Category: Vancouver

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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Recently it’s been getting much hotter in Vancouver therefore marking the beginning of… Swimsuit Season! So I looked at what I had in the bathing suit variety and well, nothing fit. So my mother and I did some research online to figure out what stores would have suits to fit my human shaped body. Now, I’m no toothpick but I really wanted a two piece with space in the middle that could make me look and feel good. We looked up places such as H&M, Old Navy, Walmart, Gap and places that carry Billabong swimwear. The things we saw on […]

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I was going out for dinner in Vancouver with a group of friends and nobody was very picky as to where we were going to eat. One friend (we are all 14-15) suggested we go Hi-Nippon, a sushi place on West 4th Avenue and Vine. I figured well, we have no better ideas and I’m getting hungry so sure. We enter the venue and are immediately shown our seating options. We could either sit at a regular table or we can sit in one of the take-your-shoes-off-and-get-into-what-feels-like-a-mini-apartment tables. We are a party of five and the Japanese tables look like […]

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There is a small shopping area in Vancouver‘s Kitsilano neighbourhood that you may not know about. It runs one block on West 1st Ave between Burrard and Cypress. There are restaurants, spas, clothing stores, a wine shop and tucked in one spot on the north side is Koko Monk. If you are a true chocolate freak, you must try this place. It’s tiny, but you can sit and have a hot chocolate, but the artistic unique flavoured chocolates are something to try and behold. There are unusual flavours including lavender and watermelon that are so carefully blended in, you are […]

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I’ve been to a number of places for steak in Vancouver, but this is where I always return. I think the primary reason Neil fully understands steak is that he never fully bought onto the fat-makes-you-fat routine. Back in the 80s or so when the de fatting of all food was really in full swing, I noticed that steaks at home and out generally started tasting bland. Guess what, the fat helps give it flavour. Anyway, the restaurant is stylish without emptying your pocketbook. It’s best to be on Neil Wyle’s mailing list because that’s how we found out about […]

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December 2015 in Vancouver has been hit by a series of ‎ storms that featured high wind, cold temperatures (5 C is considered cold here) and rain. It’s a gross feeling to have rain literally blown into your ear by the wind. But, between storms there have been single days of sunshine showing the snowy peaks of the North Shore Mountains. And, better yet, ‎coincided with our visit to Bright Nights in Stanley Park. Due to these storms people with choice of timing also came down to the Park, which makes it a bit crazy down there. For parking, there’s […]

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The Stanley Park Halloween Ghost Train is an annual favourite for locals and visitors to Vancouver. The setting for the miniature train is pretty eerie at night even without all the dramatic presentations. Since we have one younger child, it’s best to head there at sunset because, by the time you have bought tickets (we just bought at the gate; it was 5 days before Halloween and there wasn’t a crowd), the woods are getting to be just that great creepy feel. Lingering sunlight from sunset is blocked out by the trees. This year the theme was old monster movies. […]

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It had been a number of years since I’d manage to organize time for Bard on the Beach, the Shakespeare festival in Vancouver. It is a collection of tents in Vanier Park nestled next to the Museum of Vancouver and the City Archives. “Bard”, as the company is called, has been running since 1990 where they had one tent and one play they put one and now have the main tent which for 2015 alternated between Comedy of Errors and King Lear. On the small stage they were performing Love’s Labour’s Lost and Shakespeare’s Rebel, a modern play by C.C. […]

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Kitsilano is a Vancouver neighbourhood that begins on the south west side of the Burrard Street Bridge. Kitsilano Beach Park, or Kits Beach as it’s known locally, has a great beach, wonderfully upgraded concession stand and a huge swimming pool. An additional feature of Kits Beach is the Kitsilano Showboat which, this year, celebrated its 80th anniversary. It’s an outdoor theatre on the south side of Kits Beach Pool. (Were it on the north side, it would be in the ocean!) In 2015, Kitsilano Showboat ran from June 22 through to August 15. We caught the last show which was […]

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