It’s one of my dreams to one day travel all the way across Canada by train. I know it’ll take forever and be super expensive, but whatever, it’s something I really want to do. We have such a beautiful country up here, and sure, visiting all the important cities by hopping from one to another on a plane is great, in its own way, but first of all, I am afraid of planes and avoid them whenever I can, and secondly, if you’re way up there in the sky, you don’t get to see all the in between bits of the country. I guess to really get to enjoy the cities individually, I’ll have to get off the train for a day or two at least at each stop. That’s got to be a thing people do, right? Like when people say they want to go from the East Coast to the West Coast on a train, surely they don’t just sit on the train for days and never get off and enjoy the sights … that’s certainly won’t be what I do.

Something I’ve been doing to prepare myself for this trip (which I plan to take when I have enough money, so in, like … I don’t know, forty-two years) is looking up things I want to see in each city. I will probably want most of my time spent in each place to be exploratory, getting into the nooks and crannies of the cities, away from all the tourist stuff and to the really good place that only the locals know about. Assuming the locals will help me get there, of course; but it’s Canada, and we’re nice here, so I don’t anticipate that being a huge problem. But anyway, even though I’ll want a lot of my exploring to be off the beaten track, I’ve decided that I probably will want to see at least a few tourist attractions, just to say I’ve been there. And frankly, places don’t become tourist attractions for nothing, so I expect each attraction will have something fun and unique to offer.

I have decided to present my findings in a series of blog posts, so that anyone else who may have aspirations like mine can check it out and hopefully find at least a few helpful tidbits! I have decided to go from West to East (for no particular reason), so I’m starting with Vancouver. I know a few people from Vancouver, and I know even more people who have been there, but I have yet to travel there myself. I hear that there are lots of beautiful natural spots to poke around in, and I must admit I think I’m most looking forward to that. But! As I said, I imagine some of the tourist spots are absolutely lovely, too! So, all that in mind, I’ve decided to post about four posts for each city I want to visit, starting with Vancouver, and I’ll be sure to include some explorer-y stuff as well as info on some more typical tourist spots that I think look particularly interesting. I hope you enjoy the ride!