nursemakeyouwell

Hi everyone! Well we have our reccie trip booked for October and we have 6 days and 7 nights to get a feel for the place and decide where we are going to live when we come next year!!

I'd love to hear your opinions, for those living in Vancouver, what things should we see and do while we are there that will give us a real flavour of living and working in Vanoucver. What will show us the real City and what it is like to be there. We will probably look at Tricities, maybe Burnaby and North Van. The latter looks nicest on photos, and is nearest to where I have a job offer (Lions gate Hospital), but is also the most expensive.

I'd value your suggestions for days out both touristy and not, places to eat, shop (for food as well as other stuff), estate agents, schools anything really

Thanks a bunch. I have another question to ask but this post is already too long so I'll do it on a seperate one!

live to ski

Practice the commute, both ways between Lions Gate hospital and all the places that you are thinking of living.

What hobbies / interests do you have? It might be worth looking into clubs etc that you would be wanting to join.

We ski, sail, mountain bike, hike, and scuba dive, so I can send you links to any of those if you are interested.

Eating out - SUSHI is probably the most traditional Vancouver food! If you have children then there is also WhiteSpot http://www.whitespot.com/. Make sure you save room for one of the puddings though!

As for real estate agents, I would contact Frank Gerryts at http://www.relocation2bc.com/.

nursemakeyouwell

great suggestions thanks. Hobbies, we'd aspire to the outdoor life if we had time over here, so all the outdoors stuff sounds fantastic. Also into crafts, kids love dance, and football but will do anything really, quite versatile, and would value whatever their new friends value to be honest!

Rob4BC

Hi
Take note that North Van and West Van are the other side of a stretch of water to Vancouver and there are 2 bridges that cross that water, and in busy times are very slow going and to be avoided, so may I suggest you take note of the Lion's Gate Bridge, and the Second Narrows Crossing to see what I mean, and then concentrate your home search in North Van, West Van. (Of course dependant on where OH will work and shift times.)

Stanley Park exploring and a full walk of the Sea Wall to include English Bay is a must to get a feel for Vancouver - do some people watching. While you're there, take in Granville Island, the Aquarium. Also Londsdale Quay, Steveston, Metro Town Mall and walk Robson Street downtown....oh I'll stop now as you are only there for 6/7 days.

There's so much to see and do, but all you need is to get a feel for the laid back West Coast feel - the less stressful lifestyle to be had.

Incase you hadn't noticed, I kinda like Vancouver and hope to be there sooner rather than later.

Best of luck and have fun, it's a great place to be - oh, and it's been voted tops too!

Rob.

bazzz

Take a cruise through Hastings and Main; just keep the doors locked.

If the weather's good head up one of the local mountains - Grouse is probably easiest.

Purley

My sister tells me that White Spot burgers are to die for!!

bazzz

I haven't had one, but I doubt they're as good as a Vera Burger.

http://www.verasburgershack.com/

Judy in Calgary

Here is a restaurant guide for Vancouver, Victoria and Whistler. You can sort by customer rating, type of cuisine, geographical area, and price range.

Judy in Calgary

Are you do the recce with or without kids?

Edit: Scratch that question. I've now seen in your other thread that you will have your kids with you.

live to ski

Canadian Thanks-Giving long weekend (bank holiday) is 6th-8th October. Have a turkey dinner with pumpkin pie! If you're not here then, just buy pumpkin pie from Safeway and have it anyway.

Vancouver ski show at Canada Place is 27th-28th October.

Around Halloween go down to one of the pumpkin farms in south GVRD and get the kids to pick their owm pumpkin.

There is Grouse, Cypress and Seymour - all on the north shore. Local ski hills in the winter, and hiking in the summer. www.grousemountain.com, http://www.mountseymour.com/ and www.cypressmountain.com.

Maybe contact a potential school and see if your kids could spend a day there, which could give you some adult time to look at houses etc or go on a Granville Island brewary tour! www.gib.ca. I love Honey Larger and Pale Ale.

Grab a Lonely Planet to BC - we still use ours a lot for the touristy things in Vancouver such as China Town, Stanley Park, Granville Market (arts 'n' crafts down there).

Have a Canadian family brunch one Sunday, with pancakes and maple syrup!

For standard family type shopping, to give you an idea of everyday life, there is MetroTown in Burnaby or Park Royal on the boarder or North / West Vancouver, just over the Lions Gate bridge.

You could also head up to Whistler for the day.

Just to warn you, that we moved over at the end of September, and we found it to be a rather 'flat' time, in that the summer activities had more or less finished, and the winter ones aren't really going yet.

That said there will be less tourists.

We're planning on learning to play (ice) hockey this winter. Haven't started to look for begineers adults lessons yet, but they have to exist somewhere. We decided that we should learn as the little Live to Skies will no doubt play once they've arrived. Maybe see if you can get the kids an ice hockey lesson. http://www.city.vancouver.bc.ca/parks/rec/rinks/

Make sure that if you go to WhiteSpot you have Triple O sauce on your burgers. Also, food at the Grill at Jerico sailing club is good value and has one of the best kept views - shh don't tell anyone. http://www.jsca.bc.ca

For little boys of all ages there are some great transport things to do: trolley buses, B-Line buses (not as exciting), SkyTrain (you can sit at the front and pretend to be the driver!), SeaBus. And all on just a Translink transit ticket! http://www.translink.bc.ca/Transport...es/default.asp.

You might also be here at the right time of the year to see the salmon run. http://www.fodors.com/miniguides/mgr...erty_id=119916.

The GVRD also put on special events and tours at certain times of the year, so it will be worth checking out their website nearer the time. http://www.gvrd.bc.ca. Note that they are currently changing their name to Metro Vancouver so might have changed their website by then.

Rob4BC

Not too bad - why not try The Elbow Room for breakfast, an experience, but be warned, might not be for the kids!

nursemakeyouwell

Thanks sooo much for all these fantastic ideas!!


For those who have made the big move over to Vancouver, do you have a regular get together, if so will there be one when we are there from 16-21 Cot? would love to meet up with some of you guys!

JonboyE

This thread http://britishexpats.com/forum/showt...o+in+Vancouver has lots of useful information about things to do in Vancouver.

There is far, far more than you could possibly hope to do in a week.

I don't know of a regular get together of BE members, but this could be a good time to have a first one! The Granville Island brewery seems a very good place to start.

live to ski

There hasn't been a Vancouver BE meet-up since I've been on here (or that I've been invited to!).

But Granville Island brewary, sometime between Oct 16-21 sounds like a good plan.

nursemakeyouwell, I'm making you responsible of reviving this thread nearer the time to remind us all!!

startwin

Check the Brits2Vancouver site, there are regular get-togethers at downtown pubs.

Also, I have to second the comment about Vera burgers - best in the world. White Spot comes in 2nd. But so many fantastic places to eat out in Vancouver, many hole-in-the-wall type of places that are great food and value. Especially in the Kits/west end areas. Good luck on your recce.