We’re spending a few days in Vancouver. The main reason is to catch up with a couple I knew during my postdoc days in Dallas. They live in Nova Scotia and don’t get west of Ontario very often. However, we don’t need much of an excuse to visit Vancouver. It’s less than three hours away (Customs permitting), and is the most beautiful city on the West Coast–after Seattle. As a bonus, these days the US dollar has a very favorable exchange rate versus the Canadian currency. (The Seattle Times touted this fact in a travel article yesterday.)
Seattle and Vancouver share many characteristics. Both are surrounded by water, and have bustling ports. Water is a key constituent of their climates, in the form of rain. Both cities have large Asian populations, and a diverse dining scene. Seafood is featured prominently on many restaurant menus. Vancouver has Seattle beaten by the sheer number of high-rise apartments in the center city. Seattle is heading in that direction, thanks to the Amazon headquarters downtown and ugly traffic. And both cities, alas, are heading toward non-affordability. [Coincidentally, Paul Krugman wrote about this dilemma in today’s New York Times. As gentrification proceeds, people of more modest circumstances who are least able to afford long commutes are being pushed to the periphery of metropolitan areas.]
Vancouver’s present, Seattle’s future?
We are staying at our usual hotel, the Robson Suites. This used to be a condominium before it converted into an extended-stay/boutique hotel. The rates are very reasonable, especially with the aforementioned exchange rate. Each unit comes with a real kitchen that’s well-stocked with dishes, pans, and utensils. The units vary in size from a studio to a reasonably large one-bedroom, which is what we have on this stay. The building is located between the Robson and Georgia shopping strips, two blocks from the Denman Street restaurant strip, and three blocks from Stanley Park. There is no onsite restaurant, unless you count the McDonald’s that’s open 24 hours (and I don’t). There’s a Safeway across the street to stock the kitchen as needed.
We arrived here just in time to watch the end of the Grey Cup, Canada’s equivalent of the Super Bowl. The Edmonton Eskimos came from behind to beat the Ottawa Red Blacks, 24-18. I believe the CFL could teach the NFL a few things to move games forward a bit faster. After the game, we wandered Denman Street in search of dinner. Two of our favorite spots are no more, the Rain City Grill and Maria’s Taverna. Other places, such as De Dutch and the Ukrainian restaurant near the corner of Denman and Robson, are still going strong. We settled on dinner at the bar of a Spanish restaurant, España. We had tapas of salad and white anchovy toasts, followed by a paella. The salad was good. I had one bite of the anchovy toast and gave the rest to Julian. The sight of 6-8 anchovy fillets mounded on a hunk of bread was a big turnoff. (Anchovies work best for me in small, covert doses, as in Julian’s puttanesca sauce and in Vietnamese fish sauce.) The paella came with a side of aioli, aka mayonnaise. Neither of us paid much attention to it. The paella was quite good, heavy on the smoked paprika. After a quick stop at Safeway, we went back to the hotel and watched the end of the New England-Denver game.
More adventures from Vancouver to come–once Julian gets moving.
Recent Comments