We asked Chef Concierge Bertine Hage of Four Seasons Hotel Vancouver to gather the savviest sightseeing suggestions she could find—not just her own but also those of other local connoisseurs, including some she works with every day at the Hotel. Vancouver’s dramatic natural setting and sophisticated urban pleasures make for an unusually diverse range of experiences, from nightlife and fine restaurants to outdoor recreation and mountaintop views.
This innovative Vancouver Aquarium offers a behind-the-scenes tour of marine mammals, including beluga whales, dolphins, sea turtles, sea lions and lovable sea otters. Besides helping to feed animals, tour participants visit the research area where they can watch trainers at work with animals and ask them questions.
Robert Sung leads a lighthearted, informative tour into the history, culture, cookware, herbal medicines and culinary delights of Vancouver’s Chinatown. The tour begins at a classical Chinese garden, passes through fascinating specialty shops, food markets and a Taoist temple, and ends with a delicious dim sum lunch.
For quick access to outdoor recreation, Vancouverites head to Stanley Park, a vast acreage of gardens, woodlands, trails and beaches at the edge of Georgia Street. Created by the city 120 years ago, its children’s farmyard, totem poles and miniature train cater to children, while adults can marvel at the rhododendron and rose gardens luxuriating in the soft maritime air.
Once the city’s warehouse district, Yaletown is the most exciting neighbourhood for hip boutiques, performance spaces, and cafés and restaurants, day and night. Among our favourites are Glowbal, with its grill bar; Cioppino, for its superb Mediterranean cuisine; and Blue Water Cafe + Raw Bar, where you can tuck into the best fish in town, for which Vancouver is famous.
One of North America’s most successful urban redevelopments, Granville Island has been transformed from a rundown industrial park to a lively collection of renovated warehouses that today host restaurants, theatres, artists’ studios, craft shops, a brewery, a sake maker and a special kids-only market. Best of all, the city’s huge public market sells fresh seafood and locally grown produce.
Located in a spectacular building overlooking mountains and sea on the campus of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver’s Museum of Anthropology is a rich trove of indigenous objects, including totem poles, carved doors and utilitarian items, from the region. After a visit to the MOA, pass by the excellent Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art in downtown, which displays work by contemporary aboriginal artists of the northwest coast of North America.
The Hotel’s stunning YEW restaurant is a tribute to natural materials of British Columbia: glass, wood and natural rock. With lofty 40-foot-high ceilings, a glass wall wraps around a skylit private dining room at the restaurant’s centre. The menu created by Executive Chef Oliver Beckert uses ingredients from the entire Pacific region. The communal table for 14, a slab of hand-hewn western maple, is a great way to meet other visitors.
It’s the best workout in the city, it’s free, and there’s a stunning payoff at the end. More than 100,000 hikers a year take the challenging trail up Grouse Mountain, a 2.9-kilometre (1.8 mile), 2-hour climb known by locals as “Mother Nature’s Stairmaster.” Take a taxi to the trail’s beginning—15 minutes form Four Seasons in North Vancouver—do the “Grind,” and be rewarded with a panoramic view of the city and the Pacific Ocean as you reach the peak’s plateau.
Photography (Stanley Park) Tourism Vancouver/John Sinal
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