I know…this post is kind of long overdue. It’s getting busier and busier in the blogging world and that is a good thing! But I still wanted to take a moment to write about the highlights of my trip this past summer to the beautiful Vancouver BC.
First off I planned a very short trip (really only turned out to be 4 full days) because I was scared about all the things I have heard about Vancouver being really expensive. I assumed we’d have to stay in a hotel ($$$) and eat out for every meal (more $$$) and as we all know that can seriously add up!
So I ended up doing the airbnb thing. If you’re not familiar with airbnb I really recommend you checking it out. Basically people put up their own homes (they either live their or just own them) for short term rent. I always looked for spaces where I would occupy the entire space (shared spaces means you’d essentially have a roommate there with you!). I was skeptical at first and this was my first experience using the service but it was excellent and I will definitely use it again. I couldn’t have asked for a better location and we saved a ton of money since it was much less than staying at a hotel and we had a kitchen to work with so we could at least eat breakfast and some snacks without having to eat out. Most of our days were spent out so we usually ate lunch and dinner in restaurants.
Anyway, here are few photos of some of my favourite moments of the trip.
I mentioned that I couldn’t ask for a better location…well we stayed right at Stanley Park. Just BEAUTIFUL! Honestly, how would you like to have all this in your backyard? And it’s huge, I would say 11 km around or so?
And every section is so beautiful – there is always something to see including a HUGE outdoor pool!
Vancouver is broken up into many small sections such as Gas Town, Yale Town, Robson Street etc. But they are all so close to each other I’m worried I will mess it up so I will just call it all “downtown”.
Vancouver’s downtown is incredibly small by the way. I think we walked the entire thing without stopping in about 20 minutes? When I was searching for places to stay I was worried about the distance to walk everywhere but as it turns out I had nothing to worry about. We only bothered to take a cab to and from the airport and one night we were out really late.
Of course we had to check out the Olympic Torch while we were there! I also really loved the Digital Orca. I couldn’t get enough of seeing sea and mountains everywhere!
See what I mean about mountains everywhere? We took a road trip up to Whistler and stopped on the way there – probably the most picturesque A&W I’ve ever seen!
Most of my Whistler pictures are family photos so I unfortunately won’t share those but I think this one with the Olympic rings should be ok!
We might be in other people’s family photos too as we started to draw a crowd with this one!
Lastly, definitely one of my most memorable moments of the trip was returning climbing “The Chief” in Squamish.
Here is the view from the 2nd peak:
It was crazy challenging but so worth the view!
This was our first trip to Vancouver and we were there to spend time with family. Next time I’ll try to stay a little longer and get some shopping in – perhaps check out some exclusive to Vancouver boutiques!
Have you been to Vancouver? I would love to hear your favourite areas to visit!