Staying at Hampton Inn and Suites downtown, whatever that means because it looks like we are in the middle of nowhere.

But, judging by the crowd in the breakfast room, it’s a popular hotel.  Of course, it is Sunday morning so this could be the weekend escape people.

Two things I remember about staying in a Hampton Inn are firstly the waffles and whipped butter.  It’s been five years, but nothing has changed, they are as delicious as ever.  The other is where I discovered vanilla-flavoured milk for coffee, and it, too, is addictive.

They also used to have flat burgers that were made out of delicious sausage meat, but on the first day, they were not on the menu.

Nevertheless, it was still a very delicious breakfast.

After some research into where we might find this Pixmi unicorn, it appears that it is available at a ‘Toys Are Us’ store in one of the suburbs of Vancouver.  So, resuming the quest, we took a taxi to West Broadway, the street where the store is located.

A quick search of the store finds where the toys we’re looking for are, after asking one of the sales staff, and we find there are at least a dozen of them.  Apparently, they are not as popular in Canada as they might be in America.  Cheaper too, because the exchange rate for Canadian dollars is much better than for American dollars.  Still, seventy dollars for a stuffed toy is a lot of money.

We also get some slime, stuff that our middle granddaughter seems to like playing with.

After shopping we set off down West Broadway, the way we had come, looking for a taxi to return us to the hotel.  There’s no question of walking back to the hotel.

A few hours later we walked to the observation tower, which was not far from the hotel,

a place where we could get a 360-degree view of the city of Vancouver although it was very difficult to see any of the old buildings because they were hidden by the newer buildings, nor could we see the distant mountains because of the haze.

After leaving the tower we walked down Water Street to see the steam clock and the old-world charm of a cobbled street and old buildings

We stopped at the Spaghetti Factory Italian restaurant for dinner, which is so popular that we had to wait, 10 minutes to start with.  It doesn’t take all that long to order and have the food delivered to the table.  Inside the restaurant, there is an actual cable car, but we didn’t get to sit in it.

I have steak, rare, mushrooms, and spaghetti with marinara sauce.  No, marinara doesn’t mean seafood sauce but a very tasty tomato-based sauce.  The steak was absolutely delicious and extremely tender which made it more difficult to cut with a steak knife.

The write-up for the marinara sauce is, ‘It tastes so fresh because it is made directly from vine-ripened tomatoes, not from concentrate, packed within 6 hours of harvest.  We combine them with fresh, high-quality ingredients such as caramelised onions, roasted garlic and extra virgin olive oil.’

Oh, and did I mention they have a streetcar right there in the middle of the restaurant

I’m going to try and make the sauce when we get home.

After dinner, we return to the observation tower, the ticket allowing us to go back more than once and see the sights at nighttime.  I can’t say it was all that spectacular.

Another day has gone, and we are heading home tomorrow.