How to Enjoy One Day Travelling in Vancouver

Vancouver is often cited as one of the most beautiful and livable cities in the world. And it really is. It's also one of the major departure ports for Alaska cruises. So if you're connecting with a cruise ship here, a side trip around Vancouver before you sail makes a great bonus for your vacation. I'm forever running into tourists from the states who've just flown in that morning, are leaving on a ship the next morning, and are looking for ways to enjoy the city quickly and on foot. (Maybe they can sense my "American-ness" and figure I'm a good person to ask.)

So let's set up a likely scenario. (Pull up a Google map of Vancouver and play along.) If your hotel room came as part of your package, your hotel's probably downtown. If you're doing it yourself, that's where you want to be because that's where Canada Place is, and that's where the cruise ships dock. So your plane landed in Richmond fairly early local time, you've taken a rather lengthy cab ride downtown, checked in, gotten some local currency from the concierge, and here you are in downtown Vancouver with the rest of a lovely summer day to spend, and you don't have a car.

Fortunately, Vancouver has a very good public transit system. Fares are $2.50 per person, and that gets you a ticket that's good across the system for 90 minutes, so you can transfer buses if you need to. If you don't spend much time someplace, you might even be able to get back on the same ticket. Check the expiration time printed on the edge before you throw yours away. But in general figure on $5 a person round trip bus fare. When changing money, be sure to get a supply of Toonies (Canada's $2 coin) and quarters.

You've got time to do two, maybe three things if you're quick. And you're going to want to have a good dinner. So here are some options that won't make you waste your day getting from place to place, and will give you the best experience of the city in a short time.

Stanley Park: This should be squarely at the top of your list. It offers the most options in one place, and the Number 19 bus will take you right there. In the park you can walk along the seawall and see beautiful views of the city and of the mountains to the north. You can watch the freighters and watch seaplanes take off and land in Coal Harbor. There are great places to take some souvenir photos like the gardens and the totem poles, and there are gift shops with trinkets to take home to friends and family. If you're traveling with kids, you'll appreciate things like the Water Park, the Children's Farmyard and the Miniature Railroad. One of the biggest draws at the park is the Aquarium, where you can enjoy frolicking beluga whales, dolphins and sea otters as well as a number of undersea exhibits and hands-on adventures. You really could spend the whole day at the park, but let's assume you want to see more.

Beaches: Vancouver has quite a few nice beaches but the most accessible ones for your purposes are along the south side of the downtown peninsula, Sunset Beach and English Bay Park. (You could take a bus across the Burrard St. Bridge and find beaches along the south shore of English Bay too, but there's nothing there you can't find on the north shore, and it's easier to get to.) If you're coming from Stanley Park, take the Number 19 and transfer to the 5, which will take you down Denman to English Bay. Denman St. is packed with cool little restaurants. You may want to make a mental note of one for later.

Gastown: Named after "Gassy Jack" who opened the first saloon there in 1867, Gastown is at the northeast corner of downtown. You'll probably be able to get there on foot from your hotel. The main drag is Water Street, which veers off Cordoba. Gastown is designed as a tourist destination. It offers lots of souvenir shopping, art galleries, a few good restaurants. The Steamworks is particularly recommended - it's a micro-brew pub that makes its own beer and has good food. For family-style Italian there's the Old Spaghetti Factory. Check out the Steam Clock, and the statue of Gassy Jack.

(Gastown is getting close to the sketchier areas of the downtown east side, and looks a bit more forbidding than the city would really like. That makes this a good place to note that Vancouver really is remarkably safe. Yes, you may well be approached by panhandlers, especially in Gastown. But muggings and street crime are very rare indeed. Even at night, just exercise the same basic cautions you'd take anywhere and you should be very safe in Vancouver.)

Shopping: Beyond the souvenir shops, Vancouver has plenty of offerings for the more serious shopper. A good base of operations is Burrard St. It has plenty of shops of its own, and the other major shopping streets seem to concentrate their best offerings where they cross it. Robson St. in particular is renowned for its high-end shopping opportunities. Alberni St. seems to be turning into a kind of little Tokyo with particularly stylish Japanese stores and restaurants. And a little farther up there's Davie St., which is the core of Vancouver's gay community and offers a funkier vibe with small shops and plenty of bars and tapas restaurants.

There's also Pacific Centre Mall, a huge enclosed shopping plaza that runs for several blocks along Granville St. and offers a blinding array of stores from stationery shops for sending letters home to very upscale department stores. (Granville St. itself is meant to be a major shopping destination, with a section that's closed off to vehicle traffic and lined with stores. But much of Granville is actually becoming run down, and currently most of the better parts are closed off for construction as Vancouver builds an underground rail line.

The Art Gallery: Facing Georgia St. between Hornby and Howe, the Vancouver Art Gallery is easily accessible and a great fallback if the weather's not cooperating. It has some truly excellent collections, particularly of Canadian and First Nations artists.

Granville Island: It's too bad Granville Island isn't higher on this list because it offers a fantastic array of shopping, food, sightseeing and cultural attractions in a very compact space that's perfect for your purposes. The problem is, if you're downtown and don't know your way around, it's hard to get to. It's not accessible by land from the north, which means you'd have to take a bus across either the Granville or Burrard bridge, and then get off and find your way back around to the island. There is an easier way, but you'd never know about it unless someone tipped you off. Someone like me. If you go all the way to the south end of Hornby Street, there's a water taxi dock which will shoot you right across to Granville Island in about a minute. The fare's $2.50 and this isn't part of the public transit system but a private operation, so your bus transfer won't help you here. But it's worth it because Granville Island is a great place to spend your day.

Between those options, you should find plenty to do to with your spare day in Vancouver. Especially if you came in from Eastern time, by now you should be ready to settle down, have a good meal, and get some rest before your morning sailing time. In another article, we'll look at some of the best places around town for that celebratory dinner.