Sea to Sky Highway-By Rail – Steps to Anywhere

It was a very early start for us today so we would be all packed up for a 06:10 luggage pickup and a 06:50 bus pickup and everything was pretty close to on time. After a bit of chatter from our guide and we were on the way to the CN rail yard in North Vancouver. Using this start point eliminates an hour of travel from the downtown terminal around most of Burrard Inlet. The map below shows the approximate track we followed. The scenery was spectacular and you may get some impression from the day’s photos. I say impression because, as usual, photos hardly do scenery justice.

The train consisted of two locomotives, two power units (I think), one Silverleaf car and two Goldleaf cars. Each Gold leaf car has a glass dome on the upper deck with a kitchen and 36 seat dining room on the lower deck.They don’t skimp on staff. We had a staff of three on the upper deck, two serving in the dining room plus three more in the kitchen. Today was a short day so there was only one meal service. Call it breakfast or brunch.

Upon arrival at Whistler about noon we were warned that our rooms might not be ready until 4 PM, the default check-in time. Having Air Tagged our luggage it was evident that our luggage had arrived before the train and to our great joy our room was ready and our luggage was waiting in the room. The room itself was a one bedroom efficiency suite with a reasonably well equipped kitchen. All we really needed was a place to sleep.

We, along with several of our train companions, waited for a shuttle that was supposed to take us to the gondola that would take us up the mountain to the famous Peak 2 Peak gondola. We were delivered to the Whistler gondola which was out of service. We gradually found our way to the Blackcomb gondola which we could have reached easily from our hotel without a shuttle. It turned out to be a good walk anyway.

After riding the Peak 2 Peak we returned to the village on the Blackcomb gondola and got ready for dinner. Yes, we really did have our anniversary dinner at Hy’s. The steak was amazing and the atmosphere was very pleasant. They still make caesar salad at the table and they still do bananas Foster flambé at the table. It was a short walk from the restaurant back to the hotel to prepare for tomorrow’s pick-up and some sleep.

It never fails to amaze me that wherever we go we always find someone else from close to home. Several of our Rocky Mountaineer companions are from Ontario. Our waiter at Hy’s was from Freelton; we rode the Gondola with folks from southern Ontario as well as from Wales (not so close to home). .

We now look forward to Sunday’s train trip from Whistler to Quesnel. It should be a longer trip than today’s and we are anticipating seeing terrain that I have not seen before despite having grown up in B.C.