Long drive back from Wells Grey Provincial Park to Vancouver! The highways here are mostly in really good condition though compared to some of the disaster zones we call highways back home. So upside, nice smooth comfy drive… downside, no one seems to be doing the speed limit! Apparently there’s no speed cameras here so if you’re in a 100kph zone, the ‘slow’ lane (right most lane) will be going 110kph and the ‘fast’ lane (left overtaking lane) will be 120kph or more. So it feels like you have to keep your foot to the floor to keep up or you’re going to get blown away. Not that I have a problem with driving over the limit, but loads of people doing 20 over? That just a little weird, even the campervans and RVs that are everywhere are hooning around at 110kph plus. 🙂
Anyway, we arrived safely back in Vancouver after an uneventful drive… very uneventful for Aunty Mary who couldn’t tell you much about it at all seeing as how she slept through most of it! We went for a scurry down the street to grab a few touristy trinkets for the kids and I managed to get my nails done (how lovely to be able to do that – I remember hunting for a manicurist in Turkey everywhere in 2007 and coming up empty in every town we went to!). Picked up some things for The Small Child for when he comes over in July and a few things for the cruise.
Then it was off to see ‘Twelfth Night’ at the annual Bard On The Beach Festival. Each year the Bards On the Beach society, which is largely a volunteer organization, runs a series of Shakespeare plays in a park down near Granville Island… this year they are doing ‘Twelfth Night’, ‘Hamlet’, ‘Measure for Measure’ and ‘Elizabeth Rex’ over the course of the summer. We weren’t quite sure what to expect other than a play being held in a tent.
When we arrived however, it became apparent that Vancouver has been hosting these events for 24 years (big anniversary events planned for next year) and it is a highlight of the arts and cultural calendar every year. They have an enormous tent complex set up with bars, refreshments, a gift shoppe 😉 and the actual theatre, the backdrop for which is the mountains out the back of the tent!
I have seen Twelfth Night twice before and watched it numerous times on DVD – it’s one of my favourite plays, but I must admit, the performance we saw here in Vancouver has become my favourite. The artistic director (whose name escapes me) had an amazing vision to set the play in a 19th hotel/spa… so think men in boaters and striped and tweed suits, and ladies in corseted highwaisted dresses and absurd swimming trunks etc. It was very creative and just worked so well.
The stage itself and the mountains in the backdrop become a character in the play as they become so integral to the action. The actors were amazing too… Viola was so well portrayed and the young actress playing her was wonderful. Malvolio, who was always one of my favourite Shakespearean characters, was played so well I don’t think I will ever see the likes of it again. He was fantastic… equal parts boorish, amusing and pathetic. Just great. Even Olivia who, while always being a major part in the play was always to my thinking a bit insipid, was played in such a way as to add greatly to the comedic atmosphere. Very beautiful, very clever and very professional all around. Makes me wish I was going to be here to see the rest of the season!
