Parents Visit + Touring Vancouver

This past weekend, David's parents came all the way from Massachusetts to visit us here in Vancouver! We had a packed weekend full of tourist-type activities and LOTS of amazzzzzzzzzing food. No, seriously. Did you see how many z's I put into the word "amazing"? The food was all really that good. So here's a little breakdown of our time very well-spent last weekend:

Friday

Tony and Pauline arrived in Vancouver mid-afternoon and settled into their room at the downtown Marriott hotel, where they stayed on the 28th floor and had an impressive view of downtown and the Coal Harbour/Gastown area. David and I met them at their hotel and the four of us walked a few blocks north to the waterfront and ate dinner at The Cactus Club Cafe. I've eaten at 3 different CCC's around the city and they're all completely lovely as far as I'm concerned. This time I ordered a roasted butternut squash soup that came with seared scallops, apple curry foam, and basil oil. (I just realized this is what I ordered the first time I went to CCC, way back in October 2012.) I also had a salad of seasonal greens with almonds, feta and a lemon-thyme vinaigrette. All yummy!

After dinner we walked around by the water, but it was quite cold and rainy and the view of North Vancouver wasn't too great, so we walked back to the Marriott to have a nightcap for an hour or so before Dave and I grabbed a cab back to our apartment. We don't "grab cabs" often at all - we usually walk or bus it everywhere - so this was a treat that we kind of indulged ourselves in all weekend long!

Saturday

On Saturday we picked up T &P at their hotel in the morning and we drove north of the city to Squamish to show them some of the views along the Sea-to-Sky Highway. Again, it wasn't as clear as we were hoping, but we did get some patches where the clouds would part and show us a towering mountain peak or two:

.  david admiring the mountains  .

From there we continued just north of Squamish to the town of Brackendale, where we stopped at a tourist viewing area for nesting bald eagles. It's apparently the home of one of the largest congregations of bald eagles in North America. We got to see an eagle up close right away - in a tree above us right as we were getting out of our car in the parking lot!

The eagle viewing area, known as Eagle Run, is atop a long dike with a stretch of the Squamish River between us and the eagles in the trees.

We probably ended up seeing around 15-20 eagles (and also a couple of seals!) that day. Apparently there'll be waaaay more eagles in December and January, so I hope to go back then and hopefully take some better photos. For now, you can sorrrrrta see the eagles in the pictures below - just look for the bright white spots in the trees!

On the way home from Brackendale, we stopped in Horseshoe Bay, a small community in West Vancouver. There, we took a few pictures...

.  tony took this picture with his ipad. ayo technology!  .

... and then grabbed some lunch at Troller Ale House, where I ordered a quinoa/black bean veggie burger with a side salad. The burger was ENORMOUS. Like the size of my face.

We began making our way back to Vancouver (via a detour around Stanley Park to show Tony and Pauline some big trees), and went back to our Kitsilano neighborhood to give an extremely brief tour of our apartment before heading back out for a nice afternoon walk in the lingering daylight.

We're in love with our Seaside Bike Path, so we knew we wanted to take Dave's parents along it so they could see the beautiful views it affords of the city. We walked along the path from our apartment for a half hour or so before eventually turning around and heading back towards Granville Island...

On the island, we got some tea, showed Dave's parents around the bustling Public Market...

... and then we all split up for a couple of hours to refresh and regroup before our 6:45 dinner reservations at The Sandbar (just recently voted the Best Restaurant on Granville Island).

Dave and I had been to the Sandbar twice before, but this was the first time we were eating inside on their second floor, rather than out on their third floor's heated and covered patio. Totally different vibe than being on the patio, but - good news! - being surrounded by four solid walls inside the building does not detract from the incredible food. I ordered pan roasted prawns with citrus cream and a chile-rice that were just as good as you'd imagine them to be. I really love this restaurant, and I'd recommend that anyone who likes seafood head there if they're in Vancouver.

Sunday

For their final day in the city, we took Dave's parents around the UBC campus, where Dave gave us all a tour of the lab building where he does all of his research everyday (I know I don't talk about it much here on the blog, but Dave is in a graduate program in the Earth and Ocean Sciences Department at UBC - that's why we're living here in Vancouver!).

For lunch we did a quick walk up and down 4th Ave in Kitsilano before deciding to stop in at Burgoo. I'd been to Burgoo just the week prior for a solo lunch, and it was yummy food with a nice atmosphere. This time I ordered their Gooey Grilled Cheese Grillers - a generous portion of grilled cheese made on angle-sliced baguette with mozzarella, gruyere, Swiss and white cheddar cheeses. It's a yummy sambo, but a LOT of fried cheese!! Burgoo has a great soup-and-sandwich combo option so I added a cup of butternut squash soup to my order. (Are you picking up on the fact that I love butternut squash soup?) The soup is filled with warm spices and maple syrup and garnished with toasted hazelnuts. I actually hate hazelnuts, but that wasn't Burgoo's fault. I should have asked for the soup without them! #Oops

On Sunday night we made sure to bring Tony and Pauline to Kibune - arguably our very favorite restaurant here in Vancouver. It's a deliiiicious Japanese restaurant that's right around the corner from our apartment, and I'm actually perpetually appalled at myself for not having written a blog all about it yet. Someday, I swear! I've entirely lost count of the number of times that we've been to Kibune at this point.

We ordered an amazing spread of different Japanese dishes - sushi, sashimi, gyoza, vegetable and prawn tempura, spicy beef and lots more! Really, the food is worth an entire blog post so I won't go into it too much right now. Suffice to say - if you're in Vancouver and looking for some Japanese food that will knock ya socks off, head to Kibune!

After we'd stuffed ourselves with Japanese food, we took a quick walk up the hill to 4th Ave so that we could then walk back down the hill and check out the view of the city. I didn't snap any pictures of the view that night, but this is basically what you can see walking down the hill from 4th Ave to my apartment:

And that was the end of our evening and our eventful and food-filled weekend with Tony and Pauline! It was so much fun to show them all of our favorite spots and be a tourist in my own city. Having visitors is a great excuse to really take advantage of all of the awesome things that Vancouver and BC have to offer.

I can't wait to go back to Brackendale in a month or so to see some more eagles, and I've been re-inspired to spend more time in the Granville Island Public Market because there are so many talented vendors there.

Have you had any visitors lately? Anyone else want to come visit us? :)

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The Sandbar Seafood Restaurant in Vancouver

On a recent warm and rain-free evening in Vancouver, Dave and I went out for a walk along the Seaside Bike Path in Kitsilano. As we approached Granville Island Dave announced that he had quite a hankering for some crab so we ducked under the Granville Bridge and continued our walk by winding through Granville Island's paths and streets, looking for the ideal crab-serving establishment.

We scoped out a few restaurants' menus before deciding to eat at The Sandbar - a seafood restaurant next to the big Granville Public Market building. The menu looked expensive, but we don't eat at truly expensive restaurants too often, so we thought #WHATTHEHELL. #TreatYoSelf. If my guy wants some crab, by all means, let's get him some crab.

.  the sandbar / false creek / granville island  .

And, um, yeah they certainly had crabs there. Full tanks of the little guys greet you at the downstairs entrance of the 3-story restaurant. We immediately wondered if we were not dressed well enough to be eating there but #psht #whateva. Not like we were wearing rags. Passing the sushi chefs who were hard at work on the first floor, we climbed up a flight of stairs to the second floor where we were greeted by the hostess... who then invited us to dine up on the third floor on their covered, heated patio. So many stairs. They were all worth it.

The patio upstairs at The Sandbar was absolutely perfect and was bumpin' with well behaved yet totally happy people. The building itself is right on the water beneath the Granville Bridge, so we had views in several directions via the partial glass walls on the False Creek side of the patio. We happened to be able to sit at a two-top right against the glass wall - probably one of the best seats in the house :)

.  view from the patio  .

The patio also featured tall, West-coast style heaters, two fireplaces with beautiful (probably fake) fires, a good sized bar, and lots of low wooden tables with Adirondack-style cushioned chairs. We opted not to sit at one of those, thinking that maybe the low seats would be too awkward to sit and eat at. (They'd probably be perfect for enjoying a drink with a buddy on a nice night, though.)

.  under the granville bridge  .

For dinner I ordered pan seared scallops, which were served with citrus butter, jasmine rice and a broccolini/cherry tomato medley. It was all really effing good.

.  i ate the shit out of this  .

Dave ordered a 1/2 Dungeness crab with French fries and the broccolini/tomato veggie side. He attacked it with fervor and appeared to enjoy it.

.  dave ate the crab out of this shell  .

We were both, seriously, very pleased with the entire evening at The Sandbar. The patio's atmosphere was a great balance between comfort and luxury, the food was worth every penny, and the waitstaff was really friendly and professional. I'm pretty sure we'll happily go back again sometime!

A Walk in the Vancouver Rain

In case you hadn't picked up on it yet, we really enjoy going for walks. If a destination is within 2-3 miles of our home, there's a solid chance we'll opt to walk to it rather than drive. I'd add "weather permitting" to the end of that last sentence, but I'd be lying to you. Even when weather is not permitting, we'll still usually walk. Case in point:  we once casually walked from our apartment in Falmouth down to the beach... during 2011's Hurricane Irene, with tree limbs large and small ominously scattered EVERYWHERE and wind whipping tiny pieces of who-knows-what into my eyes and face.

Well that was all quite a lot of build up to get to, "We went for a walk in the rain the other day." Sorry.

This past weekend was so rainy but it seems like a waste to not go for a walk in our new awesome neighborhood. We live right next to the beach and a great bike/walking path that conveniently takes us right to the popular Granville Island, so how could we resist taking a stroll along the oceanside walkway?

Even in the fog and rain, our tree trunk-lined beach and the large ships in the English Bay are a sight to see.

.  dark spots in the water in the background are ships  .

As I've mentioned before, Vancouver is very well set up for getting around on foot or bike, with special bike lanes on the roads and drivers who appear to be very respectful of giving pedestrians and bikers the right of way, when appropriate. They also have this great bike path that goes along the beaches - the aptly named Seaside Bike Path.  Here's part of it, where you can see it's split in half and demarcated for bikers and walkers:

.  very little room for confusion  .

Here are some things we saw from the path:

.   Downtown Vancouvzie  .

.   bitches be sailin'  .

.   let's get dangerous  .

Granville Island is a popular market area beneath the Granville Bridge. It's sort of a cross between Disney World and Pike Place Market in Seattle - lots of vendors of all different kinds of food, goods, shops, fishing boats, and what-have-you. I'd imagine it's pretty bumpin' on a sunny day.

.  Canadian Epcot  .

Our walk was about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) round trip:

.  professional map-doodler by evening  . 

Everything seems so very walkable here - look how freaking close we are to the city! It reminds me of living in Brookline, when we'd take walks from our apartment in Coolidge Corner all the way down through Boston to the harbor. Here in Vancouver, we're even closer to the city - with the bonus of also being right next to beaches and mountains and bike paths and big bridges. Not. Too. Shabs.

Eventually we'll put our walking to even better use and hike some of these mountains!