Tuesday was another day of rain, this time shower spells were a little more common than Monday. It wasn't heavy rain though but we had purchased umbrella's well in advance as that's a well known essential for living in Vancouver! It's no longer possible to see the tops of the mountains as they have now been covered by fog, and from the weather reports it looks like the weather will be like this for a few days. A few locals have been complaining about the weather, as you do, but it still isn't annoying us that much. We're really appreciating the cool weather and having a break from the heat to be honest, it's just like the UK at the moment.
 
Mid-morning we headed back to Collingwood on the Skytrain, going past our new apartment on the way (whilst wishing we could move in right then, oh well only 2 more sleeps until we can). We walked to our new bank to pick up some temporary cheques as a full cheque book will take a while to receive. We'll need these for paying our rent as they don't seem to be keen on debit payments for some reason and prefer pre-dated cheques. After visiting the bank we then explored the area a little further and discovered there are lots of Chinese and Korean stores, takeaways a supermarket and a couple of beauty salons much to Lou's relief. After more walking around we headed to a insurance broker (very common) to sort out home contents cover ($300) which we needed to have before we're allowed to move into the apartment. Whilst we were there we also got an estimate for some car insurance - $3,300 or £2,100 if we have a letter to prove we have no claims built up in the UK, luckily we did expect it to be pretty steep but it still is pretty shocking! We're just glad we already planned on getting one car and sharing it.
 
In the evening we stayed in the hotel just watching TV and doing some further research on our laptops whilst watching local news. There's been a bit of drama in BC over the last couple of days, there was a assault on a young girl in Surrey, an armed robbery in Stanley Park (very uncommon, and on the same day we intended to be there!), a racial attack in Courtenay and some protesting by homeless people in False Creek. When you hear of these things it seems quite strange because when you are walking around it visually seems pretty safe, I guess it's like any big place though and you always have to be wary, alert and aware of your surroundings. Talking of TV we're not really missing much at the moment, we've realized most of the programs we watch are American anyway and are just as easily accessible in Canada, probably more so. The only thing I'm missing TV-wise is Sky Sports News and Real Madrid TV especially during the Cristiano Ronaldo presentation the other day, it wasn't the same following it online. I've signed up for cable TV from Shaw and when they install it next week I will have TSN, Sportsnet and Gol TV which I'm led to believe will show plenty of football. Waking up for kick-offs at 8am will certainly be unique and it'll be cool in a way because the rest of the day will be left clear.