Tuesday 5 October 2010

Day 19 - Fly to London

It was time to be on the move again. We were about to leave North America for Europe. In less than 24 hours we would be in London!
We checked out of the hotel after breakfast & drove the 150kms back to Nainimo. We dropped the car off at the hire company & caught a cab to the airport.We had a fairly lengthy wait at the tiny airport before taking the 15 minute Jazz flight back to the mainland.
We had three hours to kill in Vancouver Airport. There isn't a huge amount to do, but at least we were in the international section so there were a few restaurants & duty free shops to fill in time. There is also a big aquarium with some of the local fish & plant life. Aquariums are like fire & waterfalls, you can sit there & watch them for ages.
We flew out of Canada late in the afternoon on a Being 777 (above). The flight initially took us over the mountains while the sun was still up. Fortunately the sky was clear so we caught a great look from above. We could see the many blue lakes & hugh glaciers along the way.
I'm pretty sure we crossed the final mountain range just north of Jasper just on last light. I could see the lights & flares from the oil wells of northern Alberta before it all went pitch black. The rest of the flight took us over the northern provinces of Canada & then over Greenland, unfortunately under the cover of darkness. By the time dawn broke, we were a few hundred kilometres off the Irish west coast.

So long beautiful Canada.... for now.