5 kilometers away

Day 6

Today was an odd day. We did a lot (went to four different places) .. but they all involved the same area and were all literally just up the road a few kilometers (they use metric here) up the road or hotel is on.

So .. we hang a right .. go up the road a kilometer or two and bam - Capilano Suspension Bridge. This is simply a very long suspension bridge across a the Capilano River gorge. Once you get to the other side you wander around a lush temperate rain forest. Very beautiful views. The bridge was freaky. I felt like Indiana Jones in the Temple of Doom. It was high .. it swayed, but you felt pretty secure (it was made of cable, not frayed rope!). Originally the bridge was to help loggers get to the lush trees on the other side of the gorge. Now it is simply a tourist attraction.

After wandering around the treetops of trees to high to fathom and hundreds of years old, we drive up the road a bit more and we go to the Salmon Fish Hatchery just on the river.

Next up ... we reach the end of the road and go to Grouse Mountain. "The Peak of Vancouver". $37 bought us a trip on their gondola cable car up the mountain (about a mile up) .. in about 8 minutes. What a fabulous view of the city and the surrounding mountains and bays. Breathtaking.

We reach the top and walk around, but unfortunately most of the summer activities are closed as they prepare for the winter activities. So, a bit disappointing there wasn't more to do up there besides walk around, and watch two sets of movies. If it was summer, there would have been a lumberjack and bird show as well as a chance to use the zip lilnes. If it was winter, we could have gone skiing or snowshoeing.

We did learn that some people climb the mountain (2.9 km trail up) on purpose .. and time themselves. It's a big deal .. called the Grouse Grind. I'm glad we took the easy way up! :)

They did have two grizzly bears (Coola and Grinder) up there that now make their home in a large enclosure. They were rescued as cubs and permanently live on top of the mountain. Apparently (as we saw in the video) most abandoned grizzly bear cubs are simply killed. Zoos have too many bears and rehabilatating them to go back to the wild is often too costly. The enclosure on top of the mountain is an experiment to see if rehabilitating them this way (enclosed in a large area simply by electric fence) will work.

We spent a few hours on top of the mountain and head back down. They also have some timer wolves in capativity at the bottom. These wolves were rescued from movie studios who trained them for movies.

We head back down Capilano Road and hit the Cleveland Dam on the way back down. A free park to get a view of a dam that blocks off the river and makes a reservoir. The river supplies about 1/3 of the cities fresh water.