Annually — despite challenges obtaining sponsors — Vancouver has a fireworks competition that is on the days leading up to the Saturday of the August long weekend. This year it was on July 31 and was the Honda Celebration of Light. This long running (since 1990) fireworks display capitalizes on the geography on Vancouver’s English Bay, which allows, according to the local news this year, 500,000 people to view it. Many were curled up to a radio (of some sort) to listen to the simulcast of the music to which the fireworks are synchronized. The night my family attended was […]

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Pride Week in Vancouver is a busy and colourful time honouring the city’s diversity, inclusiveness and its vibrant LGBTQ2+ community. 2016 marks the 38th annual Pride celebration in Vancouver. The event has been going strong since 1978. The author enjoying Pride in 2002 The big party is best known for the family-friendly Pride Parade, which will be held Sunday, July 31st. Hundreds of thousands of spectators crowd into the West End for a rainbow-washed party featuring at least 150 floats. Brilliantly costumed, head-dressed, sequined and bejeweled dancers rub shoulders with marching bands, representatives from local businesses, service organizations, the fire […]

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Storm the barricades! It’s Bastille Day in Yaletown, downtown Vancouver! Now you can get a taste of what it’s like to be in Paris on the French Independence Day and you don’t even have to board a plane to do it. Just channel your inner Cosette or Jean Valjean, hum a few bars of “I Dreamed A Dream” and march down to the Roundhouse Community Centre (181 Roundhouse Mews) for the Bastille Day Festival. The event runs from 11 a.m. to midnight, (July 14 this year) and includes everything from a French market offering unique French delicacies, to a kid’s […]

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It’s summer in Vancouver, and as the temperature rises, so does the desire to be outside, soaking up some rays by the water. Here’s some information so you’re ready to go! There are many good beaches around Vancouver, but what about outdoor pools? Yes, the beach is free and just as great, but sometimes, a pool is just what one needs. And there are many fantastic pools to be found! My personal favourite is the Kitsilano Pool. It’s an outdoor pool near Kits Beach, on Cornwall at Vine street, so the the views are amazing. The pool itself is very […]

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On July 9, 2016 I visited Vancouver‘s West 4th Ave, normally a busy thoroughfare on a Saturday, and it was blocked off for Khatsahlano Street Party. Khatsahlano is the First Nations’ spelling of Kitsilano, the neighbourhood for which 4th Ave between Burrard and MacDonald is a focal point. It was quite enjoyable to walk the street that is normally dominated by cars 24/7. There was live music, presentations, henna tatoo artists and virtually all the businesses on the street seemed to have goods and services either on display or for offer. My wife found some good deals at Blue Sky […]

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It had been at least two years since I’d visited the Vancouver Aquarium in Stanley Park and boy a lot has changed. For example, the whole entry point has been expanded with their gift shop being much bigger than I recall. It’s still a mandatory Vancouver attraction. With a young boy along, you quickly find out the things that are popular or cool and things that aren’t. 1. Discover Rays Touch Pool This is new exhibit and allows you to interact with cownose and southern stingrays. They didn’t have any interest in me. Maybe my magnetic field is too weak […]

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In a good way, Granville Island in Vancouver is a peculiar place. There’s a fascinating intersection of the arts, retail and not-so-light industry. In other words, watch out for the Ocean Concrete trucks lumbering across roads people often don’t really think are roads. Given the brand-name-free nature of the shopping, it’s a pleasure to actually shop. I don’t understand the allure of Robson Street that has designer name brands you can find in any city’s high street. My reason for being on Granville Island was a child’s birthday where a bunch of kids boarded a barged-converted-to-pirate-ship and all dressed up […]

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At Thurlow and West Georgia, connected to the Shangri-La skyscraper mixed-use Vancouver hotel thing, is a spot where the Vancouver Art Gallery has space for outdoor displays. This one shown is called “Your Kingdom to Command.” I took pictures of the plaques that explain this work. Regardless of that information and simply looking at it, the environmental advocacy imagery is pretty in-your-face. One of the stumps has life (the term nurse log applies) and the other doesn’t. The living stump is trying to send life to the more dead-looking stump. The drawings on the back wall are all related to […]

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Spruce Lake, a little-known gem just a few hours north of Vancouver, offers an opportunity for stunning scenery and hikes. Make the area around Gun Lake, British Columbia your base. From there, you can hike, bike or ride on horse back into the lake within South Chilcotin Provincial Park. I chose to hike, and I survived… I have the blisters to prove it! My cousin and I started our 26 km round-trip trek at the Jewel Creek Bridge, at the northeast end of Gun Lake, about 240 km from Vancouver. We left our car at the Jewel Creek parking lot. […]

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Gun Lake is a deep and gorgeous, mountain-ringed, water-filled former volcano, nestled between the sharp peaks of BC’s coastal mountains and the rolling hills of the South Chilcotin. View of Gun Lake from Sugar Loaf Mountain The 10 km long lake is roughly 240 km north of Vancouver via the steep and winding Hurley River Forest Service Road. It can also be accessed by Highway 99 (the Duffey Lake Road) to Lillooet and Road 40 to Gold Bridge. This way is longer, adding about two hours to your journey, but is much gentler to your vehicle. Because it’s barely four […]

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