Oh Canada

It's not often that my husband makes a spontaneous romantic gesture so when he asked if I fancied a week on an Alaskan cruise - just the two of us - I jumped at the chance! Apparently his work colleagues had assured him this was the one trip in the US we shouldn't miss, so we kissed the kids goodbye and set off for Vancouver in Canada where we were due to join our cruise ship for the week.

I'd been to Vancouver before way back in the early 1980's but I could remember very little about my visit to the city, apart from knowing that I'd liked it.  Well it wasn't surprising to discover that nothing seemed familiar because Vancouver has been transformed twice since then - first in the late 80's for the World Expo, and again in 2010 for the winter Olympics.

Vancouver is a modern, high tech attractive city with a fantastic, walkable, waterfront.  Whilst it may well be full of high rise apartment blocks and glass fronted offices, new buildings are erected around spacious plaza's, complete with carefully designed courtyards full of plants and water features.  The city has retained its open spaces; its clean, the air is fresh, and there is a youthful vibrancy about the place.

Vancouver has the third largest China Town in North America, but a lot of the Chinese immigrants have been there since the Gold Rush in the late 1800's.  Gas Town - the original downtown - has been recently re-vamped; there are cobbled streets, boutiques and smart restaurants.

We took a Sunday morning stroll around Stanley Park - the jewel in Vancouver's crown, 1000 acres of inner city park space, surrounded by water with a cycle path and sea wall full of dog walkers and early morning joggers.

We've already made some Canadian friends back in LA so we knew what to expect from the locals -  folks north of the border certainly seem a lot more genuine and down to earth than their American cousins.  Those joggers in Stanley Park were there because they wanted to be healthy, not because they wanted to be in the movies or look like Ken and Barbie. 

Our bus driver on the city tour talked about his home city with love and pride, he went out of his way to throw in an extra couple of stops and even apologised for the fact that we might see a "few street people" wandering around.  Two years of living in LA and not one local has ever apologised to me for the amount of street people camping out in town - we all just walk on by pretending we can't see.  LA drives me nuts but here in Vancouver I thought yes, I could live here and retain my sanity.

The cruise terminal was a mere five minute walk from our hotel; again modern and purpose built.  Floatplanes landed and took off across the water; snow capped mountains framed the view in the distance and as we sailed out of the harbour I knew my parting thought about Vancouver would again be that I liked it. Canada was definitely my kind of place.  Good, said my husband, because the Canadian economy is currently booming and it's all down the black stuff that puts the food on our table.  Oil exploration companies can’t recruit people quickly enough.

They always say be careful what you wish for.  Unfortunately the oil isn't in Vancouver, it's trapped under a layer of ice several hundred miles further north. Maybe I'm quite not quite ready to give up the comforts of my LA Bubble for Life in the Freezer just yet.