Botanical stamp collecting with Celine
I've been trying to convince Celine—with the insecure fervour of the asker in a situationship—that this thing we've been doing is at this point a tradition. But she won't budge.
Since we became friends, we've coincidentally gone on little city adventures, often around this time of year. Last year it was to see murals in Mt. Pleasant (see? it is a tradition, right? right?).
Celine works in hospitality and knows about cool campaigns like the Tourism Challenge (TC), which gets you free access to city attractions where you collect stamps. So, when she asked me to hit up UBC Botanical Garden, I was like, "duhh, obviously!"—I'm a sucker for gardens.
The Challenge
As we walked toward the garden, a barista rushed outside and shouted, "I love your hair!" "Awww, shucks, thanks", I said, rubbing my platinum-blonde strands. The day was off to a great start!
We took out our gogomi (gogomis? still haven't determined the plural form) and made our way down the Westbrook Mall corridor.
We scurried across the crosswalk to meet TC's guardian of UBC Botanical Garden: an elderly woman sat behind the stand outside the shop, cheerily reading some booklets. The increasing drizzle didn't seem to bother her, she'd been there all morning.
The septuagenarian, while explaining, handed us a piece of paper with three riddles, which were only solvable with some garden detective work. "Oou a scavenger hunt!" The guardian smiled at beaming Celine and continued. "Yes, once you've found the answers, come back here, and I'll stamp your book for ya!"
We couldn't wait. We popped on our hoods and headed straight into the gardens. Onwards!
In the Gardens
Within minutes, we were bouncing between the plants. "Woahh, what's that?" I'd call out pointing at unmarked trees. "Yoo, look at this" she would respond from across the path pointing at leaf skeletons on the ground.
In the garden, I got pleasantly overwhelmed by all the colours and textures. Meanwhile, Celine kept us on track with the riddles, phew. It didn't take long to figure out the answers, like:
Once mission accomplished, we went free-range. First stop: the canopy walk, which my friend was eagerly trying to get me to try with her.
The Canopy Walk
I couldn't refuse the chance to be high in the air, so we headed up for a self-guided walk.
My highlights: us racing across swinging segments, jumping on the boards behind Celine to create waves (she'd look back with a cheeky grin), and attempting to go no-hands while pretending to be cool. I made it 3/4 through before grabbing the ropes for dear life.
Oh—and we also listened to bird calls on the observation deck, trying to identify them with Merlin. Before heading back to the guardian, I was curious about the red gate we'd passed earlier while looking for the riddle solutions.
Tunnelling through
The tunnel led into the psychic garden. "Physic" It took me a minute to realise that wasn't psychic garden (immediately gave up on finding a wild celebi roaming there). We explored some more until it was time to return to the guardian for our spoils.
End
We returned to the front and no longer found the stand. Strange. Was the guardian even existent or was the whole thing just a figment of our imagination?
We entered the shop, and found her there. She was on a bathroom break and they had retracted the stand when the rains got heavier. She eagerly reached out her hand to stamp our pamphlets
All in all, a great Monday holiday afternoon well spent. And looks like gogomi agreed:
