Cheers, Mate!

Recently took a weekend trip to the great city of Vancouver, Canada. If you like days that start at 6AM and end at 10PM, great views of the Pacific Northwest, people greeting you with "Cheers, mate!", seemingly clean air, a very bike-friendly city, and mountain skiing close by, hey, you’ll love Vancouver! Also, though, if you like having to go through international security, people speaking in a billion different languages, homeless people loitering throughout most of downtown, and the distinct smell of marijuana wafting from buildings and street corners and basically permeating throughout the whole city, well, then you’ve come to the right place.

Stanley Park has to be one of the more spectacular areas in the whole world. The park is basically its own island (or at least a peninsula) where most of the park borders the bay/ocean, so it’s basically like a beach, except there’s also an aquarium, a rose garden, Vancouver’s signature totem poles, and lots of hiking/ walking paths inside. Basically an outdoorsman/ tourist’s dream.

Flying around the city on a bike is fun, as long as you have the energy to do so. I spent $30 on a rental bike for the whole day and really explored all of downtown Vancouver plus the surrounding beaches. Vancouver has designated bike paths, pedestrian paths, motorist roads, and even rollerblading paths. It’s really got everyone in mind. If only every city was like that! They even have their own system down, as bikers are expected to go around Stanley Park in a counterclockwise direction, and anyone going clockwise would be immediately rebuked and pointed in the right direction, literally. Organization! System! Positive externalities! Riding a bike really cut down on the time spent traveling to and fro from places. Obviously there’s the subway in most places, but you don’t get the constant outdoor feeling and you miss a lot of in-between sights while stuck in a train. Biking also makes one feel healthy and environment-conscious, as well as weight-conscious in regards to one’s waist line. No wonder people in L.A. constantly protest for biker’s rights and more biker lanes to be opened. Certainly in Vancouver, I would suggest going about by bike, especially on a nice, cool summer day (can’t be too hot or else you sweat through everything). Highly recommended!

Some of Vancouver’s real estate is truly impressive. There are some million dollar homes in the downtown area, mainly because similar to many landlocked cities, Vancouver can’t spread out, so it can only spread upwards, with more expensive buildings. It certainly makes for an aesthetically pleasing experience, especially with the various bridges and mountain ranges in the distance. I’ve always maintained that a city’s sunset view tells a lot about its physical appearance.

The fireworks show called Celebration of Light was significant not entirely due to the spectacular fireworks performance (although that was pretty cool) but the amount of diversity in the crowds watching the show. I walked from area to area listening for different languages, and sometimes I heard Japanese, Mandarin, and English, but then I also heard Cantonese, Russian, French, Spanish, Indian (not sure of dialect), Shanghainese, and some other ones I had no idea what they were! Pretty crazy, as Vancouver’s one of the more international cities I’ve ever been to.

Vancouver is also big on bridges, because one of its highlights is the Capilano Suspension Bridge on the outskirts of the city, the main feature being the deceptively long suspension bridge between 2 cliffs. Really cool experience to wobble across, and it really wobbles. I’d think that 7-footers like Yao Ming or Shaq would be more scared of going on it because one trip and they can flip over the edge! Really unique place and goes to show that if you have something that no other city or no one else has, people will come (everyone has an aquarium or zoo or Chinatown, and people will still go to those, but people the suspension bridge really stands out).

 

Fantasize on,

 

Robert Yan