Canada Place to Stanley Park and Back

• Author: WantsToTravelMore
• Accommodation: Vancouver Accommodations

There’s a really long walk you can take from Vancouver‘s Canada Place, which will take your around Stanley Park. It’s an easy walk, in that it’s flat and well kept. But it’s long.

It’s also much longer if you are a nincompoop. Never change your orthotics into newer shoes before embarking; it will feel like you just put the orthotics in for the first time.

However, let’s not focus on the pain; let’s focus on the scenery.

When you start from Canada Place it’s a more industrial place. Seaplanes, ships, cafés and so forth. The good news is that there are no cars. Only bicycles share the path.

Once you’ve wound your way around past the Westin Bayshore, you will start to find yourself in Stanley Park proper and when you look back at where you came from, the cityscape looks like:

But when you turn back towards Stanley Park, you will see cyclists and (if you walk in a bit from the path) totem poles.

Further along, especially on a work day, you can watch tugboats manipulate large tankers helping them perform what looked surprisingly like parallel parking. This kind of makes sense given the limited maneuvering ability of ships bigger than the longest limo ever.

Soon you will find yourself under the foundation and abutments (assuming I’ve looked up my bridge terminology). Frankly, it was impressive and daunting. Interestingly the current runs fast and you may be treated to a visit by seals and seabirds.

Now, if you were looking at a map, you would think that Prospect Point – which has a wonderful gift shop and place to get ice cream – was nearby. However, it’s about 200 feet above your head. Don’t try to climb the sheer wall.

Besides, if you carry on, you will get to see Siwash Rock, which is plain spooky. Entirely worth the 8.7 km walk from Canada Place.

We eventually made our way around to Third Beach Concession at which point my poor footwear choice was registering painfully. We had not planned to do the entire circumference of the park so we walked up past the concession and onto Tatlow Walk.

You are in the middle of the city but there are views like this that make you think you’re in a forest.

However, my feet were unhappy to learn that there was 5.5 km to return to Canada Place. A beautiful walk but next time … different footwear.