Dear Elizabeth br Ginting,Yesterday I went to Queen Elizabeth Park (just like your first name), which is about 30 minutes drive from where I live. The Park is actually sitting on a hill which is the highest point in Vancouver, 500 feet above sea level, and has a panoramic view of Vancouver skyline and the North Shore mountains. It was used to be a stone quarry that was turned into a 130 acres of majestic park in 1950's. The construction was overseen by then Vancouver Chief Horticulturalist William Livingstone. It is one of the best parks in the Lower Mainland, and appears in many tourist's brochures. The Park is visited by nearly 6 million visitors each year to marvel at the exceptional garden plantings and to enjoy the recreational facilities. On top of the hill you will find Bloedel Conservatory for tropical plants and birds (behind me on bottom photo), a restaurant and a parking lot. There are many recreational facilities on the lower area of the park: a pitch&putt golf, 2 duck ponds, a dogs off-leash area, 17 tennis courts, a frisbee park, a lawn bowling, a rose garden, 2 beautiful sunken gardens and a forested arboretum area with trails for strollers.
For the last year there has been a major reconstruction on the parking lot on top of the hill. There is a large crater underneath the parking lot that is used for holding Lower Mainland drinking water reservoir. Because of population growth, it needs to be expanded to hold more water and strengthening it to withstand a major earthquake. It is now completed and open for business as usual: the new parking lot, a new water fountain, a new Celebration Pavilion for weddings or meetings and an open area for sitting and exercising. There were used to be many Tai Chi diehards and Falon Gong groups doing their routines every mornings. But not today. It will probably be very soon, after they found out that the reconstruction is completed. Well 99% completed.
It is still winter in Vancouver, which is officially right up to March 21. The weather is cold, and the deciduous trees are still sleeping, just like the leafless birch and Japanese maple trees shown here with me. But some early plants are already started sprouting, like the "tear drop" white flowers shown on top photo. They have a built in biological alarm clock that set-off and start blooming in early February every year. A sight to behold in an otherwise cold, wet, windy and sometimes snowy Vancouver winter.
