Vancouver - part 2

     On the holiday Monday, CC, Aunty J and I met CC's brother and sister-in-law, Miss Kitty, at a Dim Sum restaurant, The Flamingo.  I gave Miss Kitty an origami spinning top I made and then we set down to business!  We ordered a few things from the Dim Sum carts, but had the two-course Peking Duck (my first time!).  The first course is the crispy skin with bits of meat still attached that is placed into a thin pancake with some brown sauce (Hoisin?) - droolarama!  There was quite a wait for the second course as a mistake was made but it was well worth it - the duck meat is stir-fried with chestnuts and other goodies and placed inside iceberg lettuce wraps - crispy, watery and succulent - did I say drool?  If we had ordered the third course it would have been soup made from the bones - nothing wasted here.  For dessert we had some warmed up black sesame mochis (glutinous rice cakes filled with black sesame seed paste - not too sweet but very tasty) and mango pudding (topped with condensed milk - oh god!).  We then said our goodbyes to JC and Miss Kitty and came back to the house for a rest.  We then went for a walk in the neighbourhood, had a Scotch and chat with Aunty J, ate a light dinner of grilled cheese and avocado sandwiches with greens then hit the sack.

Hycroft

     On Tuesday, we went on an adventure with GS.  She pulled up in a silver mustang convertible (but wanted to rent a jeep!), loaded us up and headed off.  First stop was Hycroft (the University Women's Club of Vancouver) of which she is a member.  It was once a private residence and there are still many architectural features extant.  It also has a lovely garden, much to CC's delight.  We drove through downtown, across the Lion's Gate Bridge, and ended up at Wycliffe Park.

Wycliffe Park

     It was a quick hike down to the beach which afforded a fantastic view.  We crossed a rocky path in the water over to an island and I Billy-goated up the rocks to take pictures and admire the vistas.  Got a close-up of some Arbutus trees and couldn't get over the red bark.  We headed back to shore and beachcombed (saw a cool, old, rusty piece of metal that looked like it had come from a ship) then went up to the cafe for some lunch.

     It was then up along the coast with mountains on one side and the water on the other - I felt quite vulnerable being in the back of the convertible, but was happy for the unobstructed views.  We turned around just past Squamish and stopped at Shannon Falls for a quick break and photo-op.

      There was a lot of traffic on the way back into Vancouver, and after a coffee stop, we went to Vij's restaurant.  

The art of Vij's

     Even though we were there early, there was a 90 minute wait for a table (they don't take reservations).  We sat and had wine while they served us nibblies and got a table after about an hour.  The wait was worth it!  There were so many incredible sounding dishes to choose from and the scents coming from the kitchen were heavenly!  I started with Eggplant with rapini in a thick yoghurt curry, CC had curried chickpeas and sweet potato-ricotta "cookies", while GS had Jackfruit in black cardamom and cumin curry.  For mains, I had Rajasthani style goat meat with mildly spiced vegetables, CC had pork tenderloin on mushrooms and pearl barley pilaf with braised pork hock, tomato and mustard seed curry, while GS had splitpea and spinach mash and spicy millet/bulghar dumplings with vegetables sautéed in pomegranate curry (!!!).  What can I say?  The best Indian food I have ever had.  We rolled out of there to our first rainfall and I had a good chuckle watching the other two try to figure out how to secure the convertible top.  Home then bed.  *Also found out that my brother was taken into emergency earlier and had to have emergency surgery to have a brain tumour removed!*