It was yet another gloomy wet day here in Vancouver, but at least it appears to be coming to an end and was just drizzling today. Where better to be than the VanDusen Botanical Gardens, a 55-acre public oasis in the Shaughnessy district of town, south of the city. Back in the early 20th Century this…
Walking In The Rain – Stanley Park and West End
It was a chilly rain-sodden morning that we decided to bite the bullet and walk the Stanley Park Seawall. We’ve been putting it off all week, mainly because of the bad weather, but this day, despite the constant drizzle, we decided now or never. We’d bought the weatherproof gear – on sale – at Cairns…
Amongst the Giants on Granville Island
Granville Island is a former industrial site of factories and mills for the logging, mining and shipping industries that thrived in early 20th Century Vancouver. It’s located in the middle of False Creek, just southeast of Downtown and lies between two bridges. First is the older Art Deco Burrard Bridge (1932) with its distinctive towers, decorative…
A Walk On The Wild Side – Gastown and Chinatown
The oldest neighbourhood in Vancouver is Gastown, down on the waterfront dock area. It largely began its life with a certain fellow named “Gassy (chatty) Jack” Deighton arriving in the area in 1867 with a barrel of whiskey to his name, offering thirsty mill workers as much as they could drink in exchange for their…
Pounding The Streets of Downtown
Downtown Vancouver is tightly packed into just 3.7 square kilometres in a typical North American grid formation, with glorious Stanley Park at the ocean end, Gastown and Chinatown at the eastern end, with the financial district, Coal Harbour, West End, Davie Village and Yaletown in between. Downtown is a heady mix of glittering skyscrapers and…
Haida Heaven. The Museum of Anthropology, Vancouver
The Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Colombia, designed by celebrated Canadian architect Arthur Erickson, was opened in 1976 and is considered a masterpiece of modern Canadian West Coast architecture. It’s around half an hour’s drive south west of downtown on the beautiful forested Point Grey peninsula that looks out over the Strait…
The Stampede to Calgary
Flying out of Vancouver you get the most incredible view of the city and its stunning coastal geography laid out beneath you. The nearby snow-capped North Shore Mountains – Grouse, Cypress, Seymour and the iconic formation of The Lions (twin mountains called The Sisters by the native Squamish people), whilst further ahead lie the vast…
Rocky Mountain High – Alberta Bound
Lake Abraham is some 194 kilometres north of Banff towards Jasper along the Icefields Parkway, Highway 93, known as one of the most beautiful roads on the planet. And that’s no exaggeration, the scenery on this drive is out of this world with soaring snow-covered rocky peaks, snow-laden forests, frozen lakes, glacial valleys, vast icefields…
O Canada, At Last!
It’s our annual ‘Escape the FNQ Heat’ time of year. And this year our cold destination is Canada and, more specifically, Vancouver. A first time for us, so exciting to see a new country and a city we’ve always wanted to visit. Vancouver is often compared to Sydney (I’ve heard this a lot) – for…
A Very Sydney Kinda Christmas
Sydney in Christmas is a magical time of the year, made all the more iconic by the loud noisy chorus of Cicadas, the heavenly scent of Frangipani and the lemony Magnolia Grandiflora in the warm sunshine. The screeching of Rainbow Lorikeet squadrons overhead and, of an evening, the plumes of large Fruit Bats heading off…
Travels With My Ant 