Day trips from Vancouver
4 stopsBest: June to September for everything. Whistler, in winter tooUpdated July 2026
The Sea to Sky highway climbs from sea level to a thousand metres in two hours, hard against a fjord, water on one side and granite walls on the other. It was rebuilt entirely for the 2010 Games and today it appears on lists of the world’s best roads compiled by people who aren’t from here. The destination barely matters: the road is the trip.
And that’s Vancouver’s advantage: it’s wedged between an ocean, some fjords and a mountain range, so two hours in any direction there’s something that in Europe would be an entire national park. All you have to decide is whether you leave by land, towards the mountains, or by sea, towards the islands.
The route, stop by stop
4 STOPS- 01
Whistler and the Sea to Sky
Two hours on the 99 and you’re at the largest ski resort in North America by skiable area, with two mountains joined by a cable car that crosses four kilometres of valley at four hundred and thirty-six metres above the ground, and which has the longest unsupported span in the world. It hosted the 2010 Games.
In summer it’s a different thing and for many people a better one: the same cable car carries bikes and the mountain becomes the biggest downhill park in the world, with trails people come down wearing armour. And there are lakes to swim in, which at that altitude are freezing and which people get into anyway.
But we’ll repeat the advice: the road is the plan. Stop at Shannon Falls, a three-hundred-and-thirty-five-metre waterfall at the roadside, and at the Howe Sound viewpoint. If you turn round at Squamish, you’ve already done the trip.
- 02
The Capilano bridge, or the other one
The Capilano suspension bridge has charged admission since 1889, before any other attraction in British Columbia, and it’s a hundred and forty metres of bridge seventy metres above a canyon, plus treetop walkways and a cantilever over the cliff. It’s very well done, it’s expensive and it’s packed.
And fifteen minutes away there’s another: Lynn Canyon has a suspension bridge from 1912, fifty metres above a river, and it’s free. A third of the people go, the forest is the same, and it also has pools people swim in during summer, with the warning that the water is freezing and there have been accidents: there are signs and they’re worth heeding.
It isn’t exactly the same, Capilano has more infrastructure, but it’s the same feeling for nothing. It’s the classic local tip and that’s why we’re giving it.
- 03
Victoria and the Gulf Islands
First the confusion to clear up: Victoria is the capital of British Columbia and it’s on Vancouver Island, an enormous island off the coast where the city of Vancouver is not. Two different places with the same surname, ninety minutes apart by boat.
Victoria is deliberately British: a Victorian parliament, gardens, afternoon tea in a 1908 hotel and over a century of insisting on it. It’s fine and it isn’t the reason. The reason is the ferry: ninety minutes across the strait, slipping through Active Pass, a channel between islands where the ship passes metres from the pines, with seals, bald eagles and, with luck, orcas.
Go on deck. And if you have an extra day, stay on one of the Gulf Islands: Salt Spring is a village of farmers and artists reached on the same boat.
- 04
The Okanagan valley
Four hours east, across the range, the climate changes completely: on the other side of the mountains it rains half as much and there’s a long valley with lakes, vineyards, fruit orchards and Canada’s only desert, with cactus and rattlesnakes. You’re four hours from a temperate rainforest.
It’s the main wine region in the west of the country and ice wine is made here, as in Ontario. And we have to be honest about the distance: four hours each way is too much for a day, and eight hours of driving to taste wine doesn’t make much sense. It’s a two- or three-day break, not a day trip.
We’re listing it because a lot of people ask and because it’s worth knowing it exists, not because we recommend it as a single day.
Frequently asked
Is the Capilano bridge worth it?
It’s well done and it’s packed and expensive. Fifteen minutes away, Lynn Canyon has another suspension bridge, from 1912, fifty metres above a river, and it’s free, with a third of the people and the same forest. It isn’t identical, but it’s the same feeling for nothing: it’s the classic local tip.
Is Victoria in Vancouver?
No, and it’s the classic confusion: Victoria is the capital of British Columbia and it’s on Vancouver Island, an enormous island off the coast where the city of Vancouver is not. They’re two different places, ninety minutes apart by ferry.
Can you do the Okanagan valley in a day?
We don’t recommend it: it’s four hours each way, and eight hours of driving to taste wine makes no sense. It’s a two- or three-day break. What is worth knowing is that it exists: on the other side of the range there’s a valley with vineyards and Canada’s only desert, with cactus.