Two metropolises and a new country

Our new record in bus travel...14 hours bus ride from Calgary to Vancouver. I was excited to see which movie would be played on the four screens in the bus...none. We read, listened to music, watched two TV shows, looked out of the window, and snacked on carrots, pistachios, and more. Then we transferred to the metro in Vancouver. 50 minutes later, we sank into the pillows of an Airbnb.

The Skytrain (similar to a commuter train, operates automatically) took us to downtown. With a rented tandem bike (which worked surprisingly well :-)), we rode in and around Stanley Park. I have never seen real giant sequoia trees, but these Douglas firs were impressive. Dense (primeval) forest, waterfront promenade,...amazing park. Every other person in Vancouver seemed to be Asian. We ate ramen with chopsticks for a late lunch (chicken soup with spaghetti).

On the next day, we took a flight to Auckland, New Zealand. We invested our last Canadian dollars in yogurt ice cream before getting on the plane for 13 hours.

In the land of kiwis (birds); Everything is opposite

They drive on the left side of the road. The sun rises in the east and moves across the north to the west. It's early spring and winter sale here; some trees are still bare, while palm trees and magnolias blooming beautifully. Winter, spring, and summer...at 10-15 degrees Celsius and sunny. This country is already amazing. And there's a Magnum ice cream with caramel swirled on top of a brownie...really good stuff. Today is the third day in New Zealand. In addition to downtown (semi-worth seeing), we climbed Mount Eden in the city. A mountain? It's more like a big hill or an extinct volcano.

Every Sunday, there's a car and camper sale in the city. Vans full of odds and ends, very rudimentary converted small buses, ...and an old 1984 Toyota Hiace. A French couple traveled in it for seven months and were selling it. I immediately liked it, Marius approached it more rationally. But in the end, we decided to buy it. Allow us to introduce? 'Jimbo'. We will live in it after we return from the Cook Islands on September 16th :-). Yeah!