The following day a group of us stood on the mainstreet & watched the Santa Claus parade, which was pretty wierd. So many of the floats seemed to have little, or no, relevance to Xmas! In fact, most of the parade seemed like an opportunity for advertisement from local/national companies (inc McDo's, of course!). We watched the full two hours, just to see Santa really.

I did my usual of walking around the city & checking the place out. I was staying on Granville Street in Downtown Vancouver, which is full of bars & clubs - although it is a pretty grubby place. Due to Vancouver's milder climate a lot of Canada's homeless decend upon it for Xmas...so plenty of bums around begging for change. Once you leave the Downtown island, either North or South, the place is a lot more attractive. Only after visiting these areas could I see why so many people love the city as a whole. I imagine it being amazing during the Summer.

I visited the Maritime Museum, which was surprisingly impressive. After which I went to the space Museum. Inside there are the usual exhibits, but they also have a planetarium & a virtual Mars mission simulator. I suspect both would have thoroughly impressed me if I was a little younger. The building was pretty cool though...

On the sunniest day during my time in Vancouver (well timed) I visited Stanley park. This is a vast area at the NW corner of the Downtown island. It is very impressive. My friend & I hired bikes & covered pretty much all of the park, prior to finishing our visit with a round of pitch & putt. Very Enjoyable, if not a little chilly. It would be an amazing place in the Summer months.

One evening I went to Capilano bridge, with a girl from Maidenhead (small world), as there was a Xmas lights display. The Bridge is located North of the Vancouver Downtown island. The suspension bridge is very "Indiana Jones" like, which was pretty cool, & the lights were quite impressive too.

On one of the wettest days of my travel yet, I visited the Vancouver Aquarium. I got thoroughly soaked walking through Stanley park, so admission was worth the shelter alone! The Aquarium didn't blow me away...it has some excellent quality specimens, although the whole place really isn't that big. I did manage to find Nemo though...

We did experience an awesome Snow storm on my final Saturday in VC. We got about 10cm in under four hours! Most of which was while we were in the pub (or moving between them). On the day I left for Whistler I was less appreciative of the Snow...my bus was delayed & Greyhound were unable to advise if it was going to run that day, However, after a couple of hours in a cold waiting room I was on my way to see Ricky & get my Snowboarding on! Happy Xmas to me!!! ;-)

written by  johnnoble on December 20, 2008 from Vancouver, Canada
from the travel blog: John's year off...
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I love peacefully nature of Canada, I would like to see Vancouver live :)

written by  Almirovski Heinz on December 20, 2008

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Welcome to the planet-arium! Ha ha!

written by  Dave Pritchard on January 4, 2009

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