Day 37 - UBC

Hello friends, today I visited my favourite campus so far, and I got to give my car a break by deciding to bus everywhere. Vanessa and I decided to go on separate adventures for most of the day, so I had a lot to learn about getting around Vancouver in a very short period of time.

I got up this morning and took the bus to UBC, and it very much lived up to everything people have said about it and more. It was a massive campus (probably the biggest one I’ve seen so far), and it was the most beautiful university campus I have ever seen. At first I was lost when trying to find my way around, but I figured it out relatively quickly. The very first thing I wanted to visit was the giant Engineering Cairn that lies in the middle of the one of the major walking paths on campus. I can immediately tell how big the Engineering community is at UBC just by walking around, and the Cairn was very symbolic of that. They even have a street on their campus called "Engineering Road". As I was making my way around the campus, there was a lot of art commemorating the indigenous population, and I thought that it was all quite fascinating. 

The biggest thing that blew my mind today was the fact that the UBC Engineering Undergraduate Society had a whole freaking building dedicated to them. Some schools don’t even have an office, let alone their own building. As a former Waterloo student and EngSoc President, I am both very impressed and very jealous. The building was closed for the summer and it was taken over by "Geering Up", an Engineering and science summer camp for kids (similar to Waterloo's Engineering Science Quest), but the volunteers in there were nice enough to let me go inside and walk around. It is such an amazing building, and an involved Engineering student's dream.

One cool thing that was happening at UBC was the Canadian Engineering Education Association (CEEA) Conference, and there were like 20 people from Waterloo there, so I stopped by to say hi. They were having lunch, so they were able to sneak me one of the lunch boxes; it was so nice getting to see so many familiar faces after being away from Waterloo for so long. I also stopped by the Beaty Biodiversity Museum and met up with Emily, the friend I made last night, and she showed me around her lab. She was working on some research involving invertebrates, and it was all really quite fascinating. The museum itself had a giant whale skeleton, which was really cool to see in person. The campus also has a nude beach (Wreck Beach), but it was too far for me to get to given the time I had, so I didn't manage to stop by it. Just walking around the UBC campus was stunning, there was so much natural beauty surrounding the campus with it being on the coast and having it's own botanical garden, but also so much about the campus itself that was a sight to be seen. I could go on and on, but to summarize, I loved my experience visiting UBC today.

I then got on a bus and started making my way to Granville Island, which is a bit of a tourist-y, hipster market place. There was a live performance with a guy and his guitar that was really cool to see while I was walking around, and there were a lot of really cute shops. I ended up doing some souvenir shopping and spent way more money than I intended, but hey I'm on vacation so might as well splurge a little on my loved ones. After spending a few hours at Granville Island and figuring out my route, I made my way to Stanley Park. There is so much to admire about the park itself, especially given how it's almost completely surrounded by the Pacific Ocean. I got to see the Vancouver Seawall and the Brockton Point Lighthouse, and it is at this point that I saw the best possible view of the entire city (only shame is that my phone was dead at that point). There were also a lot of really cool totem poles everywhere in the park, which were a very novel thing to see all things considered. I didn't have too much time to spend there, so I just walked around the main parts I needed to see instead of renting a bike like most people do. With my phone dying (which happened 4 times today, it was kinda stressful), I got pretty lost trying to find my way back to the bus stop and ultimately going home to pick up Vanessa and my car, When I made it to the bus, the driver saw I was in a bit of a panic-y mode so he took me somewhere to charge my phone enough to find my path, gave me some pointers, and even gave me a free bus ticket to get home, which was just ridiculously kind of him to do.

After a full day of exploring and a lot of commuting, Vanessa and I got in the car and drove down to the Tsawwassen Ferry Terminal to start making our way to Vancouver Island and ultimately to get to Victoria. We got stuck in some traffic, but made it there 20 minutes before the ferry was planning to leave and were still able to get on the 7 pm ferry. We grabbed some food on the ferry and sat near the window where the view of the ocean was simply awe inspiring. By being on this ferry, I have been able to cruise through both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans! After the 1.5 hour ferry ride and a half hour drive, we made it to Victoria and got to the house that we'll be staying at. Emily Abelseth, Vanessa's friend who gave us a place to stay for the next two nights, was kind enough to give us an air mattress and her bed while she spends the night at a friends place, which is insanely generous of her to do. After settling in for a bit, we went to DT Victoria to a bar called "The Drake" to meet up with an old friend, Eric Power. It was great catching up with him for a bit, but we'll be seeing him again tomorrow when we visit UVic. Tomorrow is going to be another full day, but I am really looking forward to seeing more of the capital of BC!

UBC: www.instagram.com/p/BjrQyhdlI5z