20 Neat Things About Metro Vancouver You Might Not Know

Known for its incredible natural beauty and laid-back atmosphere, Vancouver is one of Canada’s most visited cities. It forms part of Metro Vancouver, a region that stretches far beyond the city limits and all the way south to the border with the United States.

A visit to Metro Vancouver means that you can enjoy slick city life, beaches, historic villages and much more. Here are 20 neat things about Metro Vancouver that may inspire you to make this one of the top destinations on your bucket list.

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1. Movie Making

One of Vancouver’s nicknames is ‘Hollywood North’ because of all the movies and TV shows filmed here. Find out what’s filming where and get a close-up look at how movie magic is made.

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2. Superheroes at the Marine Building

When the Marine Building in Downtown Vancouver opened in 1930, it was the tallest building in the British Empire. This exquisite Art Deco building also has a secret identity: it was the Baxter Building in the Fantastic Four movies and the Daily Planet’s building where Clark Kent worked in Smallville, while it also featured in Blade: Trinity and Timecop.

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3. Metropolis at Metrotown

Canada’s third largest shopping mall – and the largest in British Columbia – is located not in Vancouver itself but in Burnaby. Metropolis at Metrotown features more than 400 stores and services.

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4. Crystal Mall

Across from Metropolis is Crystal Mall, which has a decidedly Asian flavour. It features a large variety of Chinese specialty stores and herbalists, an Asian food court and a Chinese fresh produce market.

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5. Punjabi Market

Vancouver’s Punjabi Market is the heart of the city’s Indo-Canadian community and the best place to shop for colourful textiles and spices or to celebrate festivals like Diwali. The area is also home to the stunning Arthur Erickson-designed Ross Street Sikh Temple.

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6. Kids Market

Housed in an old factory building, a train caboose and two additional buildings, the Kids Market on Granville Island is a shopping mall for the young and the young at heart. It features kid-centric stores, an indoor playground and an outdoor play area next to a pond.

7. The Maze at VanDusen Botanical Garden

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7. The Maze at VanDusen Botanical Garden

The Elizabethan Maze at VanDusen Botanical Garden is one of only a handful in North America. It’s made of 3,000 pyramidal cedars and has an observation platform if you’d rather watch others struggling to find their way around.

8. BC Highland Games and Scottish Festival

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8. BC Highland Games and Scottish Festival

On the last Saturday in June, Metro Vancouver dons its tartans and celebrates its Scottish heritage at the BC Highland Games and Scottish Festival in Coquitlam. Activities include Highland dancing, caber tossing, haggis hunting and whisky tasting.

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9. Riverview Hospital

From 1913 to 2012, Riverview Hospital in Coquitlam was a mental health facility. Since its closure and the abandonment of many of its buildings, it has become a popular filming location and one of the spookiest sites in Metro Vancouver, although it’s slated for reopening in 2019. One way to visit is through the Riverview Horticultural Centre Society.

10. The Ghosts of The Old Spaghetti Factory

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10. The Ghosts of The Old Spaghetti Factory

Like other restaurants in this chain of Italian-style eateries, The Old Spaghetti Factory in Gastown features a streetcar in the dining area. It reportedly also features four different ghosts: a little girl holding a balloon, a boy named Edward, a mischievous little man known as Looky-loo and the tram conductor.

11. The Cliffwalk at Capilano Suspension Bridge Park

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11. The Cliffwalk at Capilano Suspension Bridge Park

While the wobbly Capilano Suspension Bridge has been thrilling visitors to North Vancouver since 1889, the truly daring have now discovered the nearby Cliffwalk. The series of narrow walkways high above the canyon features glass floors in some sections.

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12. Quarry Rock

Quarry Rock is a large, rocky outcrop just outside Deep Cove in North Vancouver. The easy hike to Quarry Rock leads through forest and ends in spectacular views of Indian Arm and the surrounding mountains.

13. Pipeline Hike at Iona Beach Regional Park

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13. Pipeline Hike at Iona Beach Regional Park

At Iona Beach Regional Park in Richmond, there is a jetty that stretches 4 km into the sea and covers a giant pipe. The area is a birdwatcher’s paradise but its proximity to Vancouver International Airport means you can ask in all seriousness, 'Is it a bird? Is it a plane?'

14. Chinese New Year’s Eve at the International Buddhist Temple

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14. Chinese New Year’s Eve at the International Buddhist Temple

The International Buddhist Temple in Richmond is a stunning temple complex with a design based on Beijing’s Forbidden City. The temple grounds are open to visitors every day and ringing in the Chinese New Year here is a very special event.

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15. Dude Chilling Park

In 1991, Guelph Park in Mount Pleasant became home to a Michael Dennis sculpture known as Reclining Figure. Another artist, Viktor Briestensky, poked fun at the piece 21 years later by erecting a prank sign at the park, renaming it Dude Chilling Park.

The authorities removed the sign but after a public outcry, it is now recognized as a quirky piece of public art in Vancouver.

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16. Douglas Coupland’s Public Art

Acclaimed Vancouver-based author Douglas Coupland, who gave the world the term 'Generation X', is also a sculptor and has given Vancouver some of its most striking pieces of public art.

These include the Digital Orca at Jack Poole Plaza, the Terry Fox Memorial in Pacific Boulevard and Marine Drive’s Golden Tree, a shiny replica of the 800-year-old Hollow Tree in Stanley Park.

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17. Finn Slough

Finn Slough is a tiny fishing community in Richmond and was founded in the 1880s by Finnish settlers. The wooden houses here either float on the Fraser River or are built on stilts.

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18. Zulu Records

In the age of digitally downloading your music, visiting a record store is like taking a trip back in time. Zulu Records is a huge independent record store in Vancouver and sells new and used CDs, strange contraptions known as turntables and even weirder, big black discs called vinyl records.

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19. JAPADOG

Vancouver has a thriving food-cart scene and if there’s one street food you need to try, it’s the fare at JAPADOG. This local chain with carts in several locations in Metro Vancouver serves hot dogs with a Japanese twist, for example, topped with seaweed, teriyaki sauce and mayo or with shrimp tempura instead of a sausage.

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20. John Fluevog’s Flagship Store

John Fluevog’s unusual shoes have graced the feet of celebs from Whoopi Goldberg and Robin Williams to Madonna, Alice Cooper and The White Stripes. His flagship store, where the shoes are designed, is located in Gastown, only a block away from where it all started back in 1970.