 |
Wanderful is an ongoing feature where each week I throw a hypothetical dart at the Vancouver map and travel there – by foot or by transit, and attempt to capture some of the cool and interesting small details that make that particular neighborhood unique and special. From sidewalks to back alleys, gardens to graffiti, I’ll become a wandering tourist in my own backyard. Armed with only a camera and very little natural sense of direction, it’s an journey of modest proportions, and an opportunity to see more of what makes this city AWESOME! |
Since I knew I was going to be in the West End for the greater part of an entire Saturday, I thought I might as well kill two birds with one stone: horribly butcher a classic photographic medium, and shoot my weekly Wanderful feature at the same time. Done and done...
Normally I’m only able to devote 3 or 4 hours on a weekend to wandering around and exploring an area. However, last Saturday I was a captive audience in the West End for the better part of an entire day, from mostly sun-up to sun-down because I was participating in the Vancouver 12x12 Photo Marathon. This afforded me the opportunity to really dig my heels into the area and get to see a bit more in-depth some of the great things it has to offer. Although it’s pretty safe to say that I didn’t need an entire day... within roughly 2.3 minutes of arriving for the event, Denman Street had without a doubt, won me over.
Now, I’m not entirely sure if there is always this many unbelievable things going on simultaneously in the West End, but if so, I’m incapable of understanding how any of the residents are able to get anything done with all the cool stuff happening? In the course of a single day, I perused a Farmer’s Market, visited with many sidewalk pets, took in a balloon-decorated street fair, saw multiple sidewalk sales outside apartment buildings, witnessed a gazillion people flood onto Denman for the fireworks, watched the police stride down Denman atop giant gorgeous Clydesdale horses, and enjoyed the Hare Krishna’s dancing exuberantly down the street after them with trumpets and tambourines, singing. This was on top of the incredibly charming and quaint nature already inherent in this area, without it even trying. It didn’t need all the bells and whistles to make it cooler (although admittedly it was all just icing on the cake!). It felt almost over the top, like some random TV producers sat around a boardroom table and imagined every kick-ass thing possible, then decided to stage it all together, in ONE DAY.
Due to a poor footwear choice, after several hours of photo-marathoning, I stayed relatively close to the 12x12 home base at the Urban Rush Cafe (headquarters of delicious beer!), but I still got a fairly broad sense of some of the incredible things Denman and the surrounding streets have to offer. Restaurants galore for every type of food craving imaginable, insanely cool public art, cupcakes, a huge bike marathon, street performers juggling things, a guy walking down the street with a black cat balanced on his shoulders, a tiny forgotten shoe wedged into a stop sign so the kid who lost it might be reunited with it again. This feels like the heart of the city: a place to be embraced for your choices, walk down the streets safely at all hours, count on your neighbours for friendship and dinner party rations. I’m only 3 months into a new apartment, and this one single Saturday of wandering made me truly wish I hadn’t signed a 1 year lease. I have a feeling that I'm going to be gazing longingly over the bridge from the Westside until then, marking off the days with big red 'X's.
After growing up in a smallish town, the West End has that same friendly familiarity about it that I sometimes miss, when the hectic hustle and bustle of the city gets me down. It has all the things I have loved about every neighbourhood I’ve been fortunate enough to call my home, and a thousand things more (at least). Without the West End, a gigantic colourful part of what makes Vancouver amazing wouldn’t exist— for fireworks, sunny beach afternoons, and just taking in everything that makes this city of ours excellent.
