AUGUST 31, 2018
Our renters wanted to move into our apartment first thing Sept. 1. Figuring we could do with a good night’s rest after our frantic packing, I booked a room at the Vancouver Pacific Guesthouse in Richmond for the 31st.
With our bags pulled into the hallway, and our backpacks on our backs, we locked and slid the key under our apartment door, and walked away from our home for a year. It was clear and crisp outside as we inched down the sidewalk. My arm aching within minutes. How the hell would we make it through Europe. We thought out loud about the difficulty of pulling these monsters over cobblestones.
Our friend, Tracey, picked us up promptly at 4:00 and had to help us lift our bags. Each weighed about 75 pound and held four seasons of tightly-packed practical clothes, vitamins, toiletries, shoes and boots, rain gear, papers, etc. (for more details, go to Packing for a Year)
BATES STREET
After looking up and down Bates Street, in a suburban neighborhood of Richmond, for the Guesthouse, we called. I thought I must have written down the wrong address. Garish, oversized, new homes surrounded us.
“Yes, you are here,” said the woman who answered the phone. We spotted a small sign with green lettering, Vancouver Pacific Guesthouse, hidden under a pine tree. In the upstairs window, a man looked down at us.
We left the bags in the car, followed the path that led to the woman waiting at the open door. The living room showed no sign this was a “hotel” of any sort. There was no signage, no coffee maker or pamphlets. It was almost as though the couches were covered in plastic. That’s how it felt.
The man had come downstairs and was standing in the kitchen doorway.
Feeling ill at ease, we asked to see the bedroom and followed her up two flights of tan, carpeted stairs. “Are there any other guests here?” I asked. “Yes, we can have other guests,” she said. Which clearly meant, no. (maybe her kids?!)
Back at the car, freaked out and feeling like we had booked a room in The Bates Motel, Tracey offered to put us up for the night. I told the woman it wasn’t what we expected, and we quickly jumped in the car and sped away. What if a single woman booked here, or a traveler from another country? It didn’t feel safe. I reported the hotel to hotels. com. My first act of feeling responsibility to other travelers.
BACK TO VANCOUVER
Joking as we drove along, Tracey noticed someone hanging out the window near me, on the passenger side of the car. The driver was honking, too. “You better pull over,” she yelled. “The back of your car is open.” Sure enough, we left in such a state that we forgot to shut the back of the SUV and our bags, with all our carefully packed belongings, were tottering on the brink of falling into a busy, four-lane street.
“Wow,” said Chloe, “is this what our year is going to be like?” She looked worried.
Back in Tracey’s neighborhood, only a few blocks from our home, we had dinner at a local favorite, watched some YouTube Videos of an Australian singer Tracey was crushing on, and had a great time.
“I hope things goes this way,” I said to Chloe as we fell asleep. “Sometimes by going the wrong way you find the best route.” She agreed.
