If you’re looking for the best city on Earth, ask where Vancouver is. The third largest Canadian city, located in the province of British Columbia on the Pacific coast, has been honored with this proud title three times in the last ten years.
This city offers everything that tourists usually dream of seeing. Its central part lies between two mountains, Hollyburn and Mount Seymour. Not far from the city is the popular Whistler ski resort. Vancouver is dissected by many rivers, over which there are no less than 20 beautiful bridges, huge parks. And although there are not many historical sights, tourists will always find something to see.
Archaeologists claim that the first settlements appeared on the territory 8000-10000 years ago. But for the first time the foot of Europeans stepped here in 1791, when the expedition of the Spaniard Jose-Maria Narvaez arrived. The city was named in honor of another navigator, George Vancouver, who arrived here a year later than the Spaniard.
The first European settlement on this territory was called New Westminster. It was formed in 1858 from 25,000 prospectors who came to the Fraser River during the gold rush. And the future Vancouver was called Gastown. In fact, Vancouver was founded in 1867 on the site of a sawmill. Three years later, the sprawling town was called Granville.
Because it overlooked the harbor, the city became the terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1884. Two years later it was named Vancouver, and another year later the railroad was completed. This expanded Vancouver’s economic opportunities and gave a boost to its development and population growth.
If at the time of receiving its current name in it lived in a thousand people, then by 1911 they were already 100,000, and in 2011 the population of Vancouver was already 604,000 people. And more than half of them do not consider English their native language.
A small indigenous population is made up of English-Canadians, and the rest are immigrants. Mostly from Southeast Asia. Here you can find both modest Chinese neighborhoods and fashionable suburban developments, where people from Hong Kong live.