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The town:

Maple Ridge feels like a very small town, even though it is part of the Greater Vancouver area, and has an estimated population of around 106,000.  But the downtown was TINY.  Everything was within 5 minutes drive, or so it seemed.  The (old) Walmart was 2 floors though, and they had a cart lift thingy like an escalator to take your shopping cart up and down so you weren’t waiting for the elevator.  We managed to either forget/lose (me) or destroy (Randy) our sunglasses, so that was our first stop.  All the store sections were really small – except for the areas with the Halloween candies!  But still - it had what we wanted, so we didn't feel like we needed to go to the bigger stores outside of Maple Ridge.

Even though we are in the very southern part of BC, the sun sets 15 minutes earlier here than at home.  Since it is autumn, we have found that the temperatures are pretty much the same as home.  But in winter the weather is much milder here, from my understanding.  And the flowers outside are still quite happily blooming away!  

  

The home:

We are staying in a retirement community again!  The home itself is a very cute little 2 storey townhouse style condo.  The townhouses here have the coolest roof lines I have seen, which make  the whole neighborhoods very attractive looking.

 

Inside over the front door there is a cathedral ceiling with a big window that catches the morning light.  There is a breakfast nook, a good sized galley kitchen, a dining room, a powder room (newly renovated!) and a comfortable living room with a huge TV and a gas fireplace.  Very nice space.  Upstairs it has a roomy master, and a spare bedroom/office.  The bathroom is very nice, with a bit of a cathedral ceiling over the soaker tub, and a separate shower.  No basement, and the furnace/utility room is accessed from inside the garage, which feels quite foreign to us.

         

   

It has a teeny back yard, which is open to all the other back yards for this row of townhomes.  Makes sense, as the condo takes care of the outside areas. The flowers are still blooming here, in the yard and around the 'hood!  They mow the lawn, and they come in regularly to clean up the leaves.  Even up on the pet owner’s deck!  Impressive!

     

     

 

The front yard doesn’t really exist – there is only about 4 or 5 feet in front of the home, just enough for some shrubs and flowers.  We had asked if we got to park in the driveway, but when we arrived we saw the driveway in only 6 feet long!  Hahahaha – I’ve never seen anything like it.  Some of the homes do have a driveway long enough to park in, but not ours.  So, all together its about 1300 square feet of space.  We found it quite practical, and it felt very roomy.  The downside - the backyard backs onto the street, so there is some street noise in the morning.  The solution - was to make sure we turned on the tower fan at bed time!  It provided enough white noise that the traffic sounds disappeared.

The pet parents

A good pet parent will let you know what you can use and what you can’t use.  Sharon & Don were fantastic!  Sharon left me 3 pairs of slippers and a fluffy plaid bath robe.  They also said feel free to borrow coats, etc, since they knew we were flying in and the weather is changeable this time of year.  They also said help ourselves to anything in the fridge 😊  So  – heading to our massage appointments – I will be sporting a magenta raincoat and snakeskin patterned rubber booties!  Paired with Sharon's polka dotted umbrella!  I love it.

 

Local restaurants:

We asked our pet parents for recommendations, and they like a pub called The Black Sheep.  We like it too!  Instead of wing night on Tuesdays, they have Crab Leg Night - $1.99 per leg!  That is my kind of place!!! 

We also saw there was a Red Robin burger place, the first time we have seen one outside of the USA.  We were excited to go there for their $8.99 burger special, but were informed by our wait staff that it was only in the US locations.  So we asked for the kids menu, and each ordered the cheeseburger (double cheese on Randy’s burger, none on mine) and they came with one unlimited side.  Fries for Randy, steamed broccoli for me.  It was the best! Does it still count as healthy when I was able to pour melted butter over the top of it? I did get a refill on the broccoli, and the burgers were enormous.  And the cost – was $9.99 each.  Half the price of the “adult” burgers. 

One of our weaknesses is donuts.  Here we managed several visits to a place called Vegas Donuts!  They were quite pricey, but oh so good!  The first visit was to try the honey dip, bavarian cream, and biscoff.  So fresh!  The second time was going back for another biscoff cake donut, and to try the chocolate skor one.  Mmmmm.

In comparison - we tried a place in Vancouver and got a salted caramel (that I managed to knock over and get gooey caramel all over my water bottle), plus one of the biggest fritters we have ever seen!  My mistake was assuming it was an apple fritter.  It wasn't.  It was raspberry - with big pockets of something like gooey pie filling in it.  So I ended up eating the whole thing myself, since Randy doesn't like raspberry.  That would be fine, but it was "Dinner for 4" size!!!  And since it was evening that made it hard to sleep - lessons learned.  Next time - just freeze half for another day...