On the theatrical scale, TUTS productions fall smack in the middle between low-budget, high-energy high school musicals and big-talent, big-ticket touring shows. Every show features a handful of pros and a whole bunch of keen (read unpaid) up-and-comers.

Vancouverites love ‘em as much for the open-air Stanley Park setting as for the hummable tunes and family-friendly themes. (The alternating show this season is Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.)

I didn’t know if I could push the iconic Gene Kelly and Debbie Reynolds film version of the show to the edges of my brain long enough to let this production have its own time in the spotlight.

Director Shel Piercy didn’t make it easy. There were so many nods to the more-famous film cousin, some of which were surprisingly successful: Cosmo Brown’s (Neil Minor) backwards wall flip, for example, and Lina Lamont’s (Cailin Stadnyk) on-set bitchy ditziness.

But my toes were definitely tapping–especially during the second act when the razzle-dazzle song-and-dance numbers that are the TUTS hallmark came fast and furiously and the cast was just too busy to be nervous.

Give it a week to work the kinks out (the pacing was a little ragged last night and there were too many tech glitches, but the promise is there) and this would be a top pick for a bit of frothy family summer fun.

Show times and ticket info

Win a TUTS pre-theatre dinner for two at Adesso Bistro!

The charming Adesso Bistro on Haro Street, just a short stroll from Malkin Bowl, is offering a special pre-TUTS three-course menu for just $29.95 every day from 5 to 6:30 pm through August 21.

Just tell me your favourite Theatre Under the Stars memory–or why you want to make a new TUTS memory below.

I’ll do a random draw on July 22, 2010 at 8 pm for a pre-show dinner for two at Adesso. (You can use it any time until August 21.)

(Feel free to tweet this contest for a second entry–just use the ShareThis tool up there on the right…)

It’s free, fun and ridiculously simple: just plug in a starting address at citytours.googlelabs.com, select your dates and bingo–you’ve got the first draft of your tour complete with highlighted destinations, recommended length of stay at each site, and time to complete the walk.

A few more clicks and you can amend the tour to include–or remove–particular sites.

Prefer food to fashion? Music to museums? No problem. Just enter your preferred choices–or click on the options provided–and your tour is instantly updated. Import the map to your handheld and off you go!

I test-drove the service by entering starting addresses in cities I know well and was impressed with many of Google’s suggested itineraries.

Still, it’s not perfect yet: I concur with some of the criticisms in this Jetpacker post, especially the point that some of the walks seem unreasonably long.

It’ll never take the place of personal tours like the ones offered by TourGuys, of course. But with a bit more tweaking (imagine if Google included the transit information it already has with the tour itineraries?) it could do a real number on printed guidebooks…

Have you ever used Google to plan a walking tour? Do you plan to? Can you recommend it? Any tips or tricks?

If you haven’t done a free walking tour before–they’re popular in Europe but fairly new to Canada–here’s how it works:

• Go to www.tourguys.ca to choose your tour. If you only have time for on, consider guide Steve Woodall’s recommendation: “My favourite tour is the West End & Granville Island, as it highlights how Vancouverites actually live, it’s filled with some hidden gems like the float homes of Granville Island and some great stories. Besides, who doesn’t like a tour that ends at a brewery?”
• Reserve your spot online so they can staff accordingly. They can, for example, offer tours in French and Portugese if demand warrants.
• Show up in comfortable walking shoes at the Olympic Countdown Clock in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery at 1 pm. Tours run daily through the 2010 Olympics, Feb. 12-28.
• If you enjoy the 2.5-hr tour, consider offering a tip. $10 is pretty standard, but it’s completely up to you how much–or even whether–to give. And Steve promises: there is no nagging-for-tips on these tours.

That’s it! Fun and virtually free!

Have you done a TourGuys walking tour in Vancouver or Toronto? What did you think?

With these sorts of crowds, public transit is the only way to get around the roads during the 2010 Winter Games.

I just did a post about Vancouver’s “Top 5 public transit sight-seeing tours” over at InsideVancouver.ca.  Check it out and add your own route recommendations!

Feel free to add your own recommendations!

From January 22 to March 21, it’s going to be a feeding frenzy for culture vultures in BC’s Lower Mainland thanks to the Vancouver 2010 Cultural Olympiad.

(And yes, it is weird that in this time of brutal funding cuts to the arts we are about to enjoy 600 international-calibre performances in a period of 60 days.

My only hope is that someone with a bit of political clout will be so inspired by the experience that they will deliver a demon-crushing come-to-Jesus speech in Victoria as a result….)

The good news is that there are still tickets available for most of the shows; the bad news is, they’re going fast. In fact, had not a kind stranger handed me a friend’s unused ticket to see Streb:Raw at the Roundhouse on Sunday afternoon, I would have been shut out of the (insert superlative here) performance.

Repeat after me: I will not wait ’til the last minute to buy a ticket.

Ask 100 people for their pick-of-the-litter performances and you’d get 100 answers. Best to browse the program guide (pictured above) available from libraries, theatres, and community centres around town, or visit the Olympiad’s events listings page.

Here are my top 5 picks (feel free to disagree!):

• Robert Lepage’s The Blue Dragon/Le Dragon Bleu
• Inuit throat-singer Tanya Tagaq and the Kronos Quartet
• Nix’s The Only Animal, set in Canada’s first theatre built of snow and ice
• Maria Pages’s Flamenco Republic
• U Theatre of Taiwan’s Sound of the Ocean

What are your top picks for the Cultural Olympiad?

Someone over at Heritage House Publishing deserves a bonus for releasing John Lee’s Walking Vancouver: 36 strolls to dynamic neighborhoods, hip hangouts, and spectacular waterfronts just as the city-by-the-sea prepares for the Olympics and its worst case of gridlock since the invention of the automobile.

Local boy Lee is an internationally published travel writer hailing from the UK. He appreciates a good walk almost as much as a good pint (and sometimes both together–see Chapter 8: Gastown Bars).

In this well-conceived $19.95 softcover, he covers plenty of Metro Vancouver ground from the North Shore to New Westminster and everything in between–including the contentious Downtown Eastside.

The maps and directions are clear and easy-to-follow, and for those who already know where they want to go, the index is comprehensive.

As a long-time Vancouverite with a penchant for pedestrian travel, I was delighted to find surprises in these pages: “back story” pullouts that explain the history of taken-for-granted landmarks and vistas, as well as wining, dining and shopping recommendations for each themed stroll.

If I was coming to the 2010 Olympics–or hosting guests–I’d definitely want to find a copy of this book in my Christmas stocking.

(And while you’re waiting: check out TravelSmart2010 for suggestions on how to get around during the Olympics…)

Win Walking Vancouver!

If you’d like a free copy of Walking Vancouver, just leave a comment below explaining why. The most convincing case made by Dec. 13 at 8 pm PST wins.

Tweet this contest (use @theseboots in your tweet) and you’ll get a second chance to win!

Update Dec. 14:

Well that was hard…everyone had such good reasons to want to nab a copy of this book! I decided to give it to someone from out-of-town so that left Paul from Belarus (!), Donna from Alberta, Vik from somewhere in the U.S., and A.R. from “away”. I used www.random.org to pull a random winner…and congrats to Donna Majeau from Edmonton, Alberta! Enjoy your walks! ]]> http://theseboots.travel/2009/12/12/win-a-copy-of-walking-vancouver-just-in-time-for-2010/feed/ 17 http://theseboots.travel/2009/11/12/where-to-stop-on-the-way-to-whistler-galileo-coffee-company/ http://theseboots.travel/2009/11/12/where-to-stop-on-the-way-to-whistler-galileo-coffee-company/#comments Fri, 13 Nov 2009 06:01:43 +0000 Julie Ovenell-Carter http://theseboots.travel/?p=1436 I’m heading up to Whistler, BC for Cornucopia this weekend. There was a (very recent) time when that drive from Vancouver was so long and hair-raising–all those white-knuckle twists and turns–that it was necessary to take a break halfway just to gather your wits.

Now with all the pre-Olympic improvements to Highway 99 you get to Whistler so fast–just a little over an hour–that you don’t really need to stop. But you should, because the Galileo Coffee Company in Britannia Beach is too good to miss.

If you’re looking for a good cup of joe, don’t wait until the Starbucks in Squamish. They roast their own beans at the Galileo–just a 15-minute drive up the Sea-to-Sky beyond Horseshoe Bay–and the results warrant buying a bag to take home.

Opened about three years ago in a 1905 heritage home next door to the venerable “99er” restaurant (the kind of place where all the heads turned when a stranger walked in the front door), the friendly cafe offers great coffee, excellent sandwiches and a postcard-pretty view of Howe Sound.

I recently enjoyed a kick-ass Ruben and a limonata for $7. Good thing too, since I spent a little more than that on some earrings at the amber store across the road…

Starting Tuesday, Nov. 17 (and not Nov. 2 as previously reported), Captain Ihab Shaker will start shuttling locals and visitors across Burrard Inlet between Ambleside and Coal Harbour aboard the Coastal Runner.

The ferry–affectionately dubbed the “Silver Sausage” by Bowen commuters–will leave for Vancouver from the foot of 14th St. in West Vancouver at 7:30, 8, 8:30 am and 4:45 pm, and will return from the dock at the foot of Thurlow (near the new convention centre) at 7:45 and 8:15 am, and 4:30 and 5 pm. (You can find the schedule here.)

The short trip will cost $5 one-way and $9 return. A monthly pass will go for $150–competitive with a transit pass.

Serene and scenic, it’s a quick and inexpensive way for visitors to expand their sight-seeing range on a short trip to Vancouver.

There are a bunch of excellent shops and restaurants along Marine Drive in West Vancouver between 14th and 17th, and the seawall walk offers a completely different perspective on the city.

As Shaker says: “I’m not introducing something new. This was the way people traveled to the North Shore in the past. In fact, the dock I will be using in Ambleside was originally built for a ferry that ran to Gastown. The ferry terminal building was actually built in the early 1900s and is is now a gallery and museum.”

Makes a great day-trip…

These kids don’t exactly blend:

Michael Beaty is a six-foot-tall redhead currently on exchange from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC to Waseda University in Tokyo. A failed French student who came late to Japanese language-training, he’s now fluent and his blog–IheartPocky–is a hilarious recounting of his Nipponese adventures, educational and otherwise.

And Kai Watkins, also six feet and model thin, is equally uninvisible in Morocco where she is on an exchange semester to Al Akhawayn University from Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, BC. Her mildly bawdy blog, Student(un)raveled, is likewise a lot of fun for armchair travelers–especially those of us who are a wistful sigh away from our own adolescent walkabouts.

Check out their blogs–and please add a comment below if you know of other great travel blogs by wandering Canucks. We’re among the most-traveled people in the world, so there must be more out there!