Even though I had slept in stops and starts, I was awake at 6:00. I checked on how Radiance was doing. She had made good progress since I had last checked. Not only was she back in Canadian waters, but Victoria was already on the tracking map. The captain had definitely the pedal to the metal during the night. With the last bit of concern removed, I then concentrated on the day at hand.
We had a food tour booked that started at 15:00. This would provide a late lunch/ early dinner. We had plans to spend the morning at Queen Elizabeth Park and the Bloedel Conservatory. There were two things that I wanted to do before Graham woke up. First of all, I wanted to recheck the best way to get to Queen Elizabeth Park. I also wanted to check if there was somewhere to get breakfast either near the closest Skytrain station or close to the park itself. As we were not due to get lunch until midafternoon, I was looking for something a bit more substantial than a coffee and a cake. On the flipside, I did not want to wait until the local shopping centre opened at 10:00. Fortunately, when it comes to public transport, sometimes Google Maps does weird and wonderful things. When I had originally checked this, it had shown me a mixture of Skytrain and bus. This time, it tried to send me via multiple buses with the first suggested bus going in the wrong direction. While I was looking at the route, something caught my eye. There was a Denny’s not too far away from the hotel. I checked that this is in fact still open, and it was. Eventually I did convince Google Maps to give me the routing I wanted. There was just one slight alteration. There was a Skytrain station that was closer to Denny’s then our local station.
When Graham woke up just before 7:00, I told him what I had discovered. He was all for the idea to have breakfast at Denny’s. We got up and took turns having a shower. Once we were ready, we headed out. We were heading along the same main road that we had been taken to the shopping centre the first afternoon, but in the opposite direction. This end had a very different feel to it. The area between where our guesthouse was, and the shopping centre very much has a leafy suburb vibe. Going the other way, there was initially some neighbourhood shops and restaurants plus a community centre and then this became quite industrial. About 20 minutes later, we went up a different road and Denny’s was at the next intersection.
They seemed to be steady business, but we had no issue getting seated. The other people in the restaurant all seemed to be locals and I wondered if we were the first tourists they have seen. This location was definitely off the beaten track. I struggled with the menu a little. There was just too much that looked good. In the end, I decided on the country fried steak with fried eggs, hash browns and sourdough toast. This came with peanut butter. Graham knew straightaway what he wanted. He went with the T-bone steak, hash browns and fried egg, which also came with sourdough toast. We both had coffee, which was very nice and some orange juice. This hit the spot.
When we had finished our breakfast, we headed to the closest Skytrain station. This was one stop further from the centre. A train arrived just as soon as we got to the platform. Even with being one stop further down the line, it was only four stops until our interchange stop. We then had to take to the buses. The bus station was right opposite the exit from the station. The bus we needed was already there, but the driver was on a break. About five minutes later, we were on our way. Google Maps had led me to believe that it was a bit of a walk from the closest bus stop to our destination, Queen Elizabeth Park. However, when we got there, Queen Elizabeth Park was right opposite the bus stop. I suppose they measured the distance to the main entrance, which is the opposite side of the park. We walked uphill through a woodland and then reached the duck pond. This was one of the areas Graham wanted to visit. Apparently, this is a good place to see hummingbirds, which kind of surprised me as there plenty of trees in the area, but no flowers. We were out of luck as far as hummingbirds were concerned, but there were plenty of teal on the pond as well as some seagulls. The main attraction however was a pair of western tanagers. They are beautiful yellow birds, and they were quite entertaining flying backwards and forwards between the two banks of the duck pond.
We sat there for around an hour and then we moved on. We walked through another piece of woodland and some meadows. Then we reached the quarry garden. The former quarry on Little Mountain was converted into a garden into the 1960s. This area has multiple levels and consists of a mixture of trees, shrubs, and flowers. It was really beautiful, but we were probably a couple of weeks too early to experience the full effect of this. It only just started to warm up a little just before we arrived.
From the quarry garden, we went further uphill and reached the highest point of the city of Vancouver. There was a lookout with some beautiful views as well as a gorgeous antique clock. The main attraction for us was also in this area, the Bloedel conservatory. Whereas the Queen Elizabeth Park is free, there is an admission fee for the Bloedel Conservatory. However, from our perspective, this was money well spent.
The Bloedel Conservatory is a tropical habitat inside a glass dome that is home to koi carp as well as parrots, more than 120 free-flying exotic birds and 500 exotic plants and flowers. The idea was born in 1966 while Canada prepared for its Centennial celebrations. Due to a very generous donation, the idea became reality and the Bloedel Conservatory opened in December 1969. It is not particularly big, and a lot of people complain that it takes them a matter of minutes to visit. This is a typical case of you get out of something what you put in. We did see a lot of people who came in, did a loop without really stopping anywhere and headed out again. We however where in there for well over an hour. Initially we did not see any free flying birds. The first birds we saw was an enclosure with two scarlet macaws. There was a bench in that area, and we sat down for a bit. There were a couple of gardeners in his area that were moving some rocks about and changed some of the plants. It was quite interesting to watch.
While we were sitting here, we saw the first bird that was not in an enclosure. It was a Lady Amherst’s pheasant. They are very pretty birds. When I worked in a boarding school in Buckinghamshire, we would occasionally see them around the village. Suddenly there were free flying birds everywhere. I am not sure if my eyes adjusted to them or if they had got used to us and were coming closer. We also saw some more parrots and cockatoos in various enclosures.
I have to admit that I was interested more in the birds than in the plants. There was one exception to this though. The Bloedel Conservatory is home to a titan arum or corpse flower. This rare flower was named Uncle Fester by the public in a city-wide poll. Corpse flowers only flower rarely, but Uncle Fester flowered for the first time in July 2018, and for a second time in August 2021. It is believed that they only flower a total of three times. Uncle Fester was on display at the Bloedel Conservatory both times while he was in bloom. However, at other times, he normally lives at a greenhouse off site. He was returned to the Bloedel conservatory when he started to grow a leave in 2023, which was the first time he was on display in this stage. He has now gone back to being dormant. This is a definite blessing as corpse flowers emit a stench that is described as a mix if rotten flesh, with notes of old fish and decayed cabbage when they are in bloom. Fortunately, they are entirely stench free when they are dormant or in their leaf phase, but they are still quite beautiful.
After a while, we got a little too hot and decided that it was time to move on. We left via the main entrance plaza. The main feature of the plaza is the Dancing Waters Fountain. This consists of 70 jets of water using 85,000 litres of recirculating water. When it works, the fountain operates on a program to vary the heights of the jets. This must be quite impressive. Unfortunately, it was not working when we were there. I wondered if again we were there just a little bit too early for this to be operational, but apparently it is awaiting some very extensive and very expensive repairs. There is however something quite impressive in this area. The plaza features a bronze sculpture by the English artist Henry Moore called Knife Edge – Two Piece. Moore created the sculpture in 1962 and authorized three castings of the work. The first stands on John D Rockefeller’s New York estate; the second stands outside the Palace of Westminster, London, England; the third is at the entrance plaza of the Queen Elizabeth Park. This was a gift from the Bloedel family.
I had no clear idea where we were in relation to where we entered or how we would get back to a bus route. Retracing our steps did not really appeal. Fortunately, Graham has a very good sense of direction. After going down two quite steep hills linked by a path and we were back just down the road from the bus stop that we had arrived at in the morning. The next bus back to the Skytrain station where we had changed in the morning arrived about 10 minutes later. There was another bus going in the opposite direction that headed to another Skytrain station about 5 minutes earlier, but we decided to stick with what we know. We still had plenty of time until we needed to be back at Waterfront station. It did not take us long to get back to the Skytrain station and we only had to wait for about a minute for the train to arrive.
We had a food tour booked for the afternoon. The meeting point was outside a Starbucks at the exit of Waterfront station that was the opposite side from Canada Place. We still had just over an hour until we had to meet for this. Unfortunately, the Starbucks was closed for refurbishment. We did however find a coffee shop that is part of a small chain called Deville Coffee. Graham had an Americano, and I had an iced Matcha latte. We both enjoyed our drinks. This was quite a big operation, but they still did not have any customer bathrooms. We both wanted to use the bathroom before our tour started. Fortunately, there was a sign at a building opposite that there was a food court in the basement. Once we had finished our drinks, we headed across the road and sure enough, there were bathrooms there. We somehow had got turned around and left via a different exit. This turned out to be a bit of luck. There was a huge wine shop at this exit that amongst other offerings had multiple shelves with locally produced wines. I could not resist this. I did find a nice bottle of a local Gewürztraminer. This is probably my favourite type of wine, and I was very tempted. However, I did not want to carry around a bottle of wine on the tour. I figured depending on where we would be at the end of the tour, I could always go back.
When we got back to the meeting point, most of our group was already assembled. We were waiting for one more family. When they had arrived, too, we did a quick introduction round. We had quite a diverse group with people from all over the USA, a couple from Canada, a couple from Australia and ironically another couple from Greater Manchester. One couple from Texas were also heading for Radiance the next day. Our tour guide Rachel was amazing. The tour company we booked this with only employ comedians as tour guides. I was not sure what to make of this and decided to keep this little bit of trivia to myself. Rachel was bubbly and personable. She also was an excellent storyteller. She really brought the history to life. We had visited Gastown in 2013 and had been unimpressed. Gastown would not have been my choice for a food tour, but most food tours concentrated on this area and the one I picked seemed to be the pick of the crop. Thanks to Rachel, I saw Gastown in a different light by the end of the tour.
We did not have to go far for our first deep dive into Vancouver history. We literally walked a handful of steps to get out of the way a bit. This part of Waterfront station is very beautiful, which is out of character for the Skytrain network. The other stations we had come across were modern and functional. There is a good reason for this. Waterfront station was built by the Canadian Pacific Railway and opened on 1st August 1914. It was the Pacific terminus for the Canadian Pacific Railway’s transcontinental passenger trains to Montreal, Quebec, and Toronto, Ontario. In 1978, when Via Rail took over the passenger operations of the Canadian Pacific Railway and the Canadian National Railway, it continued using both railways’ stations in Vancouver, but a year later, Via consolidated its Vancouver operations at Pacific Central Station. The last scheduled Via passenger train to use Waterfront station departed on 27th October 1979.
We exited to the car park where we got our next history lesson. Rachel pointed out how the area had changed over time. The waterfront had been much closer to where we were standing in the past. She also pointed out the boundaries of Gastown. Gastown was the first neighbourhood of Vancouver.
There were also two interesting elements of more recent history. She explained that Canada Place was built as the Canadian pavilion for Expo 86 and that the sails on the roof represent the 10 provinces of Canada.
The final element that she pointed out was a rather ugly brutalist high rise tower. We had already come across this as the top of the building is the tower for the seaplane operation in the harbour. However, the building also played another role. The address is 200 Granville Street, and this was the beginning of what was supposed to be Project 200. Project 200 was supposed to be a number of identical towers all in the 200 blocks of neighbouring streets, a huge underground casino and access to two major highways. If the project had happened, both Gastown and China Town would been knocked down. The only building that was ever built as part of Project 200 was designed as a show building to attract investors. It was especially Chinese investors that the city of Vancouver tried to attract. They hired a Chinese translator to assist with the negotiations. However, when she learned that China Town would be destroyed if Project 200 went ahead, she actively campaigned for prospective investors not to go ahead. Fortunately, Project 200 never got off the ground.
Absorbing all this history is thirsty work. We headed across the car park to our first stop. Steamworks is a brew pub and microbrewery. We were seated in the basement, which is where the brewery is located. We were given a choice between a lager, their flagship IPA and a non-alcoholic option. I am not really a beer drinker, but if I visit a brewery, I try their beer. We both went with their flagship IPA, which was also Rachel’s recommendation. It reminded me of one of the IPAs that a local craft beer brewery here in Manchester makes. They call theirs Juice Springsteen and it contains all kinds of tropical fruits. My tastebuds did not deceive me. This had the same ingredients.
We were sharing the table with the couple from Greater Manchester and the couple we were going to be on Radiance with. We were chatting away when the couple that we would be cruising with noticed that they had an email from Royal Caribbean. I checked and we had this, too. Our port call to Skagway had been cancelled as repairs to one of the docks had been delayed. Instead, we were due to dock in Haines. I was in two minds about this. Originally, we had looked into making the trip over to Haines. We did a shore excursion that included the ferry over to Haines in 2022 and figured that this is a place that deserves exploring. However, when we realised that with one ferry a day in each direction, this was too risky. Instead, we booked an excursion that was a real bucket list item for me. We were going up the Klondike highway to Summit Lake and then were going to visit a sled dog camp to play with husky puppies. As thrilled as I was to get the chance to visit Haines, I was upset that I would miss out on meeting the husky puppies. At least we could cancel the excursion for a full refund.
Once we had finished our beers, we headed out again. We just had to walk around he corner for our second stop. Our destination was called Guu with Otokomae. Guu with Otokomae is an izakaya concept, which is essentially the Japanese take on a tapas bar. Izakayas specialise in serving alcoholic drinks with small plates. We were not there to drink, but we had some karage chicken with a hot & sour onion sauce and garlic mayo. Rachel recommended that we dip the chicken in both sauces. I tried this with my first bite, but this did not do anything for me. I did however really like the dish when I just dipped it in one sauce at a time.
On our way to our next food stop, we passed two more important landmarks. The first one was the Edward Hotel, which replaced the Regina Hotel. The Regina Hotel was one of only two structures that survived the great fire of Vancouver in 1886. The fire started when railway workers were clearing land. What was supposed to be a controlled fire, quickly got completely out of control and within 30 minutes, the city of Vancouver had burned to the ground. The Regina Hotel was saved as it was covered by wet blankets by enterprising patrons. When the Edward Hotel replaced it in 1907, the new hotel was built with a fire-resistant steel and iron frame. I am sure this was not a coincidence.
The second landmark is the steam clock. This looks a lot older than it actually is. It is made to look like something out of the 19th century but was actually built in 1977 by Raymond Saunders. Saunders was hired by Gastown’s local merchants to build the clock as a monument. It also had an alternative purpose. It was placed over a steam grate above one of the pipes that provides heat to most of the downtown core. This means that it keeps local homeless people from sleeping on the warm spot. Every quarter of the hour, the two-ton Steam Clock shows off a bit, whistling and shooting steam from its five whistles in its version of the Westminster Chime. On the hour it marks each hour with a toot from each whistle. We were lucky that we got there just before 16:00 and got to experience the steam clock performing. Rachel explained that the steam clock is the most photographed landmark in Vancouver. In October 2014, the clock was temporarily removed for major repairs by its original builder and was reinstalled January 2015. According to Rachel, the sign that was put in its place to advise what had happened to the steam clock was still photographed more often than anything else in Vancouver. People really are strange.
Our next stop was Brioche Ristorante. Apparently, this is a great spot for brunch. We were too late for this. We sampled their Sicilian Tortellini with homemade bread. We also had a choice between an Italian white wine, red wine or a non-alcoholic option. We both had the white wine. The wine and the food were delicious.
Up to this point, we had sat down at each stop to eat or drink. This time round, we ate while standing outside the venue. Our next stop was MeeT in Gastown, which is a vegan restaurant. We had vegan sweet & chili cauliflower wings. I normally hate cauliflower. I don’t like the taste or the texture. Those however I did enjoy. The marinade covered the cabbage taste, and the texture was crispy on the outside and melt in the mouth tender on the inside. I was struggling to believe that this was actually cauliflower. Graham was not quite as convinced. Rachel pointed out a certain irony. The address of MeeT in Gastown is Blood Alley. This was the old meat district.
It was at that point that we learned where Gastown got its name from. I had assumed that this was related to the gas streetlights that used to be in this area. The name however precedes the gas streetlights. Gastown is named after a historical figure. His real name was John Deighton. John Deighton originally went from England to the USA to work on a ship that transported people from the east coast of the USA to California for the California gold rush. He did this for a while before working a gold claim in California. He then learned about the Fraser Canyon gold rush in an area that is now British Columbia. He headed north, but he did not find any gold. Instead, he operated steamboats that took prospectors to the gold fields. Ultimately, he had to find a different line of work due to health issues. A friend of his operated a sawmill on the south shore of Burrard Inlet and this friend encouraged John Deighton to open a bar in this area. The bar was built by idle sawmill workers in exchange for all the whisky they could drink in one sitting. The bar was ready for business one day later. It appears that he was a larger-than-life character. John Deighton seemed to be rather fond of the sound of his own voice. He was therefore known as Gassy Jack. Locals called the area around his bar “Gassy Jack’s Town” though its proper name at the time was Granville. Eventually this got contracted to Gastown. Recently I decided to find out a bit more about Gassy Jack. It turns out that he originally came from Hull. Hull and the neighbouring town of Beverley had a special place in my heart since my late teens. Indeed, we will take a mini trip to Hull and Beverley in September, but that is the matter for another trip report.
We had one more stop for some savoury food. This stop was an English pub called Six Acres. According to tradition, the spot where Six Acres now stands is the same spot where Gassy Jack’s bar once stood. This had burned down in the big fire of Vancouver. I chose to take the statement that this is the exact spot with a pinch of salt. I have to say it also made me smile that I was visiting an English pub in Canada.
Six Acres is popular for its Sunday roasts. We were there on a Thursday. We were there to sample their traditional Canadian poutine. Rachel explained that there are regional variations. The base ingredients of poutine are fries, cheddar cheese curds and gravy. In Quebec, where poutine originally came from, apparently, they like to add a lot of gravy so that the other ingredients almost swim. In British Columbia, less gravy is used. Each place serving poutine then has its own take on this. At Six Acres they use the same gravy that they use for their Sunday roasts. They also added some spring onions on top. This was very nice. We had a choice of a local red or white wine, a beer or non-alcoholic option to go with this. Rachel recommended the red wine. I was in two minds about this. Red wine can set off migraines. In the end I decided to risk it. The wine was gorgeous, and it really was the perfect match. It also did not cause a migraine.
After all this savoury food, it was time for some dessert. Our first stop was Soft Peaks, which was just the other side of Maple Tree Square. Soft Peaks specialize in soft serve ice cream that is made from only organic milk and sugar. Rachel pointed out that they never use vanilla in their ice cream. The ice cream then has all kinds of toppings. We had the choice of chocolate, caramel or various fruit toppings. I went with chocolate and Graham had blueberry. This was delicious.
Our final stop was Waffleland Cafe. This is another popular brunch spot. They specialise in both Belgian and Norwegian waffles and offer a huge range of sweet and savoury waffles. We had Norwegian waffles with cream, fresh strawberries and a gorgeous chocolate sauce. Graham had his own version minus the chocolate sauce. Waffleland Cafe is also really quirky venue. It kind of looks like a secret garden. Rachel also told us that the owners are huge Disney fans.
After this, we were coming towards the end of the tour. We headed back towards the steam clock. Rachel told us a bit about Gastown today. It is home to many up-and-coming designers. It is also known as the Hollywood of the North. A lot of Hallmark movies and Netflix original content is filmed right there. Rachel told us that every summer, a big part of Gastown is transformed into a winter wonderland for about a month when Hallmark and Netflix film their Christmas movies.
Then it was time to say goodbye. Rachel offered everyone some pointers about what would be good to see or do during the rest of our stay in Vancouver. For us, this was too late as the Vancouver part of the trip was essentially over. I did wish that we had taken this tour earlier in the trip. Having said that, I don’t think I would have changed much. The only thing that likely would have changed is our meal choices.
After we said goodbye to Rachel, we headed back towards Waterfront station. I did decide to go back to the wine shop to pick up the bottle of Gewürztraminer. Then we headed back to our guesthouse. We were back at around 18:30. I read for a bit. Graham told me that he was not tired and was just going to relax. This of course meant that he was fast asleep about 5 minutes later. At some point, I must have fallen asleep as well as we both woke up around 21:00. We decided to have our wine then and it was very nice. Once we had finished our wine, we got ready for bed, and we were soon fast asleep again.
Dolphingirl’s Travels 
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