Vancouver greeted us with a crisp fall morning, and we set off to make the most of it -after having done laundry! When I stay in apartments I choose ones with washing machines, that way I can pack light and wash my clothes as often as I want. That said, this trip upholds my belief that washer/drier combos are a scam! It’s a good thing they also have hangers to line dry our clothes!
We took a bus directly to Coal Harbour, on the northeast shore of Vancouver, which marks the start of the Seawall Walk, the world’s longest uninterrupted sea walk at a staggering 28 km long! It goes all along Stanley Park and back down and must make for a wonderful stroll or bicycle ride. As far as we’re concerned, we’re taking a walking tour of Stanley Park tomorrow, so I just wanted to see the sea and maybe spot Canada Place from there.
When we got there, we found a pleasant city park, its green trees and fountains in contrast with the massive glass skyscrapers jutting out from all over downtown. A few steps down is the harbor itself, which I was equal parts surprised and delighted to discover is actually a seaplane harbor. In Seattle I saw seaplanes flying above us all the time, but I don’t think I’d ever seen one take off or land in person before. Here, there was a constant traffic of planes coming and going, so much so that it seemed to operate like a full-sized airport, the sea being the landing strip, constantly in use.
The sight itself is beautiful too, with forests in fall colors across the water, and enormous mountains further off in the distance. There were people milling about, either tourists like us taking pictures, or locals on their bikes or walking their dogs.
Leaving the rest of that walk for tomorrow, we made our way down to Mario’s, a coffee shop that had also been recommended to me. The place is tiny and unassuming, but it’s supposed to serve the best coffee in Vancouver (not that I’d know). The owner is Argentinian, so we were able to talk to him in Spanish, and in return he put Basque folk music on for us. Listening to Basque being sung on speakers at a Vancouver coffee shop was not on my bingo card! This is why I always seek out these local, independent places whenever possible.
Once properly refueled, we proceeded to the Vancouver Art Gallery, the first of three museums that I wanted to visit (the others being the Bill Reid Art Gallery and the Anthropology Museum). It is a large neoclassical building that looks like if someone had built a half-sized scale of London’s National Gallery. Inside, it turned out that here, too, they were doing construction and one of their four floors was closed -but of course they charge full price for the tickets: nothing to sneeze at, at $30 (€20)!
Even though I’d seen beautiful pictures online, I found the collection underwhelming. I suppose the construction work also reduced the offerings in the floors that remain open, because the fourth floor just had a small exhibit for Emily Carr, a Canadian 19th century landscape artist from Victoria. The third floor was more interesting, dedicated to First Nations contemporary artists Shelley Niro, while the ground floor had an exhibit of monochrome art in various colors. I liked both of these, but they felt lackluster for the price they charge and the significance of the building.
The Vancouver Art Gallery gives out to Robson Street, one of Vancouver’s main shopping streets, so of course we took the opportunity to window shop a little bit. The flagship store of Lululemon is here; it’s not like I would be caught dead wearing athleisure, but it’s a Vancouver company and I’m always curious about the HQ of clothing brands, whether it’s Uniqlo in Tokyo or H&M in Stockholm. We took a cursory look around this one, which didn’t feel very much like a flagship at all, before continuing down the street and having lunch at a sandwich place.
By now we were already tired -the exhaustion has been building up over the last week- so we made it back to the apartment to rest. One problem here is that everything closes at 5PM, so our strategic afternoon rests often leave us with energy and willingness to come out again but nowhere to go and nothing to do.
In the end we compromised by going out early, but not very far: we went to check out Gastown, a shopping street near Chinatown. Again, although some streets are dodgy inbetween, the main drag is well cared for and bustling with people going in and out of the shops. There are some souvenir shops, but most seemed to be high-end fashion and home decor stores. One highlight: John Fluevog Shoes, with a crazy selection of the wildest shoe designs you’ve ever seen. At $400 a pair, I was happy just to look at them!
We also ran into the famous Gastown steam clock, surrounded by tourists taking its picture (including me, natch). This steampunk clock dates back to the ancient times of… 1977, when the city of Vancouver decided to boost Gastown popularity and commissioned a flashy clock to give the area some ambiance. We heard the steam pipes whistle, but I don’t think that does anything. It wasn’t even on time!
We peeked inside two indigenous art galleries, but one was “in a period of transition” (between exhibits, nearly empty) and the other only had items in the thousands of dollars so not exactly souvenir material for me.
Lastly, we finished our fairly complete first full day in Vancouver by going to another must-see restaurant on our to-do list, Cioppino’s, right across the street from yesterday’s Blue Water Cafe in Yaletown. This is because Stanley Tucci names it as his favorite Vancouver restaurant in his book/memoir, and the way he talks about it really made us want to try it for ourselves.
Obviously we aren’t Hollywood stars and we don’t know the chef and we don’t get a custom menu, but we still had a great time. Like Serafina in Seattle, this was very dimly lit, and I know two points of data don’t make sense trend but is this a common theme among PNW Italian restaurants? Even though they told us they could only book us for the bar, when we got there today they led us to a regular table, so even that was great. I had a gnocchi cacio e pepe that was delicious -I love black pepper and the pecorino sauce was understated but flavorful- and my mom’s bolognese was to die for!
What a great way to cap off a first day in Vancouver! Tomorrow it’s supposed to rain pretty much all day, which wouldn’t bother us so much if it wasn’t because we’re booked on a walking tour… We’ve had amazing weather on this trip so far so it feels like I shouldn’t complain, but it is bad luck that of the two only days we’ve had rain in this entire trip, both coincided with our outdoorsy tours… We’ll see what happens.
This Is A Lake 