So we begin our first full day in Vancouver with a quick Uber ride to Granville island from our hotel. We had a fairly productive day 0 so let’s see how today will go, should be more chill by nature of design according to my sister but we’ll see.
After being dropped off in front of Granville island by our Uber driver I decided to back track walk a bit for documentation purposes while my sister looks inside a nearby pet store.
Oh yea, proof of existence Granville island edition, npc pose edition. Granville island is a manmade island with a bunch of food places and craft workshop stuff, it’s a pretty popular tourist spot indeed.
Such gift shops like these are common around tourist areas but this one had some good indigenous art and merch stuff. My sister brought some stuff from here, not bad.
This particular store was selling some glass gem shit but they also had some anime prints and keychains, this is just like at a anime convention lol. I suppose the owner’s son/daughter likes to attend and sell at conventions so might as well sell their stuff here, noice.
A quick look inside the Public Market, which is the main shit most people come to Granville island for which is a a bit like st Lawrence market meets CNE food building but better.
Lees doughnuts, which is kind of Vancouver’s local best doughnut shop started here and this is their first location, they have lots of locations around vancouver. The owners are asian hence the name I suppose.
Proof of Lee’s existence. Waiting for doughnuts edition.
We all got one doughnut each and shared. I can’t remember which one but I got like one called butter crunch, my sister got like some mango one my mom got a cheesecake flavored one. Overall they are pretty good shit, way better than Tim’s doughnuts as they are not that sweet and their dough is more cake-like with a bit of egg in them it feels. Would again, and we did.
It was highlighted to me JJ Bean is good coffee shop in Vancouver, I got a coffee, it’s not bad. Right beside Lees so good location.
Exploring the market, it’s beginning to get busy. They have everything from meats shops, honey shops, bakeries to fruit sellers and even craft artisans.
This place Longliner seafood had some good smoked salmon and other fish. Their main popular thing that was recommended was something called smoked salmon candy bites or something, so we got some of that.
Some areas were like a food court, with stuff like Chinese food, perogies and other very Vancouver sandwich stuff and whatnot.
Our shared lunch for today was a small mini perogies bowl, some smoked salmon candy bites and clam chowder pie/soup thing. My JJ bean coffee in the picture cause yea.
Our maple candy smoked salmon candy nuggets are kind of expensive but they are pretty good shit. So sweet and savory but also smoky with all the nice salmon flavor, worth it. We also got a variation that had black pepper but the regular one is better since it focuses more on sweetness.
Our clam chowder bowl pie was also pretty good shit, would again. The place had a whole bunch of other ones like beef and chicken, even fancy ones like butter chicken so yea, good stuff. I can’t remember the price on this one but I think it was like $16, so kinda expensive but still worth it in my opinion.
Where we ate outside had some nice views, so you know what that means? Time for some NPC pose proof of existence pics.
It was getting crowded outside but we were alright with our table. Nice bridge and shit too with music man on the side, working for coins and shit. I don’t think we gave coin tho.
Inside another building had all sorts of shops that are more artisan gift and stuff to buy. Not bad.
Book store with nice studio ghibli section. Good shit, guess people in Vancouver like their anime stuff too, even tho it’s so mainstream. Maybe this is AI generated?
Proof of public market name existence. I wish they named all these markets something better than just ‘public’ but sure.
An area where native artists can sell their shit, ranging from clothes to even jewellery and carvings, not bad.
We go back inside to get some more Lees doughnuts and some other final food items for later. Some pretty nice looking fruit stacks we have here.
Once we were done at Granville island we Uber back to our hotel to rest a bit and eat some of our take away food items, such as the above; a sausage roll. Well, it’s not that good, even GREEGS in London was way better but I guess they tried, way too much pastry, pastry not that flaky and the meat not that tasty. For $5, I could do better, even in Canada I think. The only thing that wasn’t that great I had at Granville island but other than this, I would recommend going there just for the food and shops, just to browse and eat, it’s worth at max half a day at least or a few hours, like we did.
My sister and I decided to go to a nearby art gallery, the Vancouver art gallery to spend some time before dinner. Mom was tried, so stayed back to rest/no interests.
Admission is $35 per person, hope this shit is worth it. In London all the museums worth seeing were mainly free so paying this much is kind of a big detraction.
The newest exhibition on show was by this Japanese guy called Otani Workshop, ok sure.
All of his shit was mainly like figures and statues looking kind of like this, hmm not bad interesting.
Proof of culture scull like thing art edition. Alot of his shit could fit in a ghibli movie I think.
His work is very Japanese like obviously, it can be easily sold on merch if he desired so.
Proof of little figures existence, thumbs up edition.
NPC pose hands of wonderment, just like the picture behind with magic hands.
Peace sign of existence pose, nice chill girl behind art yea edition.
Our baller artist, saying he has something and can’t communicate.
On the same floor they also have some guy’s collection of vessel pottery which he has collected over the years, er ok I guess.
Yea, so he showed his collection of pottery pieces, yea, it’s a thing I guess.
On the top floor they had a exhibt for Emily Carr, probably the most famous Canadian artists on display on this museum, let’s see what they got.
Hmm, so it’s just this green large room with all the paintings all together? Sure I guess? But I expected much more from this.
Proof of Carr painting existence, slightly disappointing edition.
On the next floor below they had an entire exhibit to an artist named Jean Paul Ripelle which I thought was an abstract artist, and in many ways he was as seen above.
This exhibit basically goes through his entire life as an artist, and you begun to see that this guy, this artist, he just wanted to be famous man lol. He changes styles every so often and gets ‘inspired’ by the new hit artists of the current age, from Monet, Jackson pollock to whatever and kind of copies their shit hoping to also get popular like them lol.
At a crossroads in identity really, this dude had no set style he was known for. He can make shit well, but he was not known for anything, no master works worth mentioning, he was like a pure follower clout chaser, no original ideas or concepts explored.
Dude even started doing sculpture shit like this too, so out of place from what he made in the past. Nice, But why tho?
By the 80’s dude was just making abstract shit that kinda looks like eggs and sperm, cell division or whatnot, inspired by living I guess?
When he eventually died one of his friends made a statue of him, the piece behind me. You can kind of tell this french guy was pretty pompous and felt himself worthy of better fame and standing. I mean, just look at this statue lol. I dunno man, I just don’t about our boi Riopelle.
On another floor we move on to some other random artists work that this museum has. Mainly installations like this one, a famous one says my sister that is like a totem pole but made of golf bags. Honestly not bad.
A cool mask that when mounted and with light pointed in a certain way on it, projects a body of shadows. You can see the shadows for the legs and arms, not bad.
At the gift shop now. They don’t have very much merch of the exhibits at all, not even magnets or key-chains of the main artists that they are showcasing except for maybe a book on Riopelle and a book for Otani. Weakest merch gift shop I have ever seen. Overall, I would not recommend this art gallery/museum at all, it’s shit and hardly worth the price of admission, I would avoid if possible. The lackluster Emily Carr was just bad and featuring Riopelle? What a joke. While Otani was not bad, it’s not enough of offset the lack of shit to see.
After a worse than expected gallery showing, we collected our mom from the hotel and went to our dinner reservation. Joe Fortes, a seafood/steak restaurant that was recommended by online guides and locals/white people.
Nice oyster bar, which I was sitting behind. Not for me tho, not a fan of raw oysters.
Joe Fortes was apparently just some black dude that moved to Vancouver who was a former sailor and Vancouver’s first lifeguard, who taught lots of people how to swim. Just generally a really well liked guy, this place was named after him when it opened in like 1985, about a hundred years since he died or so, hmm ok.
My mom doing some action with her hands, mimicking a crab or something, I forgot.
They have unlimited bread and some lobster oil with balsamic vinegar dip. People say this lobster oil is the best shit but it was just mid honestly, I could barely taste any lobster and just the balsami vingar. I would rather just have olive oil instead honestly.
An app of fried oysters as per requested by my mom, they were good after some doubt from my mom saying white people can’t fry oysters good, only Asians can do it. They were good.
We ordered a family surf and turf platter that comes with a bunch of shit on it. Our waiter asked us if we wanted to have another order of mash potatoes and veggies for $6 so it’s more balanced and we said yes. I guess our ‘family’ platter is actually meant for two people I guess? Who knows.
Our ‘family’ surf and turf platter came with steak, lobster, crab legs, shrimp, prawns and mushrooms. Pretty good shit, nothing bad really, all was cooked good and seasoned well, nothing to complain about. The price was quite expensive tho, at over $250 roughly, which is a bit much but yea.
Overall, would I recommend Joe Fortes? Yes I guess, if you want a upper than normal white people seafood experience with nice lore and somewhat intentionally dated decor going for 1930’s or even 20’s vibe, even tho it only opened in 1985 or so. Yea, not bad, but not something for everyone. After our app and tip/tax, our meal was over like $350, so that’s another thing to consider.
On our way back to our hotel we saw this samosa cart, shilling samosas. Decided to get some for some late night snack later. Sad brown guy is just there to fry up/heat up samosas, sure.
After a few hours chilling in our hotel room, we had our post-dinner snack. Two veg samosa for $5? Kinda overpriced but what do you expect, should be like $3 but whatever, not bad, but not amazing either.
When we left Granville island we also brought back some more doughnuts from Lees. I think this time we choose maple glazed, cinnemon and jam filled. While still very good, they are much better fresh, the flavors we choose this time was also not as good as our initial picks so yea, good but better fresh the first time.
And that about ends our first full day in Vancouver. Pretty chill in my opinion compared to other travel ventures but yea, we are in a pretty chill mode this trip so yea, let’s chill out again and lets see more stuff tomorrow. Hope it goes well, it will be our most ambition day I think.