May 29, 2016 – I should know better than to go downtown on a Sunday afternoon.
Kirk had some work he wanted to do at the Yacht Club so I thought I’d do a dozen errands and then join him back at the Club to process a few hundred photos from Sailpast two weeks ago.
But traffic on the bridges was stupid, so I deleted a few stops on my list and decided to whip into Gastown and stop at The Bay and then head back to the North Shore.
That shouldn’t take long.
Right?
Wrong.
I circled Gastown three times than gave up and drove up to the Mall where I figured I’d just park underground and walk down to the shop I wanted to go to. On the way down I couldn’t figure out why there were SO many people wandering somewhat aimlessly.
Then I saw the stacks and realized that two cruise-ships had puked thousands of tourists into the downtown core.
Exactly why I didn’t leave these two errands until tomorrow when I could have just walked from work, I do not know.
Clearly I am an idiot.
It is cruise-ship season again. That time of year during which thousands of cruise ship tourists arrive for a superficial glance at this fabulous city, and then re-board after a few short hours and declare they have visited.
And what do they see?
Well, when I was trying to navigate Cordova street I ran into the mass of people waiting to hear the steam clock whistle. And all I wanted to do as I tried to get past the masses waiting with their cameras in video mode, was yell “It’s fake!!!, it’s not a real steam clock!!!”
Yes, clearly I should not go downtown on a Sunday again until September….
I struggled in gridlock trying to get out of downtown and back to the sanity of the North Shore, and then marvelled at the idiocy of some drivers as a fellow in front of me in a black pickup truck stopped at a red light at a busy intersection, waited about 3 seconds, and then proceeded through the red light.
That was enough for me, time to give up for the day.
Honestly, the best way to get out on the water is on a small vessel, where one can actually be close to the water and have a bit of solitude.
Like this fellow above.
Oh, and a beer, that’s always a good plan for cooling off 😉
30 comments
why do you say the clock is fake?
It hasn’t been a steam driven clock in many years. The gears are electric, only the whistle is steam….and it’s all for show.
According to this, the movement is gravity driven by ball weights and a small steam engine lifts the weights. http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/canada/british-columbia/gastown-steam-clock-more-accurate-after-refit-says-creator-1.2919411
Perhaps fake was too harsh. But it’s not a truly, fully, steam driven clock, which is more or less how it is touted by the tourist industry in the area.
I think what bugs me about it is that it is marketed locally as something left over from the days when Gastown was built, but it wasn’t built then. It’s not a 19th Century piece of heritage, it’s not fully steam powered, it does have electric motors driving components.
“But the clock is not entirely steam powered. It also has three small electric motors to help operate two internal fans, one of which blows the steam out the top, and another that controls the valves that play the tunes on the five steam whistles mounted atop the clock case.”
so it’s a hybird, friggin’ hippies must love that.
The Prius of public clocks.
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I think we do idiotic things like going downtown on a Sunday to remind ourselves why we should not go downtown on a Sunday!
It’s not always like that, just when cruise-ship season disgorges ten to fifteen thousand people, from three or four ships at a time, into the core for a few hours to get a totally wrong impression about the city-of-the-day.
And since they can’t really get anywhere to see much of anything, they all flock to the touristy spots within range, like Gastown, or Stanley Park, or Pacific Centre Mall, or Robson Street, or the Capilano Suspension Bridge. So the core plugs up with people, cabs, and tour buses.
And residents, trying to go about their lives, get cranky and have to be reminded, through painful traffic experiences, to stay away when the ships are docked.
116 pictures in 2016
116 pictures in 2016
Part of the reason I live downtown and walk or take Canada line. There is a lot to see and do and not having a car gives freedom. At night I am always an $8 taxi ride from home.
116 pictures in 2016
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116 pictures in 2016