This was a quick trip to Whistler with a stop through Squamish on the way.
In my last travel post, we were staying in The Parker Hotel in the CBD. We checked out of there and picked up another rental car for our next adventure. We were headed to Whistler for a night. This wasn’t initially in our plans but my uncle – who lives in Vancouver planned on taking my parents there for a night. Max and I decided to come too. Unfortunately, my uncle injured himself before we arrived in Canada and before his daughter’s wedding. He ended up not coming to Whistler with us so it was just Max and I and my parents again.
Whistler is only under 2 hours away from Vancouver CBD. I think the drive would’ve taken an hour and a half without traffic and the drive there was quite scenic. We ended up stopping in Squamish on the way up.
Squamish
Squamish is a small town north of Vancouver. We stopped here for a coffee and food and checked out the shops. When you get to Squamish, you see this amazing view of Stawamus Chief which is a huge granite formation. The town itself was quite cute. We spent some time in the opshop and mum found something to buy.
From Squamish, we drove to Whistler and checked into our hotel.
We stayed at the The Crystal Lodge which was my uncle’s recommendation as that’s where he initially booked a suite for them and my parents. Max and I booked a separate room. This place was pretty big and the location was great.
This hotel backs right on to Village Stroll which is pretty much the main pedestrian street in town. There are cafes, restaurants and hotels above within this strip.
The weather wasn’t the best when we were there but we wanted to explore a little bit. Max and I have not been to Whistler before but my parents have when they went to Canada a few years ago to visit my uncle’s family.
The autumn colours in Whistler was so vibrant and cool. Even if it was raining, we enjoyed our little stroll.
We ended up at the Olympic Plaza before turning around and heading back to our rooms to rest.
I realised it stopped raining so I decided to head back out to explore. Max stayed as he wanted to check out the sauna. I ended up walking towards the gondola. The gondolas were closed during this time as ski season hasn’t started yet. It was still cool to see though and I can imagine how bustling and busy this little town is during peak ski season.
We found the sauna and I basically lasted maybe 10mins. I can’t handle extreme heat. I feel like I can’t breathe. Meanwhile, Max loves it so I left him in the sauna and got ready to go out again for dinner.
For dinner, we ended up at Ohyama Ramen and omg the crispy brussel sprouts were so good! This is the only way I would like to eat brussel sprouts. We had a nice cosy and warming dinner and then we walked back. We also popped in to the supermarket and I got a matcha ice cream wafer for a little dessert.
We were only in Whistler for one night and if I planned this part of the trip, I probably would’ve done 2 nights so we have more time to explore or just enjoy the town. We didn’t have much time here at all but we still got to relax.
Our hotel also has a heated pool and spa pool so Max and I checked that out. It was cold in Whistler so being in the spa pool was nice. I thought the heated pool was still a bit cold for my liking so I mainly stayed in the spa. This hotel has pretty good amenities.
One more thing I wanted to highlight from Crystal Lodge that I think hotels should offer is a tote bag!
Crystal Lodge had a tote bag in the closet and the note says we can use it when shopping in town. This was quite handy and we can return it and put it back. If we wanted to take it home, we could buy it. I thought this was a nice touch and hotels should have this especially in cities that charge extra for a plastic or paper bag. Having a tote bag for shopping is great. I actually travelled and brought my own tote bag from home (it was filled with snacks during this trip though) but not everyone would’ve thought about that or have space to do so.
The next morning, we met up at a cafe for breakfast. I saw how nice Provisions is the day before so we went back.
Provisions is such a nice looking cafe. The coffees weren’t too bad but the pastries looked so good.
We still had some time before we had to check out so mum and I went back to do some shopping.
We ended up in Rocks & Gems and mum and I did some shopping. I actually went into this store the day before and bought 2 rings. When I showed mum, she wanted to get herself some pieces and also bring Joan a little something too. We were there for ages and tried so many things. I ended up getting 4 rings in the end. They were reasonably priced and it’s a great Canada souvenir for me. Their main store is actually in Banff but I didn’t go in their Banff store. The Whistler store seemed bigger though. They had such a great selection of gems and jewellery.
Before heading back, I got us coffees from Arabica because the cafe itself is so interesting. It’s like an alien igloo in there.
After we checked out, we decided to explore the area more before heading back to Vancouver CBD.
We stopped by Green Lake.
Then our next stop was Nairn Falls which was an hour-ish walk. The walk itself was a fungi walk. It was so cool to see many different types of mushrooms/fungi!
This was by the carpark which was a decent size.
The walk wasn’t too difficult and it was a slow incline. We were by the water which I think was the Green River.
The walk up to see the falls was rocky. My parents didn’t want to go up and they started walking back. Max and I checked it out.
Here’s some of the fungi we saw during our walk:
There were so many! Many more I didn’t take photos of and it was amazing to see. I don’t know the names but I read this NZ fungi book a while ago which was fascinating. This is the most I’ve seen in one place and time.
Our next stop was Train Wreck and the suspension bridge. This was a much shorter walk than Nairn Falls which is great because we were pretty tired.
This was the suspension bridge over Cheakamus River.
I love bridges so when Max saw there was this suspension bridge, of course we had to check it out and it happened to be the way to Train Wreck.
Train Wreck is an actual train wreck and is a popular spot near Whistler. This spot has 7 box cars from the wreck back in 1956 when a freighter train derailed.
They left the box cars and now with grafitti, it’s a stark contrast to the natural environment within this forest.
We also saw more fungi during this walk:
There were so many different ones. My parents probably thought we were so weird finding these fascinating but we did. Max and I enjoyed spotting all of them and finding different ones.
After this, we drove back to Vancouver. We dropped our parents off at their Airbnb which was in Richmond then Max and I checked in to our last hotel of the trip. This was a long day for us but at least we maximised our time in Whistler and saw a few spots. We got some steps in on this day too.
Our next adventure is back in the city and it is the last part of our Canada trip until our travel back home to NZ.
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