Canada

Capital: Ottawa ♦ Population: 36 million ♦ Currency: Can $ ♦ Language: English. French in certain areas.

Blog posts

Vancouver (and whistler, squamish)
a ferry ride away
the canadian rockies
the okanagan valley

FURTHER beyond

Highlights

Vancouver: my only experience with a Canadian big city, I fall more in love with it every day. It is a very futuristic feeling city, surrounded by the most beautiful landscape: mountains, ocean, parks and of course, the Sea Wall: an ocean side path running 14 km around Stanley Park and False Creek. The whole place is incredibly scenic and everyone there seems to embrace an outdoor lifestyle. The food scene is also great: there are too many breweries to count and a number of interesting and well established restaurants.

Whistler: snow-bunny PARADISE. So much snow and plenty of internationals; they say the local accent is Australian. They also say that if you go in summer time, it’s got some epic mountain biking parks. It is pretty pricey though: in recent times I have tended to stay in Squamish and drive the 40 min or so to get to the mountain.

Alberta: if you need more snow than Whistler, head on up. My mum lived here for a few years and she used to ski to work! Way better than taking a bus. The Rockies in the summer time is also pretty unreal: it really doesn’t take long to see why Jasper and Banff are considered world class destinations.

Montreal: I felt as though I had been transported straight out of Canada and dropped into the middle of France. The food, the language, the culture – it is a fantastic holiday destination for something entirely different to the rest of Canada. I was fortunate to go in the fall – absolutely spectacular.

Niagara Falls: one of Canada’s most well known tourist spots, these falls should be on everyone’s bucket list.

Did you know?

  • Canada has the longest coastline of any country in the world.
  • Canada has a similar relationship with the US to what New Zealand has with Australia. They hate being confused with Americans, they are each other’s greatest rivals – but at the same time, there is an underlying love for thy neighbour (except maybe in 2020…)
  • Weirdly, Canada has the highest consumption of macaroni and cheese in the world.
  • Although Canada is the second largest country in the world (by land mass), only 0.5% of the world’s population actually lives here.
  • If a Canadian greets you with ‘Bonjour’ it is more than just a hello; they are testing whether your preference is to speak English or French. Therefore only respond with ‘Bonjour’ if you want to continue speaking in French, otherwise you might start seeing some annoyed Canadians!