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Photo: Lee Coursey from Decatur, GA, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
The oldest part of downtown. You will find cobble-paved boulevards and over-priced tourist traps selling every imaginable thing you can print "Vancouver" on. Popular with tourists are the Gastown Steam Clock, promoted as the only active steam clock in the world but in fact an electric clock that pumps steam, rather an underwhelming experience. The area is notorious for aggressive beggars-drug addicts who are quite unsettling.
Gastown is the original settlement that became the core of the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and a national historic site and a neighbourhood in the northwest section of the Downtown Eastside, adjacent to Downtown Vancouver.
© OpenStreetMap contributors
A clock that tries to look old and belches steam every 15 minutes may not be the most stunning landmark, but it has an endearing charm in a kitschy kind of way. It was built to take advantage of the steam vents that are all over downtown Vancouver, but it never lived up to its billing and now relies on electricity to count the minutes. It is one of a kind though and remains a photographic pilgrimage for thousands of Vancouver tourists.
A distinctive red and mustard coloured building completed in 1910. It was the first steel-framed high-rise built in Vancouver and briefly was the tallest commercial building in the British Empire.
A small park covering one city block. It has the cenotaph commemorating the dead from World War I and is the site of Vancouver's Remembrance Day ceremonies.
A high-rise building built in the Beaux-Arts style. It was completed in 1912 and was the tallest building in the British Empire at the time. The tower is noted for its dome (painted to look like copper cladding) and its exterior was used in the TV series, Smallville.
Located at the western edge of Chinatown, it consists of ornamental arches with tiled roofs in traditional Chinese style.
This two-storey building is the world's narrowest commercial building according to the Guinness Book of World Records, with a width of just 4'11" (1.5 m) at its base. Its slim size is due to the city expropriating most of the lot to widen the street. The owner went ahead and built anyway, and businesses have been operating out of its confines since 1913. If you do take a look, the perspective is better from the other (north) side of Pender.