I went to the #5 Orange… once. I later read in the newspaper that half the people in there were gangsters and the other half were cops!
I appreciate all the advice so far - I just thought I’d give this a bump since we’re leaving in about three weeks. We’ll take the train from the airport to our hotel, which is downtown.
So far my plans include Stanley Park, Granville Island, the museum of anthropology, and Grouse Mtn if weather permits.
The last time we were in San Francisco I took a bus out to the Golden Gate National Rec Area and then took most of a day to walk back to our hotel, which was near Geary and Market streets - about 15 miles total, with a lot of neat neighborhoods and architecture along the way. Any suggestions for a similar walk in Vancouver? Any areas that I should avoid walking through, for whatever reason - industrial, ugly, or dangerous?
Lastly, Asian food recommendations?
More precisely where are you staying? That will help with walk recommendations.
On W Pender, down by the convention center. However, I’m also open to taking a bus somewhere, walking, and taking a bus back to the hotel at the end.
Looking east, Gastown is good for shopping, but abuts the bad part of town (east hastings). Chinatown is on the other side of bad part of town, so if you decide to go there don’t walk through east hastings. You’d notice and turn around though. Chinatown is OK, better than in Honolulu, but not as good as San Francisco.
Walking down Howe will take you down town for shopping. You could go to False Creek and take a water taxi across to Granville island. You may need a bus or cab to get to Stanley Park, but there is nice walking there, plus the aquarium.
2nd and 3rd beach are nice.
Off the downtown peninsula, you may like Kitsilano for noodling about and snacking and shopping, dropping down to Kits beach. Kitsilano is cleaner than the downtown areas. UBC forest / University endowment lands are full of trails, but I’m not really better than Stanley Park. Commercial drive and Main street are funkier ‘realer’ areas - less yuppified than Kitsilano - but still safe and clean
You need to know that you need to eat at Legendary Noodle.
Take a rain jacket as well, unless you’ve ordered tourist weather. 