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Locals, international tourists, and recent immigrants - try and count the number of accents you catch as you stroll along here - throng the hotels, eateries, and shops of Robson Street, Vancouver's de facto shopping promenade. Stand at the corner of Burrard and Robson and watch its colorful parade of shoppers and shops unfold.

Shoppers come to browse and buy the high-end clothing and accessory shops that line Robson Street. While most shops are of the ubiquitous chain-store variety, many boutiques showcase up-and-coming designers.

It’s also worth heading to the Stanley Park end of the strip, where you'll find a modern “mini-Asia” of subterranean internet cafés, hole-in-the-wall noodle eateries, and discreet karaoke bars populated by homesick Japanese and Korean language students. It's a great area for a cheap-and-cheerful, authentically South Asian lunch.

Resembling a space ship that landed atop a downtown office tower, the Vancouver Lookout gives you panoramic 360-degree views of the city and surrounding landscape. Perhaps befitting the observation tower’s space age design, American astronaut Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, was also the first visitor to the Vancouver Lookout, inaugurating the tower in 1977. Though the 30-story structure now seems almost petite compared to Vancouver’s newest skyscrapers, it’s a great place to get oriented to the city with vistas to Stanley Park, the North Shore mountains, and on a clear day, all the way to the Olympic Peninsula.

You can explore the views on your own – there are informational plaques in front of every window – or ask one of the guides for a complimentary tour. You can also join one of the free 20-minute tours that run throughout the day. Your admission ticket is valid all day, so you can scope out the daylight views and return later for the sunset.

Found within the current bounds of Vancouver's Stanley Park, Prospect Point is not only the highest point in the park and a great viewpoint of the harbor, but a place of significant history. In the late 1800s, boats traveling into Burrard Inlet were forced to pass extremely close to Prospect Point, as uninhibited water from the Capilano River plowed into the harbor, carrying with it silt and rock. The mineral-heavy flow further out caused the waters to be less buoyant, but crossing so close to the cliffs of Prospect Point wasn't without its risks either. In 1888, a ship called the S.S. Beaver ran aground on the rocks. It was then that the decision was made to put a warning light on the point to help guide ships through the passage. Some 25 years later, a signal station was built on the point to relay information to ships entering the inlet and, in 1948, the current Prospect Point Lighthouse was erected.

At the center of Vancouver lies a short protected inlet that separates the downtown from the rest of the city. Once a centuries old fishing village dismissed by its disconnection to the Vancouver Harbor, it is now a highly sought after residential and commercial area. False Creek sits peacefully by the water, which draws many boaters and kayakers. There is also a promenade that allows visitors to walk alongside the water and take in views of the city skyline and the surrounding sea.

Many visitors hop on board one of the ferries that run along the water, stopping at trendy parts of the city such as Granville, The Village, and Yaletown. These neighborhoods all face False Creek, and offer some of the best restaurants, shops, and markets in Vancouver. Southeast False Creek was the site of the Athlete’s Village for the 2010 Olympic Games.

A tranquil break from bustling Chinatown, this intimate "garden of ease" exhibits the Taoist symbolism behind the placing of gnarled pine trees, winding covered pathways, and ancient limestone formations.

On your visit, learn how everything in the garden reflects balance and harmony, and the placement of each item has a considered purpose. Soft-moving water flows across solid stone, while smooth, swaying bamboo grows around immovable rocks. As you wander the peaceful paths, notice how dark pebbles are placed next to light pebbles in the paving. If you visit in summer, the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden is the scene of musical performances and dances. Every Friday night from mid-July through the first weekend in September, the garden hosts an eclectic repertoire that includes classical, Asian, world, Gypsy jazz, Slavic soul, and fusion music.

Vancouver’s Olympic Village, coming in at over 1,000,000 square feet in size, was built for the Winter Olympics and Paralympics hosted in the city in 2010. 1,000 units accommodated nearly 3,000 athletes, coaches, and personnel during the games. Construction took place over three years, and it is now a housing and retail space with a community center. It is one of the greenest building structures in the world, granting Vancouver its reputation as a leader in sustainable living. Built mostly in steel, the many elegant towers stand as modern icons of a growing city. The Olympic Village area is growing in population and popularity as a result. The neighborhood has a variety of excellent restaurants, as well as paths for walking and seafront views of the water. A walk along the seawall can run scenically alongside Vancouver's inner coastline from Coal Harbour to Kitsilano Beach.

Exotic sights, sounds, and aromas pervade North America’s third-largest Chinatown. In this evocative area, you’ll find families bargaining over durian fruit in a flurry of Cantonese; shops redolent of sweet-and-sour fish; and street vendors selling silk, jade, and Hello Kitty footstools. The steamy-windowed wonton restaurants, butchers with splayed barbecued pigs, and ubiquitous firecracker-red awnings will make you think for a moment that you’re in Hong Kong.

Start your trek at Millennium Gate, the official entry into Chinatown. Head under the gate, and spend some time strolling the tranquil pools, intriguing limestone formations, and gnarly pine trees that fill Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden. After strolling the garden, nip next door to the Chinese Cultural Centre Museum & Archives. Across the street, on Carrall Street stands the Sam Kee Building, the world’s thinnest office building.

Pedestrian-friendly Yaletown is Vancouver’s "little SoHo", a former red-brick rail terminal turned into a warehouse district lined with swanky New York-style lofts and chichi boutiques. The focal point of the modern-day yuppie enclave exudes a hip and inviting atmosphere - especially at night, when its sophisticated drink and dine spots are packed to the rafters with the city’s beautiful people checking each other out.

Walking along Yaletown streets provides a bounty of attractions. The neighborhood has plenty of pricey boutiques to window shops, art galleries to linger in, and lots of places to stop for lunch, coffee or a splurge-worth dinner. Some of the best seafood restaurants are here, as is Yaletown Brewing Company, where you can sample its home-brewed beer. If you’re curious about the area’s almost-forgotten rough-and-ready past, follow the old rail lines embedded in many of the streets and amble over to the Roundhouse Community Arts & Recreation Centre.

Come for the views at this 128-acre (52-hectare) park located at Vancouver’s geographic center – it’s the highest point in the city. You can look out over the gardens and grounds all the way to downtown and the North Shore mountains. Within the park itself, there are Quarry Gardens, former rock quarries now filled with flowers, shrubs, and other plants; an arboretum – the first to be established in Canada – with more than 1500 trees; and a Rose Garden that blossoms with many varieties of the flower. In spring and summer, you can browse the Painters’ Corner, where local artists display and sell their work. Seasons in the Park, a restaurant overlooking the gardens, serves lunch and dinner daily.

If you’re looking for more athletic pursuits, you can golf the park’s Pitch & Putt course, play tennis on one of the 17 public courts, or join the lawn bowlers at the Vancouver Lawn Bowling Club, which welcomes visitors several times a week during the spring and summer.

One of the highlights on a visit to bucolic Stanley Park, as well as Vancouver itself, is a walk or bike ride along the famous Seawall Promenade. The 9km/5.5mi stone wall hugs the waterside edge, following the entire perimeter of Stanley Park and beyond, offering cyclists, pedestrians, joggers, and inline skaters scenic vistas of forest, sea, and sky.

Starting from Coal Harbour, it winds eastward toward Brockton Point, then curves northwest along the Burrard Inlet, with views of the North Shore mountains across the water. Spaced at regular intervals along the walk are information panels that go into various aspects of Vancouver’s past. It’s education, exercise and eye-candy at the same time. After you pass Lions Gate Bridge, snake down the west side of the park, a perfect spot to watch the sun sink into the Pacific. After circling the park, the Seawall Promenade continues along Sunset Beach, on the southeast side of downtown, around False Creek.

Located in Jack Poole Plaza in front of the Vancouver Convention Center, the Olympic Cauldron was built to commemorate the city's 2010 hosting of the Winter Olympic Games. The 33-foot-tall cauldron was constructed with steel and glass and was first lit as the Olympic torch made it's final run on the relay to B.C. Place Stadium for the opening ceremony of the games. Across the plaza from the cauldron is the Vancouver Convention Center, which was host to the media during the Winter Games and a key cog to the operations of the event. It's a fitting placement to commemorate the amount of work put into the event by the city of Vancouver. Today, the cauldron, which is back-dropped by stunning view of mountains and sea, has become a tourist destination in the heart of downtown Vancouver. However, the cauldron is only lit on days of special importance such as Remembrance Day or Canada Day.

The VanDusen Botanical Garden is a 55-acre botanical oasis in the center of Vancouver that showcases diverse plants from around the world. Not surprisingly, the garden is considered to be among the top public green spaces in North America. Among the rhododendron, magnolia and sino-Himalayan plants, you can also find plenty of art installations, such as beautifully carved totem poles and sculptures. Many visitors especially enjoy the cedar maze made up of 3,000 pyramidal cedars and if you get the chance, make sure to attend one of the seasonal festivals.

Inspired by the natural environment around it, the visitor center is unquestionably an attraction of its own. It has strived to meet the Living Building Challenge, which means that it isn’t only constructed in an environmentally conscious design that draws on natural forms, but also uses renewable resources and achieves net-zero energy consumption.

Arguably the most popular beach in Vancouver, Kitsilano a.k.a. ‘Kits’ Beach is packed during the long summer days – and beautiful all year round. Kits Beach has everything you’d want for a relaxing day at the beach: picnic areas, concession stands, tennis courts, basketball courts, and huge grassy patches perfect for playing Frisbee or fetch (or sunbathing, for those who might not want to fill their crevices with sand). The beach itself attracts volleyball players of all levels, who come from all over metro Vancouver for a game or three in the sand courts. Kits Beach faces out onto the Burrard Inlet with unparalleled views of the North Shore mountains, the Gulf Islands, and sometimes even the Olympic mountain range in the distance.

Located in the heart of downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, the Vancouver Art Gallery is one of the most impressive collections of both historical and contemporary works in Canada. This extensive gallery contains over 10,000 different pieces of art and has a great focus on the local and regional artists, many of whom are of aboriginal decent. Among the most famous artists on display are Vancouver locals such as Jeff Wall and Rodney Graham. Moreover, the gallery also contains a substantial collection of the works of Emily Carr – perhaps British Columbia's most famous artist.

Like Emily Carr's work, most of the Vancouver Art Gallery's collection is geared towards art that has been inspired by the indigenous life style and culture in the Canadian Pacific Northwest. That said, there is also a significant collection of international works as well, including a series of important art from 17th-century Dutch artist Jan van Ravenstyn.