The Aquabus is a ferry by Hornby Street, which is within walking distance from the Hyatt hotel. The walk is around 20 minutes, if you want to grab a cab or rent some bikes, you can do that as well. The walk will, however, allow for you to explore the restaurants on your way there – just in case you get hungry on your way back! 😉 The Aquabus is a great way to explore False Creek within a half-hour ferry tour and then go shopping and dining at the end of the tour. We took the all-day pass, which is convenient if you want to hop on and off and explore each stop, or you can just stay on the ferry if you like without having to buy the all-day pass and just by a two-way trip for going and coming. The moment I reached the dock, I was a bit confused, because I didn’t see anyone selling tickets at a booth, but you’ll realize why it’s not really needed. The person who collects the money on the ferry can provide you a ticket, but no one really has a ticket unless you do the tour, which we did.
The tour consist of going to Granville Island- where all the shopping and restaurants are, David Lam Park- good for children if you want to give them a break and play around, Stamp’s Landing, Spyglass Place, Yaletown, Plaza of Nations, and, Science World-there’s a huge science museum that you can’t miss which is good for kids and adults.
We personally didn’t get off at all the stops; we just took the tour and then hopped off at Granville Island. There are a lot of shops, I found them to be a bit on the pricey side though, with an exception of a few shops, which was reasonably priced and a good place to buy any souvenirs or gifts for family members. We roamed around for a while, quite longer than expected. It was a nice vibe, the cute town where you can just hang out for a while and have some coffee or tea. I noticed children playing by the lake and there were ducks there as well, so it was nice. There was a public Market Place, which seemed to be dedicated to little children filled with toy stores and a play area for the little ones. I stopped by an organic coffee shop, it was nice to just sit and spend time watching kids play with the ducks and helicopters they brought along and just relax and chit chat away without worrying about the time.
Since we weren’t hungry, we didn’t have dinner on the island, although it did look like they had a lot of good choices, and people do come down to eat at these places.
We went back to Hornby around 5Â PM, which was nice because we got to see the lights and got some great pictures.
Be aware if you’re traveling in January, you might want to dress extra warm, not all the ferries are heated and it gets cold at night, even though Vancouver was experiencing a mild winter!
Adnan and Samia are a Muslim married couple who travel across the world. Adnan works for International Relations through which he is able to make these trips to exotic places and take his wife along for the ride. Together, both of them travel over 400,000 miles in a year!
