper blade

The Toronto skyline as we drove downtown on the Gardiner Expressway

View of Toronto from Panorama

Downtown Toronto from Panorama

Tasty, creamy, caramel-y, and with Skor pieces

My cousin and I

On our way out, we passed the Skydome (now Rogers Centre) and the CN Tower

RIP Windshield Wiper Blade (Passenger Side)

Day 19 -- Mississauga, ON

Google Earth measurements (straight line between locations)
Distance from Vancouver: 3350 km
Distance from Kingston: 263 km

Distance Driven Today: 716 km
Total Distance Driven: 5581 km

Crash ... boom ... bang! Oh no, there goes our windshield wiper! That was our introduction to the 400 series freeways in southern Ontario! It was my first time driving on a confusing system of very large highways, it was raining hard, and to top it all off, the passenger-side wiper blade decided to disconnect from its socket, hit our windshield and fly over the back of our car. We suffered no damage and the car behind us was far enough away that the wiper blade hit the ground. We were also fortunate that it was the passenger side wiper blade so I could still see enough to drive the rest of the way to our hotel. We will be getting replacement blade(s) tomorrow!

Earlier today, we left Sault Ste Marie on Highway 17 and had a quick lunch in Sudbury. After that, we left Highway 17 after about 1500 km on it and took Highway 69 which turned into Highway 400, our first 400-series freeway. It started out as a 2 lane highway each way and then grew to 3 lanes and then six (including exit lanes). We had to get in the correct 2 out of 6 lanes to exit onto the 401, which we managed to do successfully! Yay! Then it started raining hard and we lost our wiper blade! After the 401, we got onto the 427 and then the Queen Elizabeth Way (QEW) and finally found our hotel. It was my first time driving on a highway that large and that complicated! I guess I will get used to it eventually if I drive around this area long enough.

Watch out!

We didn't see any!

It's like Metrotown! (Parry Sound, ON)

The aftermath

It's not very effective!

Waterfalls

Day 18 -- Sault Ste Marie, ON

Google Earth measurements (straight line between locations)
Distance from Vancouver: 2880 km
Distance from Kingston: 660 km

Today was another restful day. We slept in, did laundry, looked around Station Mall, the "largest mall in Northern Ontario". It's about the size of Lansdowne in Richmond. We then drove out to Kinsmen Park to see a small but pretty waterfall at Crystal Creek. There were a lot of pretty friendly Canadian Geese there too. Sault Ste. Marie is a pretty small town, population 75,000. We find it really pretty by the waterfront, but nothing special for the rest of the town. There are some nice parks such as the Crystal Creek Waterfall outside of town though!

Sault Ste. Marie is very humid, today's temperature was only 23 or 24 degrees but the humidity was at least 80%! Sault Ste. Marie is also the hometown of Roberta Bondar, the first female Canadian astronaut. The town across the water is Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. Confusing names!

Tomorrow we will do our last long drive of the trip. When we arrive in Mississauga, we would have driven about 2000 km in Ontario, which is about the same distance as Vancouver to the Manitoba border!

The International Bridge from Sault Ste Marie, ON to Sault Ste Marie, MI

Friendly Canadian Geese

Squirtle is in his element

 Pirate ship on the waterfront

Bears fishing at Roberta Bondar Park