Ashley Chow dot Com

Boy, my feet hurt. I feel like I’m on a trip. Except that with this trip, I get to drive back to my own home instead of walk back to my hotel. Anywho, I traveled back Downtown today, the main purpose being to visit the Royal Canadian Mint Pavilion (500 Granville Street). I got there a little after 9am and the lineup was already massive. It took about an hour and a half to edge my way in there and another 30-45 minutes to get inside the room full of Olympic and Paralympic medals.

Here’s that 100kg of pure gold $1 million coin on display at the Mint.

Now here are the medals. The first set are the Paralympic medals. They’re more square and have braille on the backs of them, which supposedly say “Vancouver 2010″.

This set are of the regular Olympic medals, which are rounder but just as heavy as the Paralympic medals. It supposedly takes a total of 24 hours to make one of these medals from start to finish. Note that each design on each medal is unique, so no two medals are exactly the same.

After visiting the Mint, I went walking, walking, walking, and walking some more (it’s no wonder my feet are in pain). I happened to walk right to the Vancouver Art Gallery (750 Hornby Street), where the Olympic clock sits. The clock seems to be counting up the days now, but it’s saying today is Day 3 as opposed to what I thought was Day 5.

I’m gonna need a better photo of that clock. The biggest Canada flag in the world must be included. (The flag is just across the street from the clock.)

Here’s the bustle and hype of Robson Square (800 Robson Street), where GE Ice Plaza (the skating rink) is and also the Ziptrek Ecotours zipline as noted by the wires in the photo below. There was a performance at the ice rink by some skaters in hoodies and the three mascots: Quatchi, Sumi, and Miga.

It seems somewhat ridiculous, but the mascots got a security escort out of the ice rink. And little kids were screaming, “MIGA! QUATCHI! SUMI! AHHHH!!!”

While wandering the mostly car-free streets of Downtown Vancouver, I came across this copper Goldilocks-cowboy-tingirl hybrid.

When girls and little kids would go up to her for a photo, she would hold out her hand, but when guys would go up to her, she would pull out her GUN. And point it right at their faces. She was really good though.

Anywho, as I continued walking along who-knows-what street, I came across the lanterns that I had previously only seen in photos.

And that pretty must sums up the gist of my day. Oh, and also watching the Canada vs. Norway hockey game at a friend’s house. I was on the lookout for a big Canadian flag today (missed my opportunity yesterday) and later also a Canada Luongo jersey but ended up getting a huge Canada hockey flag and lucking out on the Luongo jersey, which meant I was forced to wear my Canucks Luongo jersey. Great nonetheless.

As for the proposed Wednesday nighttime outing, that has been postponed until Thursday. As for Wednesday, I still will be heading out yet again to Downtown, I forget for what right now (I’m exhausted), and another hockey game watching will happen on Thursday along with an outing. And another outing on Friday, places to be determined.

If this doesn’t sound like a trip/vacation to you, I don’t know what does.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 16th, 2010 at 11:41 pm and is filed under Olympics, Photos, Staycations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.