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Tag Archives: Canada Place

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Photographing Vancouver– Around the Marina

by Damien Walmsley Posted on

The conference is intense but during the lunchtime breaks, I was able to take time out and stroll around the seafront.  Vancouver is a photogenic city and there is always something happening.  You can spend many an hour just watching the harbour float planes taking off and landing in front of the conference centre.  The marina has beautiful yachts and colourful house boats.  There are people just enjoying the outdoors, cycling and running around the Marina. The city does have its homeless problem but I did like the ingenuity of the person who hung his hammock on the house on stilts.  The aluminium house is known as the “crooked house on stilts”, or LightShed by Liz Magor. When I looked the next day the hammock was gone. All pictures by my Sony RX100v5 either on P or S setting.

Even though the view is breathtaking, it is time to take a stroll outside.
Float planes landing and taking off
A single figure goes forward into the land of high rise living.
An ingenious way to find a bed for the night.
Colourful House boats in the Marina
Space Venus by Salvador Dali

The last picture is of Space Venus by Salvador Dali. This picture was taken on the Friday. I learnt that the statue was vandalised and the golden egg taken on the Saturday night after we left to go back home. Details of this were reported in the local news.

Categories blog

Photographing Vancouver – Playing Tourist

by Damien Walmsley Posted on

Vancouver is a beautiful location for a conference, and it was my third visit to the city, previously visiting in 1999 and 2009. Therefore, as the year was 2019, I was due my usual visit 🙂  We had some down time prior to the start and my post doc, Marco and I wandered around Canada Place before heading off for the Capilano suspension bridge. 

Canada place has the iconic sails and every day there was a different cruise ship in the dock.

Canada place with cruise ship in dock
A sail from Canada Place

Twenty years ago the Capilano suspensionbridge and the associated park was very quiet.  Not now.  It is a major Tourist centre with both a tree canopy and cliff walk.  Both of these were spectacular and made good use of the natural resource.  The trip over the suspension bridge was a slight worry.  There was a high volume of visitors and the picture shows the large number of people who were crossing at the same time. The statistics are awesome 450 feet (137m) across the valley and 230 feet (70m) above the Capilano River.  If you are scared of heights it is not the ideal sightseeing tour.   The movement of the bridge did provide a photographic challenge as it was never still.

Indian carvings
Pine needles
The suspension bridge with people
North American Kestrel

On the other side there was a canopy walk in the trees although my photographs do not fully represent the views that you were able to see.  The light was difficult with both dark and bright areas.  It was much easier to take photographs of beautiful birds of prey including a North American Kestrel.  One lady was reprimanded for getting to close to the birds.  “They do bite” said the handler!   We also successfully completed the cliff walk which took us out over the canyon. 

We then caught a local bus back to the bay but stopped on the North Shore where we captured postcard views of the city through artwork in the grounds of the local park.

View from the North Shore
A tangled art work with the city in the background

It was back to the conference and after the opening reception we caught taxis to Seasons in the park. The restaurant was in the hills high above Vancouver.  It was possible to catch the light as the sun was setting.  Thank you to the British Dental Journal for the opportunity to see and photograph Vancouver from a different angle