It’s a car, it’s a bug, it’s an Olympic celebration on four wheels. Underneath all that, we’ve discovered it’s even more than any of those things. We are psyched to announce Jules Andre Brown as the winner of our April Travel Photo Contest with his photo titled, “Love Bug.”  As Jules explains:

This was shot at the Vancouver Olympics, just after Canada won the gold medal for hockey. It brought great joy around Vancouver; an exciting moment for locals and tourists alike. It belongs to a great fellow named Marc, with whom I currently work with. Marc donates his time, his car, and even his movie collections to people experiencing autism.  This car actually changes from time to time. In fact, sometimes the car has a working water fountain with mermaids and different sculptures. However, I think this time it was a special Olympic model. I’ve been privileged to be with him in meetings about life and this car.

Mermaids? That’s quite a ride. As Matt puts it, “if you’re serious about doing a road trip, then this is the car you want: one that has the worst possible aerodynamics and is the most likely to get you pulled over. Oh wait a second, what I meant was . . .” Personally, I’d have no qualms about rocking the Love Bug on the open road, no matter how many cops I’d have to explain it to. “Officer, this is a love bug, and I’ve . . . Well, I’ve got a lotta love!”

The picture was shot with a Minolta SRT 201 and 400-speed Kodak Film. To see more of Jules’ awesome work, head to his Flickr page or his website www.julesandrebrown.com. For those interested, digital prints of his work are available for purchase, drop him a line at julesandrebrown@gmail.com. Congratulations Jules, we look forward to more of your work.

We are excited about TheExpeditioner’s Flickr group and all the amazing  submissions we are receiving daily. If you have a Flickr membership, we invite you to check out the shots, join us, and get uploading! Here’s a list of our past winners.

For next month’s contest, we are looking for the very best landscape shot from your travels! So scour those hard drives and get them posted for your chance of winning a feature the first friday of June! Happy travels, everyone!

It seems that North Americans are perpetually torn and divided on which “coast” to favor. Seeing as the United States and Canada are such expansive countries, it’s a luxury to be able to judge those on the other side of the nation.

In Canada, there is a quiet, yet pervasive, rivalry between Vancouver and Toronto (Montreal is always adorable because it’s on the French side). The laid-back, pro-pot-smoking, West-coasters don’t understand the filthy, grimy, stressful life of those living in Ontario’s capitalist capital.

The same goes for the United States. San Franciscans are social progressives who have a cool calm outlook which contrasts with the hub-bub-addicted, hyper-caffeinated New Yorkers. Over the decades, as each city created its cultural stamp, the friendly-feuding began.

I stumbled across this clip on WorldHum. It’s an attempt to vouch for San Fran in 76-seconds put together by Robert Reid, a Brooklyn resident. In it he developed four reasons why Frisco seems better than New York:

1) The Mission burritos are better, wrapped with more foil to contain all deliciousness within.

2) Better coffee culture with better coffee. (Question is, why don’t they drink more of it?)

3) BART is better.

4) San Francisco has been the same for decades: It embraces what it is.

New York has lots to offer, too — an opera-singing Chinese-food delivery man and being listed as 8th most bike-friendly city in America — just to name a couple. In the end, do these things really make one city better than the other or just different? My bet is on the latter.

Personally, I respect the West-side but feel most at home in the East — my Manifest Destiny never really kicked in. There is a sense of reality that is forever present in New York City and Toronto. Perhaps it’s just my fascination with the cynical, skeptical, chain-smoking coffee-drinking jerks.

I still enjoyed my stays in San Francisco and Vancouver, both cities having lots to offer in terms of beauty and tranquility, a different pace of life, a utopia. However, by the end of the week, I was happy to head back, East of Eden.

I left Whistler on another gorgeous, bright winter morning. Unfortunately, obligations exist. So I headed down to Vancouver in hopes of filling my mom’s order for several pairs of those cheesy mittens and curling tickets. I spun through a mall but, alas, no mittens.

I spun through the Vancouver Olympic Center’s box office and, realizing I was in Canada still, no tickets (who doesn’t want to experience the world of curling first hand?). I decided, tail between my legs, to get started on my drive home. It must have been somewhere in the midst of Eastern Washington’s barren fields of nothingness that I thought to share some of the knowledge I gained in my ten days in Vancouver and Whistler.

1. Any and every event, regardless of how lame or amazing you may think it is, will blow any of your preconceived notions out of the water.

2. Give any German flag-bearing fan a wide berth. I took a shot upside the head, then had a great chat about Oktoberfest. I guess that’s not so bad, eh?

3. Best Whistler restaurant — Prime Tapas at the base of the Creekside Gondola. If you have a chance, order the mussels (from Vancouver Island) or the fresh Tuna. If you’re trying to . . . you know, I suggest the oysters.

4. Lindsey Vonn is gorgeous (yes, believe the hype).

5. Vancouver’s diverse neighborhoods should be a destination themselves: Granville Island’s maritime and market vibe, chic Yale Town, historic Gas Town, the most authentic and largest Chinatown in North America; with the influx of green space and parks, I can see why the city is a popular destination.

6. I can’t help but give a shout out to Bryon Wilson, the bronze medalist in the men’s freestyle moguls, and a fellow resident of Butte, Montana. That was an extra special moment for me. (more…)

Today officially marks the beginning of the end of this escapade through Vancouver and Whistler’s Olympics, but in true Wick style, I need to end it with a bang (insert innuendo here). By that I mean a day jam packed with Olympic events. I caught three different disciplines, but none are legitimate events, really. The ladies super-combined is just a combination of two different ski runs, while the skeleton is nothing more than a balls-to-the-wall human missile contest.

The new prize for the worst $200 I’ve spent goes to the ticket I bought for the Ladies Super-Combined. I was stuck in a pit, miles from the racers, behind two ski paths, a row of press cubicles with Volkswagen sized cameras, and four fence barricades for the gal catching the occasional edge and bailing into a few spectators. Let’s just say it wasn’t the best spectator sport I’ve caught at the games.

I did, however, get to see some of the most technically sound and fastest skiers on earth. The downhill event is the fastest speed event for Alpine skiing, and where the gates are the farthest apart. To help you imagine this, it’s what you imitate on that run after you’ve put back a few of those lunchtime beers in the lodge. The Super-combined event pairs that up with the most technically challenging event, the slalom, where the gates are really close together.  First one down the mountain wins — my kind of skiing.

Both are completely different styles of skiing, to the point of being very different sports. The morning was very cold and the snow on top of the hard course a bit sugary. When the competitors flew down the hill (and if you watched the finish of the skiing events, that’s literally true for a large portion of it — they call it the “hot air” jump), they kicked up snow behind them that looked like a trail of smoke. I was quite far away, though, and I like to believe it was smoke. Actually, I would have believed anything to justify the overly priced, awful tickets I bought. (more…)

I survived the hangover of 2010, and got up early this morning so I could catch a bus to Whistler Olympic Park, about 9 km down the Sea-To-Sky Highway from Whistler Village. I had a ticket to the Classic Style Cross Country Sprint races. Since I’m cross country skiing illiterate, I really had no idea what to expect. I’ve learned at the other Olympic events I’ve been to that in person they are far more impressive than the finely edited broadcasts you see on television, but cross country skiing? Really? Yup.

After an unwarranted ticket scalping interrogation by the RCMP (a mounty that went without his morning Timmy Horton’s, apparently) at the gate of the venue, I grabbed a fence position as the sun rose over the racers already on course.

I figured I’d see a start, then wait for 20 minutes, then see a finish and the rest of the racers trickle in. Shows you how little I know. Rapid fire, the skiers came shooting passed me and my Norwegian-speaking neighbors. The fans roared to life, their coaches sprinted along the snow and barked orders as far as they could keep up. As quick as I began doing nothing when I entered the stadium, just as quickly the mayhem broke out.

This kind of race — and correct me if I’m wrong — begins with every competitor starting at intervals in a time trial situation. So if you can imagine, craziness follows each skier as they go around the track. For me, relatively unaffiliated as who to cheer for, noticed there was a kind of wild wave of energy that coursed through the venue for both the men’s and women’s races.

When the time trials were done, then came the dull. Over an hour and a half of nothing; meticulously anal course grooming, hand raking, leveling, and raking again. Not the spectator sport it should be. Maybe this is where my cross country skiing stereotypes come from. (more…)

There’s really no excuse for me to only spend 12 hours in a city like this, or any city for that matter, but alas, I’m trying to keep a schedule. Vancouver: bustling, urban, chic, innovative, I had to see it all. Could I? I mean, I had Opening Ceremony parties to attend to. Whether I like it or not, I had to, I was going to head up Whistler Creekside in the morning and set up camp next to the Dave Murray downhill course to see if any of the Olympians would smile at me as they passed (or so I thought . . .).

What does a first time Vancouverist (that’s Vancouver and tourist — did you catch that?) do in such a diverse, and Olympicly vibrant city such as Vancouver? Granville Market.

This island in False Creek holds one of the best markets I’ve been to in North America. I arrived there early and the workers were just getting things set up for the day. That didn’t stop the activity, however, and bakers were churning out goods. The blindingly colorful vegetables were stacked, sweets were on display, cleaver-wielding butchers tended to their lamb hocks, and the smell of JJ Bean cappuccinos hung densely in the air. It was love at first sight. At first the resemblance to Seattle’s Pike’s Place Market was evident, but the more time I spent in there I found it to be less raw, more polished in delivery. (more…)

The Olympic Games (exhale). Well, not quite yet. Those officially start Friday, but don’t tell Whistler. Based on their scurried preparation all day, I’d say they know how much time they have down to the second. For me, my trip to the 2010 Games started with a fourteen-hour drive and a late-night pitcher of dark beer (not at the same time).

As I sit here at my computer, now twenty-four hours in, I’m thinking about the two faces of Whistler that I witnessed today– starting completely different than it finished. To put it simply, it is pre-morning versus post-morning coffee. I could feel the transformation happening right before my eyes: from the mega posters now hanging from the slope-side condos, to the splattering of temporary media structures erected all over the city. The energy of the people, the infinite amount of volunteers donning their questionably sky-blue outfits, and the village where a tangible excitement was ratcheting up throughout out the day. The preparations hit overdrive. In fact, I even overheard a practice medals ceremony, where the winter sport powerhouse countries of India, Egypt, and Kenya took home the medals. It made me chuckle a bit.

With my local guide, Louis — a friend I taught with in South Korea — showing me around, I put forth an outstanding “prep session” myself. I mean, if the Olympics can do it, can’t I? My first reaction to Whistler is how personal the village feels. It is modeled after an old European ski town, car free but for two streets, and architecture to match. It wasn’t Aspen yuppy, which often comes with the development of a resort. It felt welcoming and intimate — just how a ski town should feel with two imposing peaks always looming over your shoulder. (more…)

86 events, 17 days, 5500 participants from 80 different countries, 3 billion television viewers, and 1 managing editor sent to stir up the pot and see what happens. Yes, the rumors are true: I will be loading up my camera, skis, tickets, and computer and heading to Whistler on February 9th for roughly a week, to see what all this Olympics hype is about (and to do my best tracking down the notoriously inept ski jumper from Calgary’s ’88 Olympics,  Eddie “the Eagle” Edwards — he’s got to be nearby, right?).

Truly, though, I am extremely fortunate to have this opportunity. To many, the Olympic Games symbolize the coming together of people and cultures from all over the world. Despite its controversy, as there always seems to be at this event, I have always held the belief that the games mean more than winning a race of a sport that you never see but every four years. It is about representing your country, yourself, spirit, abilities, and seeing the best in people from different backgrounds.

Besides all that, how cool is the Skeleton (picture extreme headfirst sledding, in tights, somewhere within Avatar’s Pandora)? Where else do you see cross country skiers with rifles on their backs, or curling for that matter? This is stuff you just don’t see everyday!

To better follow the happenings, TheExpeditioner will put up a picture along the right hand side of the site, under the Features Section. So, keep an eye out for my daily Olympic dispatches from my time in Vancouver, Whistler, and everywhere in between.

• Cheap Lodging For The Olympics: The Olympics are just around the corner. If you’re on TheExpeditioner.com staff you’ll be attending (like Jon will be doing), and you can expect meager accommodations from your employer: a luxurious stay in the back of a rented van and clipped coupons for the local Tim Horton’s (sorry Jon — the budget’s a little tight this time of year).

For everyone else, why not save a little money and rent one of the many apartments being offered from local Vancouverites. Check out Rent2010.net for rooms at a fraction of the cost you’d find for a hotel. Jon, we’ll try to do better come 2014 in Russia.

• Dublin For $374: What else says “a rollicking good time in Dublin” then an Aer Lingus flight for you and three of your buds. Or, Aer Lingus introduces “The Hangover” special. The airline is running a promotion right now (apparently for the bachelor party set) where a group of four can buy four round-trip tickets for $1,498 total.

To Lima For Cheap: Flights to Peru have been really cheap, and they’re staying that way. LAN is offering flights from D.C. to Lima for only $339 + tax (around $416 total), and $359 from Miami.

It’s almost ethereal to think that my home-and-native-land gets to host the 2010 Winter Olympics in just over a month. I am proud that British Columbia gets to flaunt its grandiose beauty to the world. Back home in Toronto, a friend from Vancouver told me an apt description of the province’s landscape: Rural Ontario is picturesque, but B.C. is sublime. After seeing it for myself last May, I can say he was articulately poignant.

I would like to give a big shout out to John Lee, who wrote an article  for the Daily News about how to navigate the 2010 Games. He takes us on a scribed tour of what to see and where to see it. Due to downtown-Van being a pint-sized peninsula, most of the skating and downhill events take place on the outskirts of the core in the suburb of Richmond or via a short drive to Whistler Village. The Olympic Village is situated just outside downtown in False Creek, appropriately named for there is no creek there — more like an large inlet of water. Hockey lovers will be excited to hear that the battle for gold will be at the B.C. Place, Canada’s first domed stadium. Nevertheless, the venues that the province has chosen seem to be within a reasonable distance of one another.

However, as Lee pointed out, there is more to do in Vancouver than just watch people freezing in spandex (no matter how much fun that sounds). This being the Olympics and all, many countries are heading to the games to promote tourism to their own countries, like Germany who will be on hand selling gigantic bratwursts or Holland who will be livening things up with their own beer house. It sounds sublime.

If you happen to be in Van-city while the Games are going, check out this interactive map from The Globe and Mail where you can find reviews of places to eat, sleep, drink. Enjoy the view, it’s one of Canada’s best.

Don’t ask why, but I randomly searched to see if there were still tickets for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics coming up in February. Surprisingly, there were, and I gave a fist pump when I saw “available”  next to men’s freestyle skiing. That got me thinking, “bet I’m not the only one.” A tornado of mouse clicks and google searches ensued; here’s what I got.

Getting There: Cheapticketlinks.org has a list of budget airlines that fly into Canada: WestJet, CanJet, Flyglobespan, Horizon Air, and US Airway. Don’t forget about alternate airports to fly into: Seattle SeaTac International (SEA), Bellingham International (BLI), or even Abbotsford International (YXX).

Staying There: There’s a great article over at BootsnAll listing and describing numerous hostels in the area. They start at about $18 usd and up. Another great resource is hostelblog.org with a ton more possibilities.

Tickets: You’re going to see the games, right? So you’ll need these. Good news, you can still get your mitts on them. Many of the hockey games still have tickets, and if you aren’t picky about who you watch, you can score $25 dollar tickets. If you want to, and a little bit of me does, grab one of the opening ceremony tickets from $175 to $1,100.

Conclusion: Remember, it’s a huge event, it may cost you some dinero. Act fast, be flexible, and enjoy.

Today marks 100 days until the Olympic torch gets to Vancouver. Happy Olympics, everyone! Personally, I’m stoked, and I’m in a state of constant scheming to find a way there. The problem I run into, are thoughts of “Whistler, snow, mountains, mmm . . .” that usually vanish quickly because of, “Olympics . . . prices jacked up . . .people able to pay that . . .”

So, maybe I’ve ruled out competing in the Games (at least this Olympics), and after reading the Frugal Traveler blog from the NY Times, I might rule out going to Whistler entirely. I’m not giving up hope on getting there; I actually have more hope now. I’m going to Squamish, B.C.

An hour north of Whistler is the simpler, cheaper, and more relaxed alternative. All my style. The outdoor playground has Stawamus Chief or “The Chief,” the more accessible Canadian version of Yosemite’s El Capitan, along with stellar hiking, mountain biking, birding. Plus, during the Olympics, free shuttles will give ticket holders a lift along the Sea-to-Sky Highway, an amazing trip itself.

Rooms at nearly half the price of Whistler, catering towards the locals rather than “well-heeled tourists,” and with beer just as cold, Squamish may be where it’s at.

It seemed like just yesterday that I was getting over my Olympic fever, Commonwealth Games hysteria, and X-Games nausea, but now the Winter Olympics 2012 are less than a year away and Vancouver is gearing up, and I’m loading up on my Dramamine to handle it all.

Of course, the smart traveler would head now before prices skyrocket post-games to take advantage of the relatively affordable lift tickets at Whistler — the site of next year’s downhill skiing competitions — for $89 or do some cross-country skiing in Whistler Olympic Park for a mere $20. Or my favorite ski-town sport: competitive hot tub lounging.