Vancouver is city of contradictions. Geographically, it might have the best location in the world. Ocean, Pacific rainforest, mountains. Cosmopolitan, multicultural with abundance of arts, culture and fine dining. Most visitors think it is amazing place to live; after all it is consistently named as one of top 3 world locations with respect to overall quality of life. It is also not cold in winter - something rest of Canada can only dream about. World class skiing (Whistler), amazing hiking / mountaineering / rock-climbing. List goes on
These are the good sides. The bad? Not the rain -- you get used to it. Besides it rarely rains so badly you need an umbrella. Often just a raincoat with hoodie and waterproof shoes are enough. When it comes to weather it is grey skies that get to you. November through April on average there is 1 day of sunshine to 7 days of colorless, grey steel skies. But more than weather, it is high level of crime. Drugs, break-ins. Poverty. Smell of marihuana virtually everywhere. Crumbling infrastructure, traffic jams, higher than average number of homeless people. It is also very expensive to live in Vancouver, in particular in respect to real-estate prices. So it is a mixed bag.
I was fortunate to live in this city for 7 years. The images in this gallery attempt to portray some of places I enjoyed.
