Stanley Park

Stanley park, Vancouver's oldest, largest, and most popular park is one of the city's main tourist attractions. This canadian National Historic Site is recognized as one of the great urban parks of the world. It is an evergreen desert garden of 1,000 sections of land near the heart of Vancouver's midtown guts.

The park abounds in wildlife and its features appeal to the naturalist, sports lover, or one who would do nothing more than relax in beautiful surroundings. North America's third-largest park draws eight million visitors per year.

Visitors can have a joy ride by Stanley Park Miniature Train or enjoy the coastal rainforest with many famous landmarks, monuments, First Nations art and totem poles, and gorgeous gardens.

The park attracts an estimated eight million visitors every year, including locals and tourists, who come for its recreational facilities and its natural attributes. A paved 22 kilometres seawall path circles the park, which is used by 2.5 million pedestrians, cyclists, and inline skaters every year. Much of the park remains forested with an estimated half million trees. There are approximately 200 kilometres of trails and roads in the park, which are patrolled by the Vancouver Police Department's equine mounted squad. The Project for Public Spaces has ranked Stanley Park as the sixteenth best park in the world and sixth best in North America.

Stanley Park is the grand daddy of all parks in Greater Vancouver. Visitors can start off by doing a loop around the park. You can either drive, or if you're feeling energetic, try walking. Or you can rent a bike or rollerblades at stores near Georgia and Denman. By circling the park one can see many of the landmarks.

The west side of the seawall has three swimming beaches. Second Beach is popular with families. It has a wonderful outdoor swimming pool, equipped with slides and a special tortoise slide for the little ones. When the kids get tired of swimming you can take them to the playground.

There are plenty of trails to hike along inside the park. It also has a miniature train and farmyard for children. At Christmas time the train and farmyard are decorated in festive lights.

You can do about a hundred different activities there: feed squirrels, climb trees, watch a killer whale show, ride on a horse-drawn carriage are just the tip of the iceberg.