We are up and off to …. Um … walk the decks this morning as the darn gym is closed and locked.  Huh?  Really?  It wasn’t before….oh well, it is off to the decks we go for a little bit of exercise before our full day of traveling.  At least it gives us the opportunity to watch the Vancouver coastline as it appears – and watch the Celebrity and RCL ships arrive and dock.  Snug fit with us and RCL right up against each other!

And, now, let the waiting begin.  Our flight isn’t until 12:55p, so we have all the time in the world.  Abandoning our cabin as late as possible, we go and hang out up at the pool for a while before finally disembarking the Westerdam for good and heading off to retrieve our luggage.  Tasks handled, we enter the long, long taxi queue – maybe 50 people long? But it actually moves pretty quickly and before you know it, we are on our way to YVR. 

Check in is simple, security equally so, lounge is great and the flight takes off on time.  This plane has those awesome tail and landing gear cameras which just fascinate us during the whole flight.  It’s a blast watching us taxi and then take off down the runway.  The views from the window are stellar, as we lift off up over the water and the mountains far off in the distance.

Turning inland, we fly right over the aforementioned mountains, eventually moving out into the heartland of Canada, over the fields and farms that look so similar to the mid-western part of the US.  What a change in scenery!

The city of Winnipeg appears in the distance, rising up out of the flat farmland like the land of Oz as we descend into the airport – and the flight geeks in us delight in the landing gear camera!

Smooth flight, easy landing, we have our bags and our rental car in no time.  With the time change it is after 6 when we finally leave the airport, so we stop off at the Safeway on the way to the condo for supplies and dinner materials, then make our way into the city to our awesome rental.  OMG!  The best equipped condo ever!  They have absolutely everything you could ever imagine in terms of kitchen gear, spices, even pasta and other food stuffs.  There is even a grill!  The bathroom is equipped with more shampoo and conditioner than you could ever need.  The only thing missing is soap – there is one Old Spice liquid soap thing, but I’d rather pass on that.  Easily enough handled – tomorrow – we find soap.

Dinner handled – sandwiches, perfect!  And we are ready to settle in for the evening and prepare to begin our Winnipeg explorations tomorrow.