Vancouver & Edmonton Trip - May 2026

The last day of our Victoria Weekend 2026 vacation is here! The plan for the day? Do a tour of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, take in a few last sights in the downtown core, and head to Fort Edmonton Park -- all of which we checked off. We had arranged a 4PM checkout from the hotel, so we returned to do that before heading to West Edmonton Mall as the last stop. From there, it was on to the airport. We hung out at the Premium Plaza Lounge until our flight to Halifax boarded at 10:30 PM. We left a little bit early, landed in Halifax 20 minutes early, and were home by 7:20 AM -- time for Pam to get a couple more hours of sleep than the airplane provided, before she headed off to school at noon.  We packed a lot into four days, but we loved what we got to see in Vancouver and Edmonton, and we enjoyed some really good catch-up conversations with old friends.  By the way, hats off to Jill Scott, an Edmonton-born former work colleague and good friend, who provided all the key ...

It was 2 AM by the time we got to bed. We were supposed to have picked up a rental car at the airport when we landed last night, but the Thrifty Car Rental counter was closed when we got to it, despite having confirmed that we would be picking the car up at 1 AM. In any case, I took a shuttle back to the airport this morning, picked up the rental car, and then we headed north to downtown Edmonton, which is 30 minutes by car from Edmonton International Airport. We splurged and stayed at the J.W. Marriott Edmonton ICE District Hotel, which is connected to Roger's Centre, home of the Edmonton Oilers. Built eight years ago, the hotel is complete luxury. We received an upgrade to the top floor and had access to the Club Lounge for the duration of our stay. We spent the afternoon taking in some sights in the downtown area, and we also drove around the University of Alberta campus. We ate our evening meal at the hotel, thoroughly enjoying the “lap of luxury”. The view from our 22nd floor ...