Smart Saver Vancouver

Dear ski and snowboard fans, April is just about to start which means that the winter sports season is nearly over… So, take the last chances to grab your skis or your snowboard and hit the slopes. Since a day on the mountain can be quite expensive, here are some tips and tricks to save some money.

Before you take the gondola up the mountain, it is worth checking the website Liftopia.com. There is often a broad range of offers for discounted lift tickets, if you buy them in advance. Sometimes, there are even great discounts that include rentals already. Another website that has some good offers is Groupon.com. Currently, you can score a deal for rentals on Grouse Mountain, for example.

Mount Seymour is offering a special offer called ‘Carload Wednesday’. You can ski on Wednesday nights for only $99 per car. So, if five people fit in the car, you only pay less than $20 per person for the lift ticket. Hiring a car is not that expensive in Vancouver, so if you gather some people, it can be totally worth it! No panic for those without a driver’s license: you can check out the Facebook group ‘Seymour Mountain Rideshare’ where people are offering rides for a small fee.

If you want to head to Cypress Mountain, which is my personal favourite by the way, you can take a shuttle bus from downtown for only $20 (students) or $22 (adults) for a round trip. The bus takes you directly to the ski resort, very convenient!

A must-do trip for all skiing fans is of course the famous resort Blackcomb in Whistler. Here, it is worth it to buy a lift ticket beforehand online via their website whistlerblackcomb.com. You can save the most if you purchase the tickets more than a week in advance. So, plan ahead and score a good deal!

Last but not least, it is also worth it to check out shops that offer winter sports supply. At the end of the season, many clothes and skiing supplies are on discounted sale now. This is your chance to already get new gear for the next season!

There are many ski and snowboard fans in our INTERNeX crew, so why not team up and go on a day trip together? I hope that you can score some good deals and enjoy the beautiful mountains on your ski or snowboard!

See you at tonight’s PuB NiGHT at Malone’s!

– Kerstin

INTERNeX International Exchange
International Village,
Suite 2077, 2079 – 88 West Pender Street
Vancouver, Canada -V6B 6N9-
Web: http://www.internexcanada.com
Email: pr@internexcanada.com

How was your weekend?

My weekend? Great. Active. Short. Sunny. Full of snow.

As all of you surely know, last Thursday was the National Margarita Day. Of course, we had to celebrate this important event. Therefore, we went to “La Casita” on Friday, a Spanish restaurant in Gastown, where you can get a huge margarita (so big that you can easily share it with two or three people) in different flavours for only $24.

Saturday was a perfect winter day: sun and snow in whole Vancouver. Great conditions for a hike! The destination this time was the Norvan Falls in the Lynn Headwaters Regional Park. The whole park was covered in a thick layer of fluffy snow. We hiked for about five hours along a river and up the mountains, always surrounded by beautiful scenery. Since the sun was up and started melting the snow, the hike became a game whenever a little snow avalanche fell down from the trees. When does it come down? Who’s head is getting hit next? But we managed all slippery stairs and other obstacles successfully. After a quick stop at home to get some dry clothes and a hot shower, it was already time to leave again.

Many familiar faces found their way to the escape room. My team and I gave the best to solve all the tricky riddles to escape from the zombie apocalypse. Unfortunately, time was running out, so we could not open the door ourselves. To calm down from all the stress, we headed off to Malone’s for a beer or two. The final stop of the night was the Roxy.

Only a few hours later, my alarm went off again. I jumped in my ski pants and headed out to the science world skytrain station where already some people were waiting with their skies on their shoulders. It looked funny since there was almost no snow anymore in downtown. The bus took us to Cypress Mountain, one of the local mountains of Vancouver. After a few minutes of skiing in the clouds, the sun started to shine. The weather changed so quickly up there, it was crazy! While skiing and snowboarding, we had a stunning view over Vancouver and surrounding from the top. The day passed by quickly, so it was already dark when we returned our rentals and stepped back in the bus. Enjoying a full day on the slopes on a casual Sunday is definitely something I can get used to!

So I am starting off this week with sore muscles, but great memories. I hope that you also had a great weekend. Time to make plans for the upcoming ones during our PuB NiGHT at The Beaver Bar on Wednesday.

 See you there!

 – Kerstin

INTERNeX International Exchange
International Village,
Suite 2077, 2079 – 88 West Pender Street
Vancouver, Canada -V6B 6N9-
Web: http://www.internexcanada.com
Email: pr@internexcanada.com

Highlights of the Year 2017: January, February and March

Believe it or not but we are already in the last month of the year and before you know it we are going to welcome 2018! But we are not ready yet to let go off 2017 so that is why we would like to look back with all of you on all the amazing things that happened in 2017!

The next few weeks we will post throwbacks of each quarter of the year so you can relive all of your memories again one more time before we close the 2017 chapter.

This week we will have the months January, February and March.

January

In January we started to rethink our INTERNeX Explorer and in our first Episode, which you can find here , we introduced the new PR Team, talked about upcoming events and changed the format a bit. We also started to explore Vancouver more and started off with exploring Gastown with Tess.  Other Blogpost we like to feature for January are:

• The first PuB NiGHT of the year in The Pint.
• Skiing Day in Cypress Mountain
• New PR-Coordinators Danielle, Tess and Iris arrived.
•  Celebrated Chinese New Year.

 

February

In February we produced another Highlight video and talked about the amazing events and the great trip we did. We also featured upcoming events and talked about “How To Deal with snow storms”. In this episode we explored yet another part of Vancouver and this time we explored Chinatown with Tess. To watch the INTERNeX Explorer Episode 2, just click on the link. Other Blogposts we like to highlight are:

• Watching the Super Bowl game in the New Oxford pub.
• Trip to Kelowna.

 

March

And also in March we made a Highlight video where we talked about the great events and trips we had. We also talked about the upcoming events and about how to deal with bear attacks! This month we explored Yaletown with Danielle. You can watch the 3rd episode of INTERNeX Explorer here. Other Blogposts we would like to look back on are:

• Celebrating St. Patrick’s Day at the CelticFest.
• Whistler trip.

 

A big thank you to Iris, Danielle, Tess and Janel who organized the PuB NiGHTS, events and trips in the first quarter of 2017!

Stay tuned for the Highlights of the Year: April, May and June next week!

-Mandy

INTERNeX International Exchange
International Village,
Suite 2077, 2079 – 88 West Pender Street
Vancouver, Canada -V6B 6N9-
Web: http://www.internexcanada.com
Email: pr@internexcanada.com

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Candidate Exposé – Andreas Bächler

 

My name is Andreas. I’m 21 years old and I’m from Denmark. I came to Canada in May 2016 and I am going home now one year later. At the moment I’m not studying anything but I plan to do so after the summer. Which education, I’m not sure about yet. The reason I came to Canada is that I went to Toronto to visit some family in 2009. Back then I fell in love with the country and decided then I would return one day.

Before I knew about INTERNeX I was in contact with a Danish travel agency, Travel Alott, who helped people like me – people who want to explore the world – to reach our dreams. They directed me to INTERNeX, who I was told operated in Canada and therefore would be able to help me out with my dream, which was to go abroad and work for a year in Canada.

I participated in the Work and Travel program, because I wanted to earn some money as well during my stay so I was able to go on small trips around Canada and the US without being worried about money. I liked it, even though I worked a lot I got to see everything I wanted to see when I came. Even a bit extra that I didn’t expect to do before I came. It was indeed a good mix of “Work” and “Travel” during my stay in Canada.

I was placed at a coffeeshop in North Vancouver. I was a barista and made delicious drinks for the customers. I liked the work a lot. Even though I had to spend an hour and a half in the bus to get there, it was worth it. The beautiful location was just amazing. From the counter we had a great view over the ocean and the mountains in the horizon. It was, more or less, always busy and the customers were so nice and polite and were always interested in knowing where you were from. I had the best colleagues and a good relationship with my boss. If I wanted some days off for a trip to wherever, my boss always did everything he could to make it possible. So to sum up, I couldn’t’ t have imagined a better place to have worked at.

To work at a coffeeshop you need to be good with people, have some good communication skills and be able to work under stress. Sometimes there were cues to the door and you might had 5 drinks lined up, so you should be able to keep yourself calm and still be able to work fast. Cooperation is an important skill as well, because you might work with two or three persons and you needed to be sure who did what and when, so you still would be able to make drinks for the customers but also do the different chores that need to be done, such as cleaning.

If you wanted to, you could also try out latte-art, which is a creative way to make the drinks better. You taste with your eyes as well and therefore a heart or nice flower in your latte will make the drink better for most people. It took a bit more effort than making a regular drink, but people always were so happy when they got it, which made it worth it.

During my stay I lived with a host family arranged by INTERNeX in East Vancouver and I absolutely loved it. I felt welcome from the first day till the last. My first impression of Vancouver was, how friendly and open its people were. I had chats with people everywhere I went, in the bus, on the streets etc. It was really cool, made me feel welcome to their city.

I still have the impression now that Vancouver has a really open-minded population. Its big diversity of people makes everybody feel like home, no matter where you are from. Besides that I just fell in love with the city after a while. If not for the people, then just for the beautiful location Vancouver has. Close to the ocean and the mountains and only one hour away from the US. It couldn’t’ t be any better.

I tried to participate in as many INTERNeX events as possible. Pub nights, trips, everything. I enjoyed them a lot. I thought it was a great place to meet people. And putting the pub nights on a Wednesday was the best idea ever, since putting pineapple on pizza. The PR-team was always good to help out new people and make them feel part of the group.

I went to the Rockies, Portland and Kelowna with INTERNeX. Besides that we went hiking a couple of times, had a Halloween party, saw the Chinese New Year Parade, celebrated Canada day and much more. Besides that I visited Whistler, Bowen Island, Sunshine Coast, Toronto and Victoria.

What I like most about Vancouver is the diversity of people and the beautiful surroundings. Canada in general I would say the people. No matter where I’ve been to in the country, I always met friendly and helpful people.

The only challenge I really had to face here was when it was winter and there was a lot of snow around, it was I’d say challenging to find a bus that drove so I could get to work.

It is really hard to find one really memorable thing so I will just mention a few.

• When I went to the Rockies with INTERNeX. We had such a fun time. I saw a lot of beautiful nature and partied with the best folks at night.
• When I hiked Black Tusk. We were with five people and it took us 10 hours from where we left the car till we got back. The view from he top of the mountain was gorgeous and incomparable to everything I’ve seen before.
• All the times I went to Whistler. When I went there with my parents during the summer and hiked on top of the mountains. Also the times I rented a car with friends and made a short road trip out of it.
• And of course all the times I’ve been skiing. I finally learned it, and now I miss it. Cypress Mountain and The Big White it was an awesome time.

INTERNeX really helped me to get started. They advised me about a mobile plan, bank and tax return. And if you ever had questions at all, about anything, they were always happy to help you out. So I would recommend the service of INTERNeX to others.

The first thing I will do when I get back home is just having a descent Danish meal with my parents and brothers. The trip definitely inspired me to travel more. This summer I’m going to travel a bit around Europe to visit people I’ve met in Vancouver.

– Andreas

INTERNeX International Exchange
International Village,
Suite 2077, 2079 – 88 West Pender Street
Vancouver, Canada -V6B 6N9-
Web: http://www.internexcanada.com
Email: pr@internexcanada.com

Cypress Skiing Day

Saturday was an amazing day! The weather was perfect to go skiing or snowboarding. Thank you all for joining us!

Cypress Mountain is one of the mountains near Vancouver. It has 53 runs and many of them are accessible at night too. In 2010 it hosted the Freestyle Skiing and Snowboarding events for the Winter Olympics.

We met on the right side of the ticket windows, some people came by car and some took the shuttle bus up the mountain. After renting some skis and buying our tickets we took the first lift around 10:30 AM in the morning. The sun was shining the whole day, at one point we weren’t even wearing our scarfs because it was so warm. Some tried the jumps on the slopes, some succeeded in it and some fell. And after a few hours of skiing we had lunch with some live music, but quickly went back to our skies again to make most of our day. It became a lot busier on the runs and after a few hours we decided to have a little break again and do some night skiing when it was less busy. We had an amazing dinner and amazing coffees with baileys in the Crazy Raven Bar. In the evening we took a few more runs before going back home. The view in the evening was beautiful; you could see all the lights from Vancouver and even Vancouver Island. After 9 hours of skiing we decided to go back home. Some of us even went to the Bourbon after that for some more drinks and meet the other part of the INTERNeX Family.

Thank you all for an amazing day! I hope you had as much fun as I did and I will see you at the coming PuB NiGHT at Malones!

– Janel

INTERNeX International Exchange
International Village,
Suite 2077, 2079 – 88 West Pender Street
Vancouver, Canada -V6B 6N9-
Web: http://www.internexcanada.com
Email: pr@internexcanada.com