1) sun sets at English Bay prior to the show’s start

We attended the 25th annual Honda Celebration of Light fireworks competition on Wednesday night. Competing was Group Vision Show, a team from Brazil. The event is one of the largest in Vancouver, and as fireworks competition shows go,  arguably the biggest in the world. Occurring over 3 days – China performed last Sat; Brazil Wednesday and tonight is Canada – it has an attendance of 1.4 million people. Needless to say, it’s crazy busy but an awesome evening.

2) here’s some of the show!

3) G wanders down Davie on route to the show

4) many boats in False Creek in preparation for the show … including one gorgeous yacht, the Solaris

5) you can see a Vancouver fire boat to the right of the lamp practicing its water cannon

6) we were in the YVR Observation Deck section where you do pay but have your own toilets, assigned seats, and bar service – KLM hosted this year

7) down by the water, boats gather around the fireworks barge

8) and off they go!

9) so pretty

10) this one seems very low … did something go awry we wondered?

11) leaving with G and 300,000 of our closest friends

12) looking back down Davie Street to English Bay … it’s just a sea of people!

13) what was this RV doing?…

We did our annual Grouse Grind climb a couple weeks ago in a respectable 1:22. Even on a Thursday morning it was busy. I can’t imagine folks who climb on the weekend. It truly must be a zoo. We celebrated afterward with lunch at Kingyo Izakaya on Denman.

14) the start of the climb

15) G heads up; you can get a sense of the steepness in this shot seeing climbers weaving their way further up the mountain

16) the top!

17) popping out of the clouds on the way down in the gondola

18) my excellent vegetarian ‘inari age’ lunch at Kingyo

We also recently toured the botanical gardens at UBC which included an adventure on the Greenheart Canopy Walkway and the oh-so-beautiful Nitobe Memorial Garden.

19) G heads to the start of the canopy walk

20) away we go!

21) G pauses to take in the view

22) as do I

23) G goes down

24) G jumps in the Moon Gate tunnel that leads to the North Gardens

25) the north gardens

26) so pretty!

27) inside the Nitobe Memorial Garden

28) so very zen

29) the beautiful bridge

In June our dear friend and former 88er, Auzzie Christine, relocated from Toronto to Vancouver .. yay! She joined us and Barb & Darrin at Buntzen Lake last weekend for a day of, well, doing nothing but sitting on the beach, paddleboarding, and a bbq at B&D’s afterwards.

30) beautiful Bunzten Lake (a mountain spring-fed freshwater lake)

31) G wanders the shoreline

32) and heads out paddleboarding

If you live in Vancouver, you will have at some point see the murder of crows that fly east towards Burnaby each night at sunset. During July the 6,000 odd crows’ path took them right past the east side of our condo … as you can see in the picture below. You can read more about the crows in this National Post article. Creepily Hitchcockian isn’t it.

33) the birds!

The weather continues to be awesome here and July afforded us several stunning sunsets. We’re blessed to have views on three sides of the condo and get different perspectives as the sun sets.

34) sunset on BC Place

35) sunset on Cambie Bridge

36) sunset on the city

37) lunching at The Fish House in Stanley Park

38) cycling to Beaver Lake in Stanley Park

39) the lake is completely covered with water lilies

40) the one spot on the lake with some water

41) kayaking on False Creek on Saturday morning

42) moi over by the Os Gemeos (twin brother street artists from Brazil)-painted Granville Island cement silos, part of the Vancouver Biennale’s 2014-2016. My gaudy glasses were freebies that were handed out at the Celebration of Light.

43) G out ahead of me heads to Granville Bridge