Vancouver Guide: Mountains Meet the Sea

Vancouver sits between the Pacific and the Coast Mountains, and you can usually see both from any downtown corner. Beaches, temperate rainforest and a ski hill are all within an hour of the centre, so a single day can hold a swim, a hike and a good dinner. It rains hard from November to March, which is why everything is so green. Bring a jacket and go out anyway. Most of the best days here start grey and finish clear, and the city looks its best just after the rain has gone through.

Places to Sleep

• Fairmont Pacific Rim: On the waterfront across from Canada Place, so many rooms look onto the harbour and the peaks of the North Shore. Guests get a rooftop pool and a spa, and the lobby fills with live music on most evenings. The cruise terminal is steps away if a ship is part of your trip.
• The Shangri-La Hotel: Occupies the lower floors of the tallest tower in the city, on West Georgia Street. Rooms are calm and clean-lined, and the restaurant on the ground floor is worth reserving even if you sleep elsewhere. It is a good base for walking to the harbour and the shops.
• Rosewood Hotel Georgia: Opened in 1927 and restored rather than replaced, with the original woodwork still in place. The rooftop pool is a bonus, and the bar just off the lobby is one of the nicest places downtown to finish an evening.

What to See and Do

• The Stanley Park seawall: A flat, paved path follows the shoreline of the park for roughly nine kilometres, with cyclists going one way only. Hire a bike near Denman Street and set aside ninety minutes, or more if you stop for photos, which you will. Walkers have their own lane beside the bikes.
• Capilano Suspension Bridge Park: A 140-metre footbridge swings seventy metres over the Capilano River and sways whenever other visitors cross it. Beyond it, walkways wind between the treetops and run along a cliff on the opposite bank. Go early to avoid the crowds, and wear shoes with grip.
• Grouse Mountain: A short drive or bus ride from the centre, across the harbour on the North Shore. You can take the gondola up or tackle the Grouse Grind, a 2.9-kilometre staircase of a trail that takes most walkers more than an hour. Winter brings skiing; the rest of the year it is hiking and a wide view over the city and the water. Bring a layer, because the summit is cooler than downtown.

Where to Eat

• Hawksworth Restaurant: Housed in the Rosewood Hotel Georgia, with a menu built mainly around British Columbia farms and fishing boats. This is the smart dinner on the list, where the setting matters about as much as the food.
• Granville Island Public Market: Tucked beneath the Granville Bridge on a former industrial site. Seafood sellers, bakers, farm stands and plenty of food counters make it easy to assemble a lunch. Skip the car and ride one of the little ferries over False Creek, which is half the fun. Go on a weekday morning for a quieter wander.
• L'Abattoir: A brick-walled restaurant on Blood Alley in Gastown that cooks French-style dishes from local seafood and vegetables. Ask for the glass-roofed back room. The cocktail list gets as much attention as the kitchen does, and the whole place has a candle-lit buzz after dark.

A Few Things Worth Knowing

• City of Glass: Downtown is full of slim, green-tinted glass towers, spaced so the mountains still show between them. Douglas Coupland's book with the same title helped the nickname stick.
• More than one first language: More than half of residents grew up speaking another language at home, most often Cantonese, Mandarin or Punjabi. You will hear it on the buses and see it on the shop signs, and it shows up on menus across the city too.
• The poles at Brockton Point: A large cluster of totem poles stands in Stanley Park, among the biggest displays of First Nations carving anywhere, made by Kwakwaka'wakw, Haida and Nuu-chah-nulth artists. Information boards on site explain who carved each pole and what it means.
• Green on purpose: Nearly all of British Columbia's electricity comes from hydropower, the city has had a climate plan in place for years, and protected bike lanes run right through the downtown core.