We cleaned up the Air BnB and headed out by about 1030. We made a quick stop back by the river to say our goodbyes to the panoramic vista we have gotten to know quite well over the past few days. The Watershed Grill/Jack’s Bar was just about to open, but we made an exit before things got rowdy.
We then drove for the next 45 minutes until we got to Murdo Fraser Park in North Vancouver. This is the site for Mel’s cabin in the show Virgin River. It is situated on a pond within the park and has evidently been used in numerous shows or movies throughout the years. We made a quick loop before making our way out of the park. Our tour of Virgin River filming locations had come to a close. We drove across the Lion’s Gate bridge into downtown Vancouver and remained in traffic until we got to the airport nearly an hour later.
With such picturesque filming locations, perhaps you are thinking to yourself, “Should I watch Virgin River?” And the answer to that is no. The writing is. . . quite poor. The acting attempts to overcome the bad writing (but can only do so much), and the timeline is inexplicable. Has one week elapsed over the course of four seasons, or is it a year? If you don’t think too hard about all the plot holes and timeline issues or mind cheesy melodrama, Virgin River might hit its mark, however. At the end of the day, I think it’s just supposed to make people feel cozy and believe that there are places in the world where people actually care about each other.
Back in the real world, we checked in for our Delta flight with ease. Vancouver is considered a precleared airport, so customs and everything is set up as if we had already arrived in the USA by the time we got into Vancouver’s terminal. Our tickets had TSA Pre-Check on them and there was apparently a Pre-Check line, which accomplished nothing that pre-check is designed to do. The line was longer than the regular security line and didn’t appear to give us any advantage. I was asked to remove my shoes, which I found to be quite silly. When we got to customs, we approached the Global Entry kiosks to find that none were working. Mine kept giving me a 2 minute countdown after it took my picture. What was it counting down to? Was the kiosk about to blow up? I tried three different kiosks before the worker told me to just go to the border agent and show my Global Entry card. None of this made sense, particularly since the card is only meant for land border crossings. Luckily I had my card handy only because I figured a nonsensical day like this would eventually transpire.
Nevertheless, our arrival at the departure gate after all the slowdowns was timed perfectly. Our names were called and we were issued seats together in Comfort +. We had the option for one of us to be in business class, but considering that it’s just a 30 minute flight to Seattle, neither of us felt we were giving up much to sit back with the commoners.
Having left a precleared airport, there was nothing left to do once we landed in Seattle but to walk out of the airport. We soon found ourselves on the way to Sammamish, just outside of Seattle, to meet up with some friends on this side of the border. It is a brief pit stop on our way back to L.A.
passports & pepto bismol 