Places to go in Vancouver

[keehun]

Hello ChiefDelphi!

My family is taking a long road trip and we're stopping in Vancouver for a night. What are some locally famous restaurants, etc? Memorable Vancouver experience?

If you're in Vancouver, sorry but feasibility of seeing you is probably close to none

While I'm at it, any good stuff in Seattle? lower Saskatchewan?

Thanks
Keehun,
Team 2502 of Minnesota

[dtengineering]

"Must see" for Vancouver... depends on what you're interested in and how long you are here.

If you like hiking and the outdoors, climb the north shore mountains... everyone does the "Grouse Grind" trail, but if you turn off it and take the BCMC trail to the top you get a few more switchbacks and a fraction of the crowd. There is a restaurant and some great views at the top, just google Grouse Mountain for details. Oh yeah, if you're feeling lazy you can just take a gondola to the top, or head one mountain over and go for a drive up to Cypress Bowl. There are fabulous car-accessible lookouts on that drive.

Or bring your mountain bike... some of the world's top rides are on the north shore mountains, while tamer ones are available near Simon Fraser University and UBC. For totally tame cycling do a lap of Stanley Park, and stop by the Vancouver Aquarium to see the new baby beluga whale. Bike rentals are available if you aren't bringing a bike... and walking or roller blading the Stanley Park seawall (and the adjoining miles and miles of seawall along English Bay and False Creek) is entirely acceptable.

Or rent a kayak and go for a paddle in False Creek or English Bay. Stop and do some people watching at Kits Beach... given our recent weather you might think you had stumbled upon a little piece of California.

If you like Food, you're coming to the right place. Vancouver has more awesome and inexpensive restaurants than anywhere I have visited. Asian food in Vancouver is truly authentic, but any restaurant that survives has to be good just to stay in business. EAT! As for specific restaurants, there are so many good ones that you needent worry. You're going to be well fed here...

If you like shopping and/or have an interest in urban planning, check out Granville Island, a former industrial site now converted to a food market and artisanal space, not entirely different from Pike Place market in Seattle (which, if you're going, is worth checking out). You might want to use the False Creek Ferries for getting around. Across False Creek from Granville Island are the former Expo 86 lands, now the site of massive condominium development, as well as Yaletown, a gentrified warehouse district. These neighbourhoods, right in the downtown core, have caught the interest of urban planners around the world. You might also enjoy a ride on the Skytrain, our version of a subway, but rather than being buried in the ground with no view, a large part of Skytrain is elevated and it can give you a cheap tour of most of the city, as it heads all the way out to Surrey at one end, and links to North Vancouver at the other using the SeaBus (which is a cheap way to get a great view of Vancouver harbour). Robson Street, downtown, is also good for strolling along in the evening, enjoying some shopping, and links up with Denman and David streets to give a tour of Vancouver's urban "west end".

For a bit of culture, check out the UBC Museum of Anthropology, a significant archive of Pacific Northwest Native Art.

A bit further afield, and if you have more time, consider taking the ferry from Tswassen to Victoria and back, or to one of the Gulf Islands, or heading up to Whistler and checking out the Peak to Peak Gondola, the World's longest unsupported gondola span. You can also rent downhill mountain bikes at Whistler (and armour!) and bomb down the ski runs and get carried back up by the chairlifts.

Since it sounds like you are driving out here, you might want to allow a couple of days as you pass through the Okanagan Valley (Kelowna, Summerland, Penticton, Osoyoos) to check out the beaches, fresh fruit and excellent wineries... but basically anywhere between the Alberta border and Vancouver is going to offer great scenery and things to do so long as you like mountains, rivers and lakes.

There's more... but what do you want to see or do?

Jason

P.S. Don't forget whale watching tours are available from a number of different vendors in different locations, too. And the scuba diving is incredible, although the water is sometimes a bit cloudy in summer.

P.P.S. Oh, yeah... the night markets (one in Chinatown, downtown, the other in Richmond) are open late on weekend evenings and have some great food vendors and lots and lots of whatever arrived on the last container ship at cheap prices.

[wendymom]

Well I wasn't planning on going up there.....but now I want to!!!