Vancouver for the holidays

August 21, 2020August 19, 2020 / Greg / Leave a comment

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.

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The reason for the trip

April 12, 2020April 11, 2020 / Greg / 1 Comment

I had a decision to make – where to go on a two week solo trip in October? As I sat in an airport in June waiting for a delayed flight home, I started piecing together possible trips and scouting airfares. While I kept looking at a wide variety of locations – Chile, Ireland, Spain, Belgium – I kept coming back to Japan. Although those other locations strongly appealed to me, I ended up selecting Japan for two main reasons. First, it scared me a bit (in a good way). And secondly, and most importantly, I couldn’t stop thinking about all the food I could try. When I finally bought my airline ticket, this trip was already on its way to being a two-week long foodie adventure in the making.

Over the trip, I ate ridiculously well. Some I’ve written about already, like a higher-end sushi experience in Tokyo. For as much as I enjoy a fancy meal, I’m also a sucker for a more approachable feast, and on my first full day in Tokyo I made a beeline to a recommended conveyor belt sushi place. The idea of delicious sushi passing before me was perfect as I was jetlagged and starving, and over the course of an hour I put away a hefty amount of delicious sushi. It was a good start to my eating adventures.

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Master at work

April 1, 2020March 30, 2020 / Greg / Leave a comment

Favourite 2019 travel photos. Tokyo, Japan. October 2019.

My Tokyo omakase experience

February 1, 2020January 31, 2020 / Greg / 2 Comments

While I was in the process of planning my trip to Japan, the most common question I received was along the lines of “Are you planning any big sushi meals?” My answer to that was always a resounding yes, and while I was in Japan, I did indeed enjoy quite a bit of sushi over my two weeks there. One thing I spent an inordinate amount of time researching for my trip was where to have one blowout omakase experience. I wanted something very high quality, but not super formal or regimented. I wanted something where I would feel welcomed as a foreigner, but where I’d be dining with mostly locals.

I hit the jackpot. Sushi Saisho in the Ginza neighbourhood of Tokyo ticked all those boxes. And it did, mostly because of the sushi master himself, Saisho.

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New and old favourites

April 14, 2018April 14, 2018 / Greg / Leave a comment

Vancouver has become a favourite city of mine, especially now that it is a relatively painless direct flight away. A number of trips there over the past few years created an interesting, and delicious dilemma for my most recent visit – do I retrace my past steps for favourite foods or do I explore some new restaurants and tastes in hopes of adding to my list of favourites? Of course, balance is everything, so in the spirit of “a little from column A and a little from column B” I did both.

There was no doubt that a visit to Vancouver would have to include some seafood, and in particular, sushi. There are a couple of reasonable sushi places in Saskatoon, but arriving at Sushi Itoga on Robson Street reminded me just how amazing truly great sushi can be. I placed my order at the counter, sat down at one of the long communal tables, and a few minutes later, this amazing spread was placed in front of me.