Chinatown
Last week, my dad and stepmom were in town, and my stepmom told me she wanted to go for Chinese in Chinatown. That was easy enough to arrange: there are oodles of restaurants in Vancouver’s Chinatown, one of the oldest and largest Chinatowns in Canada.
Afterwards I took them past the Millennium Gate. It was built in 2002 and serves as the unofficial entrance to Vancouver’s Chinatown, which was declared a National Historic Site in 2010.
There’s an awful lot of history in Chinatown to explore and to write about. For now, I’ll leave you with this photo of the Millennium Gate, and the promise of more posts to come.
Millennium Gate, Chinatown
Through My Lens: Cherry Blossom Time
Vancouver has almost 40,000 cherry trees that burst into bloom every March and April. It’s my favourite time of year.
Spring Break in Whistler
One of my best friends, a school teacher from Toronto, decided to spend this year’s spring break with me in Vancouver. She played tourist in the city while I worked, but then, mid-week, we set off to Whistler for a mini-break.
One of the best things about living in Vancouver is how easy it is to get out of Vancouver. I often take my out-of-town guests to Whistler for the day. Lunching in Whistler, I call it.
Whistler is a beautiful two-hour drive from Vancouver along the Sea to Sky Highway ― perhaps one of the most scenic drives in Canada. A couple of years ago, one of the friends I took Lunching in Whistler was so overwhelmed by the beauty on the drive up, she was speechless. You’d recognize the scenery even if you’ve never been to British Columbia ― many a car commercial has been filmed on this highway dramatically juxtaposed between mountain and ocean.
This time, I suggested to my friend that we do some skiing and stay over. Although many of my friends drive up to the resort for a day’s skiing and return home the same night, I thought it would be nice if we were able to relax after a day on the mountain instead of driving back to Vancouver the same night.
And I’m so glad we did.
We arrived on a Tuesday afternoon in the middle of a snowstorm. We skied Wednesday, with snow lightly falling around us most of the day. A Texan we met on the gondola said it hadn’t stopped snowing since he arrived the previous Sunday. After our return to Vancouver on Thursday, we happened to catch a story on the local evening news in which another Texan (or the same one, perhaps??) told the reporter that he had come to Whistler as there was no snow at the American ski resorts this winter.
Whistler Village was a Winter Wonderland that met all our expectations. Here, take a look.
Art Talk: Fred Herzog
One of the most interesting photo exhibitions I’ve seen in a long, long while is the inaugural show at Vancouver’s Equinox Gallery Project Space. On display until March 31, Fred Herzog: A Retrospective showcases the work of a Vancouver-based street photographer who has become well-known only in the past five years or so.
Fred Herzog immigrated to Canada from Germany in 1952. He worked mainly with slide film (Kodachrome), which, until recently, was expensive and difficult to create prints from. He also shot in colour at a time when fine art photographers were shooting in black and white. As a result, his work wasn’t taken seriously for many years.
The first retrospective of Fred Herzog’s work was in 2007 at the Vancouver Art Gallery, which is when I first discovered his images. His body of work ― some 100,000 photos ― is an incredible photographic record of Vancouver’s social history from 1950s to the 1970s. Those of my readers who live in Vancouver: do not miss this exhibition.
Dishing: Market
My second Dine Out outing of 2012 was to Market with my Book Club. Market is a Jean Georges restaurant at the Shangri-La Hotel, Vancouver’s newest luxury hotel and, since its completion in 2009, the tallest building in the city.
I first went to Market about a year ago with my sister. We were celebrating our birthdays and on that night enjoyed a sublime six-course tasting menu. It took us several hours to eat our way through the meal, but we enjoyed it immensely and appreciated the effort and time our server took to explain the rationale behind the wine pairing chosen to accompany each course.
Market’s Dine Out menu offered a choice between two items for each course. I started with a roasted carrot and avocado salad with sour cream, citrus, and seeds. The carrots were slender and deliciously crunchy, cooked just long enough to not be raw. For my entrée, I choose the fish: slow-cooked snapper on a bed of sautéed spinach with a sweet garlic lemon broth. The lemongrass in the broth totally made this dish. Dessert was chocolate pudding with a light, foamy dollop of whipped cream, topped with candied violets. Can one ever go wrong with chocolate pudding? I think not.
Being Book Club, my friends and I chatted long after our coffees were gone about every topic under the sun except the book we had read. There was absolutely no rush on the part of our server to get us to leave, despite the crowded room, which was thanks to the draw of Dine Out. A most enjoyable evening; I highly recommend Market during Dine Out … or on any night of the year.
Snowy Owls at Boundary Bay
One sunny afternoon a couple of week ago, I headed down to Boundary Bay with my camera. A colony of Snowy Owls has taken up residence on the shores of the bay this winter. They got a lot of media attention when they arrived last December, and I wanted to see them for myself.
Apparently the owls make a regular appearance on the bay every four or five years. Their migration from their home north of 60° to all points south is linked to the lemming population, which makes up 90 percent of their diet. When the lemming population declines, the snowies head south.
The last time they were seen at Boundary Bay was in 2007.
This year, however, the Snowy Owls migrated south in unprecedented numbers. Scientists think the large migration is the result of an abundance of lemmings during the last breeding season, encouraging a one-year “chick boom.” Breeding pairs raised as many as seven chicks, when normally they raise only two.
But then, come winter, there were simply too many owls and not enough lemmings. Thousands of snowies, mostly young and male, have left the north in search of food; they’ve been seen as far south as Oklahoma.
About 28 are at Boundary Bay, while many others have been spotted all over the Lower Mainland. I counted eight owls myself.
Snowy Owls are up to 70 cm tall and can have a wingspan of about 150 cm, making them one of the largest species of owls.
I haven’t been to Boundary Bay in, well, decades. I’d forgotten how beautiful it is.
The bay is enclosed by Point Roberts, Washington, and Tsawwassen, BC, on the west; Blaine, Washington, and White Rock, BC, on the east; and Delta, BC, to the north.
It’s an important stop on the Pacific Flyway. I had no idea how serious some birders can be. There were fellows out there in full camouflage, with camera lenses as long as my arm. I wouldn’t have minded a longer lens myself, but, even so, it was a great photo opportunity and I intend to go back.
Through My Lens: Vancouver in Spring
Spring is Vancouver’s longest season. It’s always a bit of a shock to me when I see the first crocuses (I took this photo yesterday), but summer temperatures rarely arrive before the end of June.
Dishing: L’Abattoir
Dine Out Vancouver, which just finished its tenth year, is an annual culinary celebration when Vancouverites get to, well, dine out. The deal is: you order from a three-course set menu for a set price. It’s incredibly good value and lets you try out higher-priced restaurants you might not get to otherwise. And the restaurants that participate benefit as well: they are booked solid for 17 days in the dead of winter.
This year, my friend and I decided to head down to L’Abattoir, rated by enRoute magazine as Canada’s third-best new restaurant of 2011.
L’Abattoir’s French name means “slaughterhouse.” The name is not in reference to its menu, however, but to Vancouver’s original meat-packing district. The restaurant is located in Gastown, just around the corner from Blood Alley, and the building itself stands on the site of Vancouver’s first jail.
The setting is more bistro than fine dining, but don’t let the decor fool you ― there is nothing casual about the food at L’Abattoir. Chef Lee Cooper’s menu is French-influenced West Coast ― a description heard frequently about Vancouver’s best restaurants.
I ordered a starter of poached egg over potato gnocchi with a leek, mushroom, and pecorino sabayan. The combination of egg and gnocchi was unique and a nice surprise upon first bite, although I would have preferred it if the yolk had been slightly softer. The sabayan was light and airy and not too cheesy. I really enjoyed the dish. To be honest, the country-style pork patê on toast ordered by my friend looked a bit dull in comparison.
Next was a spicy chorizo–crusted Pacific cod over white beans cooked in red wine. The cod was perfectly moist and the texture and flavor of the chorizo crust added a nice kick to the fish. My friend enjoyed her roast tenderloin with ravioli stuffed with braised lamb shoulder; the combination of red meats worked really well.
Each course was paired with an Okanagan wine ― a crisp cold Tantalus Riesling for the starter and the 2008 “Adieu,” a pinot noir from Le Vieux Pin, with the entrées. We both ordered the chocolate caramel bar with banana ice cream and chocolate yogurt ― the most popular dessert on the menu, according to our server.
Innovative décor + good wine + excellent food + impeccable service = a delightful evening. I’ll be back.
Through My Lens: Stanley Park in Winter
Vancouver received a blanket of snow this week. It doesn’t happen often and it never lasts long, but when it does, it’s awfully photogenic.
Through My Lens: Winter Frost
Christmas Day 2009
We don’t often get frost in Vancouver, but on those rare mornings when the mercury does dip below 0°Celsius, it’s a great excuse to get out the camera and go for a walk.
There and Back Again 