Almost eight months later, I have a vivid, yet simple memory. My wife and I were in the Calgary airport on Christmas night enroute to Vancouver for a short vacation. We were happy to be getting away to a favourite city for a few days and to be able to exchange our Saskatoon parkas for lighter rain jackets as we escaped from a prairie winter. My memory now of that night, through a prism of a pandemic that has grounded my traveling in 2020, is just of the simple, unadulterated happiness I get from traveling. As we sat waiting for our flight on to Vancouver, sharing a snack to tide us over before a very late night McDonalds run after we landed, I remember feeling at peace. And I wonder when I’ll be able to enjoy sitting in an airport again.

More than just sitting in an airport, I’m looking forward to eating and drinking in public establishments around the world again. On Boxing Day morning, as soon as it opened, I wandered into La Taqueria Pinche Taco Shop, one of a number of “must visit” places every time I’m in Vancouver.

Amazing tacos and craft beer always put a smile on my face and this is the way I’ve started every trip to Vancouver since I first made my way into this taco shop about eight years ago.

Later on Boxing Day night, my wife and I headed for Tojo’s Restaurant for a taste of his inventive dishes. Ever since I returned from Japan earlier in the year, I had been craving Japanese food so I was excited to try the tasting menu.

After those couple of weeks in Japan, my chopstick skills were much improved over my first visit here a few years back. Everything we had was amazing including the albacore tuna, a smoked salmon and mackrel salad and, of course, the sashimi course.

To get our appetites in order before the next night’s meal, we went for a walk around an overcast, yet balmy Vancouver. As two former Maritimers, we headed immediately for the water.

There were some holiday themed displays around the cruise ship terminal, and this moose covered in small LED lights intrigued us both.

This trip to Vancouver was a bit of a greatest hits visit for us in many ways. Vij’s is always a fun night out and we ordered an obscene amount of food that we tried our best to polish off.

In addition to the amazing food, Vij’s has a great cocktail list. I can’t remember what my wife ordered here, but she looks pleased with her selection.

My favourite dish of the night was the lamb popsicle. I should know better by now and just order six of these for dinner, but the desire to try all the other deliciousness on the menu always overtakes me. If I lived in the neighbourhood, I’d be popping in here all the time for one of these and a pint of craft beer at the bar.

Speaking of craft beer, I couldn’t visit Vancouver without a few tastings. I stopped in at the relatively new 33 Brewing Experiment just beside 33 Acres Brewing Company. This is their experimental and small-batch beer joint. I loved being able to try some newly released beers including an on-point Japanese rice lager (bottom right) and a delicious orange oat pale ale (top right).

A few blocks away, I pulled up a stool for a pint at Brassneck, to this day, one of my favourite taprooms I’ve visited. I’m a fan of just about everything I’ve ever had here including this altbier that was malty and balanced and took some of the chill off of a damp day outside.

I’m always up to find new favourite places too, and I hope I can someday soon return to The Magnet. I loved the dark ambience of this bar focused on craft beer and cocktails. The middle beer of this tasting flight ended up being among the best I tried in all of 2019 – “Easy Tiger” a wheat beer by Superflux Beer Company

On the Saturday night of our trip, we headed to a Canucks game and just inside the rink on our way to our seats, I spied a place selling lobster rolls, and there was no turning back. Not as good as an east coast lobster roll, but good enough for a prairie-bound soul craving a taste of the sea.

This was my wife’s first ever NHL game, so we sprung for reasonably good lower level seats. While the game featured a lot of entertaining end to end action, we were torn between the action on the ice and a seeing-eye dog in training sitting immediately behind us. It took all of our willpower to not turn around in every break in the action to play with him.

Last on our activity list was a visit to the Vancouver Aquarium which was a first for me. It was an amazingly pleasant December 30th day with temperatures pushing 10C and more sun than clouds.

In light of the great weather, we spent most of our time at the outdoor exhibits. The dolphins leaping out of the water were a lot of fun, and so too was watching these fellas get fed and groomed.

It’s hard to believe that eight months later, I haven’t been out of the province and have no idea when I’ll next get on a plane. There’s a good chance, that when that happens, right after reuniting with family back east, a quick jaunt to Vancouver will again be in the cards.