Bob and I have been to the city of Vancouver before as well as to the ski resort of Whistler, but we have never spent any real time in the North Shore (the communities just north of Vancouver Harbor from metro Vancouver). We decided to try to amend that deficiency with a stay in North Vancouver, a municipality of about 48,000. We are staying at another great find on Airbnb with the rate being comparable to lower end hotels/motels but much, much nicer. An added bonus is that the house is directly adjacent to a boulevard with paths that lead onto other city/community paths for a nice walking/running option.
After disembarking the ferry on Thursday, we caught a bus immediately outside of the ferry terminal. We were on that bus from Horseshoe Bay to West Vancouver. We got off in front of the Park Royal Mall and caught our next bus there that took us into North Vancouver — 2 blocks from where we are staying. The whole trip after the ferry ride took just under 2 hours with a 20 minute wait for the second bus. (Important Note: We would not be very mobile if I were doing the transportation planning. Bob is the mobility guru and could probably teach courses on how to use public transport systems around the world.)
My “talent” is deciding where and what to do each day, and Bob makes it happen if only because — happy wife, happy life.
So here is what we have enjoyed during our latest explorations —
Lonsdale
The Lonsdale area of North Vancouver is the area immediately adjacent to the harbor. We had a great day exploring the area on various walking paths and checking out some of the public art and heritage sites from information that our hosts had provided.
One attraction that I had wanted to explore was the Capilano Suspension Bridge. Bob had gone many moons ago when in Vancouver for work. The park now charges $39.95/person to enter which is a bit over our daily budget for this extended holiday. However, we found a local park less than an hour’s walk from the house with its own suspension bridge. The park was free to enter and was busy on Saturday when we headed out even though many of the paths were still iced over. We got to cross the bridge and get a bit of a hike in before taking in some of the public art in the Lynn Valley area.
We used the public art map and information provided by our hosts to see more of the Lynn Valley area after our trip to the park. The following were some of our favorites —
Deep Cove
Bob and I covered almost 15 miles on foot Sunday in search of a big head photo for Bob and a walk around a local university. Neither of our initial goals were terribly exciting, but in the process we discovered the beautiful community of Deep Cove and even got to enjoy some sun!
Capilano University
Knowing that we still had a long walk ahead of us (it took us about 2 hours to walk to Deep Cove), we pulled ourselves away from the view to walk out of Deep Cove and back through Seymour before heading slightly north to Capilano University. Per Wikipedia, this a teaching-focused university that currently has an enrollment of about 11,600. We were ther on a Sunday during winter break. We could have strolled around naked and not bothered anyone, as there was no one around. My apologies if you lost your lunch on that last statement.
Peckish Travels 