on y va. Frequent flyer without miles. Vancouver-Victoria-Seattle-Hong Kong

Vancouver 4 am. 

I'm still in Vancouver mode:  Why am I torturing myself by getting up THIS EARLY?   After all, yesterday was an exhausting day, so why would I get up after only 4 hours of sleep?

It's called packing ;-)

At the bus stop I feel regret for leaving Grandma alone for a month.  She's not doing so great and I feel afraid that she won't be around for that much longer.  But I felt exactly the same way 4 years ago when I left on my epic first Tour de France and realize that I would have missed seeing a large part of the world if I had stayed home with Grandma then.

At YVR I have to check in for my WestJet flight to Victoria.  Half-the self-check-in machines are Out Of Order and the other half tells me that I just inserted an Invalid Travel Document.

 Namely my new German passport that scanned fine in all the rest of the world.  A lovely WestJet woman trying to help me is just as puzzled as I am but in the end she has to send me to the Passenger Assistance line-up.  6 counters with 2 occupied.   Will they EVER learn?  When I finally get to the counter, my Invalid Travel Document scans without problems and I get 3 boarding passes for all of today's 3 flights.  Now I just have to make sure that my seat for the 13 hour flight to HK is an aisle seat ;-)

But alas, they can't tell me here; I'll have to wait until Seattle ;-(

YVR was voted the BEST North-American Airport for 8 years in a row.  Anyone else suspect this was RIGGED ? LOL

My WestJet ride.  A Bombardier plane.

And here is an example of an IDIOT.  Trying to squeeze his OVERSIZE bag into the tiny luggage hold while blocking people behind him.

The coolest ground worker ;-)

Tsawwassen: A tale of 2 ferries

And somewhere in the course of taking these 3 pictures, I relocate my short August bike trip from the BC interior to the San Juan Islands

Victoria airport hasn't changed much since I met my pseudo-uncle here about 25 years ago.  Why did he come to Victoria?  He worked for a German bank and was selling money to the BC government.  If you don't have a balanced budget, your money has to come from somewhere, LOL.

At the airport WhiteSpot I choose a Candied Salmon & Goat Cheese scramble on Toast.  

Yummy, I must say.  Definitely good for an airport restaurant!

After some stumbling, I manage to complete an online shopping and delivery order using Save-on-foods, so that Grandma will get fresh milk and tomatoes in the middle of the month.  I tried doing the same thing from Germany, but the web-site only seems accessible from Canada.

My ride on the left.  A jet today instead of a prop plane

Time in Seattle is a little tight (especially after they stop EVERYONE from proceeding through the airport after a 'security incidence', read: they let someone through without checking their passport), but since I have to go through immigration anyway, I take the extra 10 minutes to head out for a couple of cigarettes.

fellow outcasts

Delta: same colours as Air Canada, but infinitely better food ;-)

 On a 13 hour flight, it is easy to watch 3 different movies.  This time I don't.  I watch the same movie 3 times.

Oasis Supersonic. A documentary.  Go back to the year 1995.  A British band shoots from nowhere to super-stardom in a mere 2.5 years.  I almost forgot about them.

PLAY THIS YOUTUBE VIDEO NOW as background music ;-)

 I almost forgot that Seamus dragged me to their concert at the Pacific Coliseum and that Liam Gallagher walked out after 3 songs because people threw coins at him and that was that for the concert.  


This was during the last millenium.  20 years ago.  This was before 9-11 and before Afghanistan and before Irak.  This was before people invented and started watching reality TV.  This was in the times BEFORE the internet !  

And watching this documentary again and again and again I realize that it was a great time to be alive !  How do I determine that?   Half the songs make me cry !  Because we see things they'll never see ;-)

I've never seen Hong Kong airport this busy:

But the immigration line-up is surprisingly fast, so that:

 21:30  I step out into open for my first cigarette.  It is dark, humid, and 28 degrees Celsius. I LOVE it !!!  I've missed this SO MUCH ;-)

 This is also the time when I have to wrap my brain around the fact that my Freedom Mobile Cellphone no longer roams in Hong Kong.  It did in February !   Wind Mobile was bought by Rogers and renamed to Freedom Mobile.   Freedom?  That's not Fake News, that is FAKE REALITY.   Is this yet another sign that Canada is accepting the Trump doctrine that the rest of the world is not important?  Happy 150th, you SUCKERS.  Go Canada Go !

Yes, the Airport Express has charging outlets ;-)

 After arriving at Hong Kong Station, I continue my recent tradition of NOT taking a taxi, but I walk over to Central Station.

IFC 2 mall

From here I take the Ding-Ding to withing 200 meters of my hotel.

Not my ding ding; not my pic

22:45 HK time, 7:45 am Vancouver time.  I'm in my hotel.  That was almost 28 hours but I'm here.

CAD$ 115 for a harbour-view room on the 31st floor.  And Vancouverites call Hong Kong expensive?

And I feel ecstatic.   I feel alive again.  Because this city also embodies the same spirit that was the reason that I watched the Oasis documentary 3 bloody times.   Here is an excerpt of the lyrics of Live Forever that may shed some insight on that:

Maybe I don't really wanna know
How your garden grows
'Cause I just wanna fly
Lately did you ever feel the pain
In the morning rain
As it soaks you to the bone

Maybe I just wanna fly
Want to live I don't wanna die
Maybe I just wanna breathe
Maybe I just don't believe
Maybe you're the same as me
We see things they'll never see
You and I are gonna live forever

A weekend getaway (North Vancouver to Abbotsford by bike)

2 weeks later.  Time to publish this thing even though it might not be complete ;-)

I'm heading out of town today.

The first part, from King George to the eastern parts of Surrey is very pleasant riding.  An asphalt parkway below the power lines. Empty and devoid of cars.  This path crosses oodles of cross streets with little traffic.

This picture is actually from the May 2015 ride

 Unfortunately the particular curb they built at the edge of the roads is designed so poorly that after going over them with moderate speed I have to check every time whether my saddle bags are still attached to the bike.

The part from Golden Ears Way to a bit before Fort Langley brings a dirty and loud ride along a suburban industrial area. No proper cycling path, so I ride on the road.  The the great enjoyment of all those Diesel Pick-up trucks and 18-wheelers scenting the air with their emissions.

East of Fort Langley, the route follows quiet River Road into agricultural land. Congrats to Google Maps to then divert me over a gravel road over a dyke and through the fields.  

The dyke road in May 2015

All good until I hit THE HILL.  I have enough battery power to get me up there, but at the top I notice that something is WRONG.  I feel like I'm going to faint.  I drink the last of the water in my small bottle and come to the conclusion that if I'm going to keep going at the present speed with no additional water I will most likely suffer a heat stroke.  Great. Old Age is not all it's made out to be !

After diverting to the Bradner General Store run by a lovely and chatty Asian woman to refresh my liquid supplies and stopping in the shade whenever I see any to get out of the burning sun, I'm glad the remaining kilometers are limited ;-)

I've stayed in this hotel before, in May 2015.  WHY would anyone travel voluntarily to Abbotsford? In May 2015 the reason was a Pow Wow in Mission

No Pow Wow this time. This time I'm meeting Zulema, my travel companion in Cambodia in January and Spain last June.

Coincidentally, EXACTLY one year ago, this Basque Cop tried to give us a ticket for not wearing bicycle helmets, LOL.

So this is why I came to the BC bible belt. 

But I digress.  But it's so tempting if a blog allows instant access to dated memories ;-)
I don't even have Friday dinner but pass out from exhaustion.

Saturday.  There are NO pictures.   I'm meeting Zu.  She changed her Johnny Cash look for something MuCH Brighter.  GOOD, LOL.  Lunch is great but Zu has to tend to her family again.  Me?  I'm riding my bike...  To where?  EVERYWHERE, LOL

Sunday.

I wake up at 2:30, at 7:30 (I briefly think about making coffee), and at 9:20. OMG, Check out is near !

11:00
Record breaking temperatures persist.  My arms and face have darkened to an unbelievable spray-tan-like shade in the last 2 days.  Riding is strenuous in this heat.  So strenuous that I need to take a break after only one hour. 

12:00
 I've been looking for a restaurant for at least 5 km now, so when I spot the first one in a mini-mall surrounding an ugly Safeway building, there is no hesitation.  And Lo-and-behold;  Benkey Sushi in Aldergrove is rated 5/5 on Tripadvisor.  Personally I'd give it a 4.5/5.  Great presentation, Great service. Very good (a touch less than Great ;-) food, and excellent value.  

Only 35 km left until King George Station.

I deviate from the suggested Google Maps route because it leads right through the centre of Langley. NO NO, there is a red traffic light every 100 meters.  NOT the thing you want when you're free-wheeling on a bike.

13:45
Juice is running low again.  Not in the battery (I have a spare) but in me.  I have a CRAVING for something cold and a chocolate cake.  Oh Look, there is a Ricky's Country Restaurant ;-)
I'm not actually sure where I am.  I thought this would be Langley, but Tripadvisor lists the adresss of this restaurant as Surrey already.
I order a Mt Baker Fudge described as a chocolate cake with ice-cream in the centre but I'm disappointed.  It's one of those cheap chocolate sponge cakes.

 My craving had been for dense and intense chocolate deliciousness, NOT for sponge cake. Ah Well, it will have to do the job until the next stop.

Only 15 km left until King George Station !

A quick aside:

Yes, that is a Blue Shark at a populated bathing beach in Mallorca, Spain.
The person who took this picture says that he NEVER saw a beach clear this quickly, LOL.  People were terrified, the shark was captured and killed.

Only 6 people die annually worldwide by shark attack.
49 die by lightning strike per year in the US alone.
Scorpions kill 3250 humans per year.
Snake bites score at 94,000 dead humans per year.
Malaria after a mosquito bite kills 635,000 people PER YEAR.

So WHY did they kill that shark?   You should have guessed it:  Public Relations ! Only because everyone is afraid of a shark.  Sad reason to die, isn't it?

Back to the trip.
Eating the chocolate cake leaves me gasping for air.  WTF?  Old age, food quality, or air quality?

When I get back to my hotel and notice that neither I nor my camera can see individual trees on the mountains that are only about 2 kms away, I feel confirmed that the atrocious air quality has something to do with my weak state.

An apocalyptic month of Gulag in pictures

A B&B high up the mountain. With a view of CONCRETE.  People pay A LOT for a view of concrete, LOL.

The reason you can see downtown is that it poured last night, which washed the dirt out of the air

Grandma's lawn hadn't been mowed yet this year ;-(

Did someone point out to Canada, which uses its slaughtered youth of two world wars to brainwash its citizens into dreams of glory with the image of poppies, that the choice of flower itself suggests a surreal illusion associated with an opium pipe?

Another Sunny Day (TM) in Vancouver

A temporary home in the B&B

Kookum's son (George's uncle) Brown dies and I'm house-sitting a psychologically deranged (I mean it !) kitten for a week.

Now that it's no longer raining, Vancouver can exhibit another one of its great blessings:  Visible Air.

Also known as car exhaust mixed with other pollutants

There are moments of unexpected beauty:  A fallen poppy petal covered in rain drops, but moments of beauty in Vancouver last about as long as this view

When the air you are looking through obscures the outlines of buildings only about 1 km away, you know there is something wrong.

But isn't it a great thing that cigarette smoking is banned in public parks in this filthy city?

I'm eating at a Viet restaurant on Kingsway and I get a pre-taste of things to come soon.  The daughter of the owner is chatty and the owner and cook actually cares whether I like his Bun Cha ;-)  

Thinking about the reaction of that older Vietnamese man leads my thoughts into a surprising direction:

You know those instances when a waitress in a regular restaurant asks you 3 times how the food is? They're just hoping for a bigger tip. They don't really care.  You're just participating in a well-rehearsed play.  Illusion. Waste of your life.  Go to a restaurant where the cook is the owner and the daughter is the waitress and the illusion vanishes in a second and life becomes real again.   Not a big deal but just a tiny example of how Western society engages in a meaningless dance ritual that only imitates real life.  People perform this dance ritual because everyone else does.  But deep down quite a few people have this particular feeling that tells them in no uncertain terms that their daily ritual is nonsense.  That 'particular feeling' is called depression.

But reality is still out there.  And I'm going to rejoin it in less than two weeks ;-)

Picture a shit-house without fucking drains. Picture a leader without fucking brains.

Yes, that was the F word in the title.  Boohoo.  Turn off the TV !

And I didn't write the title line.  Roger Waters did.

Yes, THAT Roger Waters.

Take 10 minutes (9 actually) and LISTEN WELL to Waters reading his poem (just click on the title below):


Is this the life we really want?