Like a lot of places on earth, Whistler comes alive even more at the weekends. There are more families around and the play park is covered in kids and watchful parents.

No, I let Jo play on it on her own.

We were supposed to start our day with a jeep trek up one of the mountains for a spot of bear-seeing and a waffle breakfast, but the guides didn’t turn up. I can’t think why on a Saturday morning in a village with 7 night clubs…

Instead we had breakfast – and again I find myself baffled as to why the Canadians have their bacon cooked to within an inch of being completely inedible! Luckily, we then stumbled across a little gold mine.

A sweet old lady had set up a row of tables, and – with the help of some others – had covered the tops in a variety of books for sale.

Sounds simple so far, but a lot of these books were brand new. I asked her how much they were and she simply said all she needed was a small donation of any amount for her chosen charity.

I couldn’t believe it! So, after scooping up a load of Agatha Christies’ for my mum I bought myself The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and an Alec Guiness biography.

After depositing our treasure trove back in our room we headed for one of the mountains and a trip on the Peak-To-Peak Gondola.

The gondola runs on three cables and   holds world records for the longest free span between ropeway towers—3.03 kilometres (1.88 miles) and highest point above the ground—436 metres, or 1,430 feet. And the view is very impressive.

On our first journey below us were nothing but clouds, but on the way back they parted completely to give us a perfect view of the woods and trees below, and it’s bizarre looking down on such majestic trees in something other than  plane!

Almost three miles later and we’d arrived at Blackcomb Mountain. There were already a few people there, marveling at a wild baby bear seemingly grazing on grass unaware of everyone taking photos. One foreign young man hopped over the fence and stood all of two feet away from the animal for a picture.

I asked a girl working on the gondola if the bear was tame and she looked confused.

“There’s a bear in a pen out there with a guy stood next to it taking photos.” I said.

She almost swore: “That’s no pen, it’s just an old fence, and there’s no tame bears around here anywhere. If that idiot is trying to take photos then just wait until mama bear returns.”

With that I guess I could have warned the man… but instead I got my camera ready in an attempt to make some big bucks.

One un-mauled man later and we were back on the gondola and off to our hotel room to get ready for our first night out in Canada, on the Whistler Club Crawl.

It’s a night of club-after-club and bar-after-bar where we meet some great new friends from Ireland, Washington and all over the US and Canada. Plus I think there were even a couple of Aussies in there as well!

It’s a long night for all… for all except Jo, who I have to walk home early, pausing often for her to puke her ring.

Class in another country, that girl.

Day 8 is a bit of a write-off and involves lots of hangovers, struggling to get out of bed, and watching everything and anything on tv.

We finally get our asses up and stumble to Earls restaurant – a sports themed bar showing baseball and NFL on all of it’s 6 screens. I watch the Eagles beat the 49ers 27-24 just as our chef brings out the food he has cooked himself for us, which I thought was a really nice touch.

Then it’s back off to bed. I’m getting too old for all this partying!!