Granville Island - Vancouver - TravBuddy

Granville is a cute 'island' with art, shops, restaurants, theatres, galleries, and the occasional street performer. I usually spend a full day wandering around the shops, getting something to eat at the market and enjoying the view of Vancouver from the island!

Granville Island is one of my favourite places to go when in Vancouver, and I try to go every time I’m there, even if it’s just to visit my aunt, whose office is there. The whole atmosphere is really laid-back and relaxing, and is a great place to just hang out. Granville Island is a neighbourhood consisting of parks, offices, a public market, art school, shops, restaurants, theatres, galleries and hotels. It’s great to go and walk around, interacting with all the people and looking at all the kiosks, and food stalls full of fresh fruits and vegetables, meats and fishes, and other different foods. It’s one of my favourite places to go for lunch because you’re almost guaranteed to find something that will suit your taste buds. My aunt and I visited on a sunny afternoon, sometime around lunch, and it was packed with visitors and tourists and people that work in the area. We went into the public market and looked at all the vendors selling their products, also keeping an eye out for what we were going to eat for lunch. I settled on Mexican, she settled on Russian. It was so good, and inexpensive. We took our food outside and sat at a table overlooking the water, and basked in the sunshine, enjoying our meal. It was a great afternoon, as it was warm, and only had fluffy, white clouds in the sky. We watched the aquabus go back and forth with tourists taking rides on it. We also watched the hundreds of seagulls try and sneak food from all the lunchtime patrons. It was lovely.

Outside, on the deck of the public market, is a little performance area, complete with bleacher-like steps for the audience to sit on. On a day as nice as the one we had when we were at Granville Island, you’re almost guaranteed to encounter some kind of show happening. The day we were there was no exception. Although I don’t know what it was about, the audience was a having a great time, as evidenced by their loud laughter. Once done our lunch, we decided to continue our journey around the area, browsing all the stalls, and working off the food we had just eaten so we could go back for dessert J. After awhile, we figured it was time to get an ice cream cone, which we enjoyed in the same place where we had eaten our lunch. The same seagulls were still there, mooching off the visitors, and trying to escape the children that thought it was funny to chase them. It was really funny to see.

The one drawback to the area is the lack of parking. On a nice day, it is nearly impossible to find parking, so if you drive, make sure you drive slow, and be ready to pounce if you see a spot open up. More likely than not you will end up parking in some kind of paid-parking garage. We ended up doing this, but the nice thing about it was that it was patrolled, so we had the ease of mind that someone was watching what was going on in that area.

If you're looking for a lazy afternoon in the sun, why not go to Granville Island? It's not really an island as it's connected to the mainland, but it sure has that feel because there's water almost all round.

You can get there by foot, bus or miniboat.

Once there, take the time to walk all round the island, it's a leisurely half hour or so, you'll see the boat houses on the way. Every month or so they change positions so that each boat house gets to be on the edge at least part of the year.

Then there are the nice little souvenir and artists shops. You can watch the glass blowers at work, their art is spectacular. And if you're feeling peckish, the market serves the freshest everything that's available in Vancouver.

Insider tidbit: Vancouver is on a fault line. Granville Island and Richmond will be the first to go when the Big One hits. But for now it's a pleasant artist community.