Vancouver city was the final destination in our trip. It is often called upon as one of the top cities in the world to live in and we were excited.

Despite living in and loving London we do recognise that it can be smelly, polluted, noisy and expensive – funnily enough these are the same things that we dislike in cities we visit. But in the end London is our home and full of interesting diverse people and I think living in a city is different to holidaying in one.

We had arranged 4 nights in downtown Vancouver, it looked promising – city beaches and the huge Stanley park meant there would be much to do.

First up we had a full day on bikes. We were initially daunted – how the hell would we manage a 7 year old in downtown traffic, riding on the wrong side of the road? Amazingly even in the downtown area there were isolated bike lanes, so worse case scenario James could only really run into another cyclist 🙈. From there we stuck to a coastal path that took us up and around Stanley park, a 400 hectare green wonderland with rainforest, beaches, attractions, and breweries. It was such a fun day and importantly it took our minds off Ucluelet. Of course it was still a city and the beaches looked out over stationary tankers in the far distance, but it was a fab day full of great tourist actions.

Despite all the travelling we have done over the years none of us have ever seen orcas. And this was one of the fews places in the world where it might just happen. We couldn’t resist this and despite already whale watching in Tofino we booked in again. We had a fabulous day and saw some humpback whales up close but no orcas. As it happened the firm had to cut the tour slightly short and so generously called the trip in as a ‘no sighting’ tour and issued anyone who wanted it with a lifetime additional tour. Obviously we booked in for the following day 😁.

Team Orca had an early start to hit the 8:30am tour to find out at 8:20 that high wind had cancelled the trip – meh! Obviously we rebooked for the afternoon when the winds were due to calm 😁.

No complaints from James about all of this but honestly he was tired. Canada has been full on – amazingly so – and we are well aware that there’s only so much you can ask of a little one. So until the tour departed we went to a local playground, John took a morning nap and James hung around living his best life.

As we set off we were warned, the wind remained high and the first hour would be bumpy. No one was allowed on the front of the boat and sick bags were handed out. Did we mention the almost boat sickness from the last trip 😱? The second compromise to enable the whale tour was James having headphones and a podcast on the afternoon trip. It was 5 hours at sea and so he was happily chilling listening to his favourite science podcast whilst being constantly reminded by me to look at the horizon!

Patience really is a virtue and one that provided us with a beautiful reward. On our third attempt we saw a pod of 5 orcas for about an hour. They were pretty active, and given the many seagulls had been successfully hunting. Twice an orca did a ‘spy hop’- similar to us treading water where the orca positioned itself vertically to visually inspect their surroundings above the water line. Such a glorious two days at sea – as a family we love a boat trip and despite the bumpy sea at first we enjoyed a gorgeous few hours in the sunshine seeing some amazing creatures. We really hope James remembers this kind of adventure for life – we know we will.

Vancouver as a city was feeling pretty cool. We’d got used to being back amongst it and had been blown away by the outdoor living that was possible. One of the highlights for us was the outdoor swimming pools. There were several dotted around the city, Kitsilano being the biggest. So one afternoon we hopped over to try out the 137m heated seawater pool. Firstly, I’d say that ‘heated’ is a generous description…it’s no jacuzzi. Secondly, 137m is a long fricking way – 8 lengths for more than one km, 12 lengths for more than a mile. James took on the $10 challenge of swimming the 137m – what a superstar! I know London does well for outdoor swimming but this was something else and because it’s Canada it was not overpopulated, such an amazing afternoon.

Like me you may think of Canada as clean, careful and considerate. In many ways this is true but there is another side which we had been seeing on our travels. In Vancouver in particular there was a very obvious drug and homeless problem. Walking through downtown there were people off their faces, meth pipes in hands and in some places needles on the street.

Immediately we worried about James, though actually he didn’t ask or say much when faced with this. We’ve talked about homeless people in London and I think he just accepted it as the same thing. If he had asked us we would have found a way to be honest in an age appropriate way – but he didn’t so we left it alone. It wasn’t the same as London, that was so obvious I did some research to better understand the problem. Whilst it’s hard to summarise something so complex, it appears to be the same fentanyl crisis that hit the US and Google tells me it is in the U.K. now too. Vancouver is controversial in its actions trying to stem the increase in overdoses (for this part of the world) by decriminalising small quantities, with overdose prevention centres and even trials offering fentanyl to drug users in an effort to reduce criminal activities and help stabilise their lives. There’s no evidence that I could find yet that this is leading to reduced drug use but I hope it is successful – it is so sad and upsetting seeing people in this position.

But enough already. Our 4 week adventure can’t end like this. We spent our last morning at the most amazing Science World for James and then a massive meal at Jam Cafe before heading to the airport. Over lunch James unprompted put it well…’I don’t want to leave Canada mummy’. Nor do we sweetie was our response.

Thanks Canada – you have been awesome! 🇨🇦