Vancouver activity list of what to see and do! There are enough amazing adventures and low-cost sights below to fill up 7 glorious days in Vancouver, BC, Canada! If you’re staying for less than a week, just pick out the ones that catch your eye for now, and do the rest on your next trip! Don’t miss the info on transportation, better parking, cheaper/free activities and what areas to stay in, at the bottom of the post too!
Table of Contents
If you have 3-5 Days:
- Bike Stanley Park
- Granville Island and Kitsilano
- Downtown walk
- Sea kayak and snorkel with seals
Bike the sea wall around Stanley Park
We spent all day biking and exploring the large and impressive Stanley Park at the northwest end of downtown Vancouver – it was so much fun! Check out the totem poles, points of interest, beaches and magical old growth rainforests along the way – some trees are hollow and big enough to walk right through them! Be sure to download the handy park map showing you where everything is (and use Google Maps to track where you are)! The Stanley Park portion of the sea wall is very flat and about 9 km long, which takes 2-3 hours to walk, or an hour to cycle, plus time for stopping along the way at each viewpoint to take photos and explore. You can swim at Second Beach’s large outdoor pool overlooking the ocean for a great view in warm clean water. Third Beach (which is quieter than second beach but doesn’t have a pool) is great stop to relax in the sun, use the washrooms/showers and grab a burger from the concession stand. We also biked on the paths in the interior of the park (quiet and shadier, but with more hills) to explore the various lovely gardens and enchanting forests (27 km of pathways). The Vancouver Aquarium is on the interior-east side ($42/adult/youth, $27/child, 9:30-5:30), with a beautiful black orca whale sculpture by Bill Reid that you can see at the entrance. You can take Harbour pics with the bridge in the background at Prospect Point (very high up, can be a tough bike ride!) or you can go across Lions Gate Bridge for pics of Stanley Park from afar. Note you can only bike counterclockwise on the sea wall (it is one-way for bikes on a raised pathway so you don’t run into pedestrians). You can pre-book bikes online at lots of places like Bikes&Blades for slightly cheaper bike rentals ($20/3 hrs or $24 half day or $32 full day) or walk into any bike shop on Denman Street ($30-45/day, hourly rates vary by store). Bike rentals include helmet and lock. Mobi/Shaw rideshare bikes were introduced recently and have docking stations near the entrances of both sides of the park, but there are no docking stations along the way, so you would be subject to overage fees as it takes about an hour to bike the seawall plus all of the fun stops along the way ($15/day as long as you can dock within 30 mins, otherwise it adds $6/30 mins overage fees). If you don’t like bikes, you can explore other modes of transportation such as walking, driving, trollies, trains or horse-drawn carriages.
Stanley Park Eating
You can eat at second or third beach concession stands on the southwest side of the park for fast food, Prospect Point for locally made ice cream or cookies on the north end with a great view, Stanley’s Bar and Grill on the east side for upscaled burgers ($24), Stanley Park Brewing patio on south end for a great happy hour ($5 beers, $6 wines, $13 cheeseburgers, $4 corn nuts) Mon-Fri 3-6 and 9-11) or splurge at the Stanley Park Tea Room ($50 entrees).
More Good Eats
For a huge variety of International eats check out Denman Street (lots of shawarma places, Thai Basil, sushi, bakeries, etc.) or the Richmond Night Market for great Chinese Food ($2.75 entry to the market). For quick and cheap pub grub, we liked Craft Beer Market by English Bay for their amazing happy hour deals on food and beverages (ocean views at tables upstairs and they have a huge patio) daily 2-5 pm & after 9 pm Sun-Thurs ($5 beer, $6 highballs, $13 tacos, $4 fries, $16 pizzas). Catch the sunset at English Bay and walk along ocean beach to finish off a great evening!
Granville Island
Granville Island is a delightful little place filled with artists booths where you can watch blacksmiths, glass blowers and painters at work. Open 9-6 daily – check out the online map and use the online planner to create your route through the wide array of art galleries and artisan stalls. There’s even a kids play area! There’s also a lot of indoor/outdoor food places, the Granville Island Brewery for craft beers and the lovely Liberty distillery. A popular local eatery is Go Fish located just down the promenade from Granville Island – heralded as one of the best in BC for fish tacos and soups. To get to Granville Island you can drive & pay for parking ($1-2/hour, 11 am-6 pm) or Transit Bus 050 takes you to the island from downtown ($3.05) in 20 mins, or you can walk and take a miniature ferry or aqua-bus – purchase tickets from any ferry dock ($3.50-$5, save $0.50 if you buy a return ticket, or get a day-pass for $16 if you plan to use the ferry more than 4 times in a day). Ferry/Aqua buses run every few minutes and it’s a short ride to Granville Island. If you’re staying near English Bay, you can walk the seawall southeast (30 mins) stopping to pay at several of the inviting beaches along the way to the Aquatic Centre ferry stop.
From Granville Island, you can walk along the ocean seawall northwest over to Kitsilano Beach (30 mins) to hang out with the locals (see notes below on Kitsilano), or take the ferry across the bay to David Lam or Yaletown $4-5 for pubs/patios (see notes below on Yaletown).
Kitsilano
Kits Beach is a great hangout spot that is popular with the locals. During the busy season, you can pre-book a timeslot at the Kitsilano public swimming pool that overlooks the ocean (90 mins in the pool, $8, book in advance). Lots of great lunch spots around like Thai Basil (2184 Cornwall Ave across the street). From Granville Island, it’s a pleasant 30 minute waterfront pathway walk to Kitsilano through beautiful Vanier Park and by the Museum of Vancouver (daily 10-5, $10-15, allow 1.5-2 hours to visit, 2-for-1 discounts are often available), and the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre observatory ($14). Or you can take a ferry from Granville Island to the Maritime Museum instead of walking. For a quieter beach than Kits Beach, take Transit or Uber/Lyft to Jericho Beach (good eats at the Kitchen Dada sushi or The Galley or Diced NCS) or to Spanish Beach (further out).
Downtown Walk
Start at Canada Place and walk around the building, then head to the Marine Art Deco building to check out the amazing architecture (open 8:30-5) where you can also eat at the Nightingale (happy hour 3-5:30 $8 gin drinks, $14 margarita pizza and $15 buttermilk fried chicken or main menu $20-30). The beautiful Christ Church Cathedral (10-4 daily) is on same block as the small but well curated Bill Reid Gallery of Indigenous Art (free admission for everyone the first Friday of the month 2-5 pm, free admission to Indigenous Peoples, or $13/adult, $6/youth, kids free, open Weds-Sun 11-5). A block away are the iconic pillars of the Vancouver Art Gallery (see notes below for more details if you plan to go inside), and then get your outdoor art on with a Vancouver Art Walk (locations and times change seasonally). Check out the internationally acclaimed Contemporary Art Gallery which has free rotating exhibits (12-6, closed Mon and Holidays). Next take a walk through Robson Square to see buskers and impromptu break dancing as well as the interesting courthouse building architecture (court building open 9-4 Mon-Fri) with a famous Tacofino food truck and then head over to the Vancouver Central Public Library with coliseum architecture – take the free library elevator up to the top floor and walk out into the roof garden with great views and columns (open 9:30-8:30 weekdays, 11-6 weekends, or check out the pub just outside the library for a 3-6 pm happy hour). Then off to the Gastown Steam Clock which goes off every 15 minutes and enjoy wandering down Water Street and exploring it’s unique shops and galleries until you get to Maple Tree Square (note that you shouldn’t walk any further east due to a rise in homeless encampments and it can be unsafe). Vancouver Chinatown is really cool with beautiful Asian gardens (Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, $12-16, discounts available) but at the time of visiting Chinatown (2021), it was also becoming an unsafe area with a lot of new homeless encampments and open drug use.
Good Eats Downtown District (by the Central Library)
Library Square Public House (craft brews, happy hour 3-6 pm daily), Glowbal ($14 eggs benny weekend brunches and $16 lunches, or Fri $15 burger and beer until 2 pm), Memphis blues bbq house ($25 ribs, $15 pulled pork sandwich), Junta Ramen, Le petite Belge waffles ($12), sushi bros takeout, Gyoza bar (happy hour 3-6 pm daily) pholicious bahn mi ($5), holy chow ($15 Thai bowls), japadog, vietsub, hungry guys kitchen burritos, wak wak burgers, la taqueria pinche, A&W (breakfast), joyeaux cafe Vietnamese (hot breakfast $7 eggs, toast, hashbrowns, lunch $13 vermicelli).
Sea kayak and Snorkel with seals
What an adventure! Seals are fun and curious creatures – they keep their distance but are wonderful to watch at play (note: you’re not allowed to touch the seals). We actually saw more seals while we were kayaking and stand up paddling, than actually snorkeling in the water with them. It was also exhilarating to jump off the top of the boat into the water at the end as well! Wetsuits were provided, but it was so hot out (34 degrees Celsius) that we didn’t actually need them (I wore a lifejacket instead). Book in advance with Sea Dragon Charters, take Transit Express Bus 257 from downtown direct to Horseshoe Bay (takes 35 mins) – use one credit card for each person to tap to pay $3.05 on the bus. Arrive 30-60 mins early to try on wetsuits, and bring a towel, warm clothes, snacks, a water bottle, gravol ginger or sea-bands (if you’re prone to seasickness) and a waterproof camera (if you have one)! $140 for a 4-5 hr boat tour from Horseshoe Bay out to Howe Sound and back. After the excursion, the Captain hands out discount coupons for local restaurants along the oceanfront.
If you have 5-7 Days, add on:
- UBC: Botanical Garden, Tree Walk, Nitobe Asian Garden & Museum of Anthropology
- Vancouver Art Gallery
- Yaletown Pubs
- Lynn Canyon rainforest suspension bridge (free)
- Science World (and After Dark programs for adults)
- GMS Observatory public viewings
UBC Botanical Garden and Greenhart Tree Walk
Such a lush and peaceful place! The botanical gardens are located on the University of British Columbia (UBC) campus and they are huge – grab a map and enter a whole new world as you walk though towering old growth forests and through to the Moon Gate. The physicians garden labyrinth has a wide variety of medicinal plants and descriptions of how doctors would have used them for to cure ailments. The rainforest garden has some spectacularly large plants and trees. Back through the Moon Gate, keep walking east through the forest to the Greenhart Tree Walk to go right up into the trees for a very unique perspective (cue your inner Ewok!). The walkways between the trees are fun to bounce along and the trees have stable viewing platforms for taking photos/video. Take the Lower Asian Way path back to the entrance and check out the Eagle Tree along the way! The Botanical Garden & Tree Walk prices change seasonally, but for the summer expect about $24 (kids half price, and under age 5 free) – we booked online and used code ExploreVan (from Tourism Vancouver) to get 25%off.
Nitobe Asian Garden
A 20 min walk from Botanical Garden over to the Nitobe Asian Garden brings you to a small but stunning, peaceful garden for quiet contemplation ($5 donation entry). Open Weds-Sun: 10 am-5 pm (last entry 3:30 pm, maximum time allowed is 90 mins).
Museum of Anthropology
Almost next door to the Nitobe Asian Garden, is the Museum of Anthropology (MOA) at UBC, which has beautiful totem poles, stunning First Nations art and unique bent wood boxes, with a large collection of famous Bill Reid art pieces. Closed Mondays, discount codes are available from Tourism Vancouver. Museum of Anthropology’s great hall was closed for seismic upgrades, but if it’s open when you’re there, check it out as it is magnificent. If you’re up for hiking, there are also lots of great trails nearby. Walk over from the Nitobe Asian Garden or take Transit Bus 044 to/from downtown for 50 mins ($3.05 each) or Uber/Lyft for 25 mins ($25-35).
Vancouver Art Gallery
If you’re downtown on a Tuesday evening, check out the Vancouver Art Gallery (Tues entry 5-8 is by $10 donation instead of the usual entry fee of $24/adults, $6.50 kids). Beforehand, stop by the onsite 1931 Gallery Bistro (climb the outside stairs by the columns up to the second floor), which hosts a great Happy Hour 4pm-close with a huge sunny patio and serves charcuterie, oysters, tacos, $6 wine and $7 beers.
Yaletown Pub & People Watching
Yaletown is home to many local and craft breweries: Central City, Yaletown Brewery, Yaletown Distillery, as well as 3 Irish pubs on Granville St – Dublin Calling, Donellans, Johnnie Fox). The Roundhouse community centre has Train Engine 374 Pavilion on display (open to public Fri, Sat, Sun, 11 am – 3 pm).Check out the free walking tour of Yaletown. It’s a lovely seawall walk from George Wainburn park to David Lam Park (ferry connections from Granville Island to David Lam or Yaletown stops). There are more breweries in Mount Pleasant, but that is a further out destination which is less accessible from downtown.
For Next Time (closed due to Covid in 2021):
- Free Lynn Canyon rainforest suspension bridge (a great alternative to the expensive Capilano Bridge) – closed for Covid.
- Science World (check out the After Dark for Adults programs!) – closed for Covid.
- GMS Observatory – public viewings of the stars by donation most Saturday nights (7-10) and the Space Museum next to it ($21) in Vanier Park – closed for Covid.
Cheaper / Free Activities!
Be sure to check out the Vancouver tourism Discount codes before you book activities online, and also this great list of Free things to do in Vancouver!
Specials on Certain Days Only
Sundays only – Glowbal brunch with $15 eggs benedicts
Mondays only – 2 for 1 entrees at 1931 Gallery Bistro in the Vancouver Art Gallery ($35-40) 5-10 pm
Tuesdays only – 4 pm happy hour at the 1931 Gallery Bistro and then at 5-8 pm at the Vancouver Art Gallery entry is by donation ($10/person)
Fri-Sun only – Yaletown roundhouse community centre is open to see the train (11-3).
What Area to Stay In?
Staying close to English Bay gives easy access to Stanley Park for activities and beach walks and Denman Street for cheap eats (we stayed at the Best Western Sands Hotel as it was mere steps away from English Bay).
Staying right downtown in a high up room with floor to ceiling windows is amazing for views of all the lights at night, but it is far from Stanley Park (although transit buses run frequently and are $3.05/90 mins use). I look on hotel sites like Agoda.ca for places with big sales on (often 4-star hotels will have rooms at 65% off – we stayed in an amazing corner room suite at both the Sheraton Wall and Hilton Vancouver Downtown that way).
Parking
Note that parking at the hotel can be very expensive if you’re driving – it’s often cheaper to park elsewhere, so check before you go! For example, at the Sheraton parking is $45/day, but an underground secure parkade across the street was only $15/day).
Airport Transfers
The Canada Line skytrain to Vancouver City Centre Station costs $8.05/adult on weekdays (for weekdays before 6:30 pm (peak time) add $1.75 to the price) and takes 25 mins. Going back to airport on Canada Line is only $3.05 each (as there is no YVR $5 fare fee added), and you can check-in for your flight at Canada Line downtown before boarding the skytrain (passport or credit card and ticket info needed for flight check-in). Or take a Lyft or Uber (about $26 depending on time of day and hotel location) which takes 20-30 mins to/from the airport.
Public Transit Around Vancouver
The Vancouver buses and skytrain were very quick, cheap (unlimited bus travel for up to 90 minutes cost around $3/adult, $2/youth, kids 12 and under are free, and for trains it just depend on the zones (about $3-6/adult, $2-4/youth & kids are free), and convenient downtown, especially if you’ve been walking all day and could just use a quick lift back to the hotel for your tired feet. Adults can easily pay if each adult uses a separate tap credit card (youth/kids are cash or separate compass cards) – just tap in and out with same tap credit card and it automatically calculates fares for you (you can tap on multiple buses within the same 90 mins and they will all be on the same one charge, to transfer between lines or from train to bus, etc. – for example: take the train from the airport, drop your bags at the hotel and then grab a bus over to Stanley Park all on same ticket price if it’s all within 90 mins. You tap getting on and off trains as they go through various price zones, but you only tap once to get onto the bus – no need to tap to get off as all buses are only one zone long). If you’re travelling a lot by transit, it might make sense to get a Compass Card, as you’ll save about $0.50-$1.20/adult per trip depending on the number of zones (or if you’re travelling with a youth and don’t want to use cash). We used tap on each of our credit cards (each person with their own credit card) and had no problems. We used Google Maps with the ‘transit’ icon selected and it showed where the buses were, in real time, so we knew if one was close-by to jump onto. Some places have more than one bus going to the same place so Google lists all the buses you can jump on to get there (though some places require connections between two different buses and it lists those too).
Hope these travel tips spur lots of great ideas for adventures for you!
Enjoy Vancouver, BC, Canada! And if you’re headed over to Vancouver Island, check out my blog on epic road trip stops on the South side of Vancouver Island!