On our first full day in Vancouver after a good nights sleep in the AirBnB, our plan was to visit Granville Island Market.
Before heading to Granville Island, we took a slight detour to a shop on Granville Street to buy some binoculars. Granville Street was a couple of blocks from our AirBnB and even at 10 am there were a few characters roaming the street (people taking drugs in the street and homeless people with obvious mental health issues). It did make us a little nervy as it wasn’t like that on the street we were staying on.
As soon as we had purchased the binoculars, we made our way to the West End Farmers Market on Comox Street. We didn’t really have an intention of buying anything, as at this stage we hadn’t got a clue what we were planning to do later. However, if you are local to Vancouver or staying self catering (if this is a term that is used anymore!) then this Farmer Market is a really good place to get fresh produce. Or if like us you are from Manchester in the UK – go and be jealous that nothing like this happens in your home city!
We then made our way over to Granville Island. The route we took was along Granville Street and over Granville Bridge.
Granville Bridge
We later found out there was a much quicker route by Aquabus from the bottom of the street we were staying on (Hornby Street), which we took on the way back. It was good to do the walk and there was some great views of both Vancouver and Granville Island from the Granville Bridge so I would definitely recommend.
Granville Island Market
Upon entry to the Market our first encounter was with the splendor of Lees Donuts. We didn’t sample any of their delights but they had a very tempting selection. Looking back at the photo we took, I think this was a big mistake of ours not to have tried one.
As we continued through the market there was a great array of stalls. Here is a small selection of the ones that caught our eye.
Duso’s
Siegel’s Bagels
La Bise Bakery
Armando’s Finest Quality Meats
The two stars of the market on that day for us were:
No 1. Laurelle’s Fine Foods
Laurelle’s Fine Foods has a great selection of pies, pastries and quiches, salads and sweet baked goods.
We ended up settling on this apple pastry tart.
No 2. Terra Breads
The focus at Terra Breads was on quality pastries and breads, which were delightfully presented to catch the eye.
We couldn’t resist the Cinnamon Cardamom Cruffin and it definitely didn’t disappoint.
Our day after Granville Island…
We drove to Costco near Chinatown to see how their steak would compare to what we saw at Granville Island Market. Sometimes abroad, in the USA or Australia we have found that Costco can be pretty top notch. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case this time.
As we were close by Chinatown we thought we might as well take a short walk to check a place I had noted. This was Keefer Bar, which was meant to be good for cocktails and Dim Sum.
The walk to Chinatown wasn’t the best, it was even worse than our experience on Granville Street earlier in the day. We decided the area wasn’t for us and made a speedy return to our car.
We then drove to Stanley Park to check it out. Our plan was to spend most of the next day there.
Finally in the evening we decided to get take out from an Indian restaurant that we had spotted on our way back from Granville Island called RV’s Butter Chicken. Check out our google review:
https://goo.gl/maps/kHDvQAusugZ9XFam7
On to Day 3….