Across the Border

"I'm sorry, Vancouver, I'm just underwhelmed."

I would love to write and say that I am so amazed and overwhelmed with exciting and never-ending activities to do in Vancouver, but I'm not. Despite the perfect weather (58, clear with no wind), Vancouver is just an okay, wanna be American city with good food in a beautiful region. Truly, the region at large is stunning. Mountains in the backdrop, water around and great mild weather. But it seems to me that Vancouver is just missing that special "pow" of great cities.

So we are at the end of day 2 with one day left in BC. We've gone to the majority of the "must see" sites, visited quite a number of neighborhoods and come to envy many of the food selections. Our first meal might rank as the best and certainly one of the most interesting, Japa Dog. Japa Dog is a fun fusion of traditional Japanese ingredients topping variations on hot dogs. Trust me, it works and the flavors just jive. Yes, I said jive.

Most of downtown Vancouver has a modern, western sterility that is tough to overcome. To top it off, Vancouver seems to have a very loose, or non-existent policy on open air drug smoking. I suppose that's fine if you want junkies to consume your downtown, but I just hate being asked for money (for the habit of course) every 200 feet. It really casts a long dark shadow on the city. We've also gotten away from the downtown area a number of times but it has been challenging to find an area with a good energy.

Anyway, most of the must sees were only must sees if there are no great cities left on the planet and it's a choice between these activities taking the ACTs again. Okay, that's a bit harsh, but needless to say, I am underwhelmed.

On the other hand, the food in this city is outstanding. Much of the food is directly influenced by Vancouver's diverse ethnic population. Additionally, the fresh fish and oysters are fabulous. The downside, it all seems overpriced and the taxes here are nuts. We are usually good at finding great tasting and cheap local and/or street food. Not much of that here, unless we are just totally missing it. The food we've had is excellent, just pricey. We did splurge tonight and enjoyed a long dinner at Vij - a high Indian restaurant in South Vancouver.

Tomorrow's plan is a day filled with hiking and the Josh Ritter show. Then back to Seattle.