The North Shore to Whistler area has a wide range of private art galleries and public museums that cater to any interest or visual arts passion. Because West Vancouver is amongst Canada’s wealthiest and best-educated communities, it comes as no surprise that it is also home to creative community of leading artists, architects, writers, designers and art-collectors. Some of these museum buildings are renown architectural showpieces, including Whistler’s Audain Museum, designed by West Vancouver residents John and Patricia Patkau.

• 1 West Vancouver Museum 14 min

  This small municipal museum in a restored house has emerged as Western Canada’s leading venue for architecture exhibitions, plus engaging shows of contemporary art produced by the North Shore’s strong community of painters and sculptors.

• 2 Presentation House Gallery 20 min

  One of North America’s leading museums dedicated to historic and contemporary photography, their new building under construction at the foot of North Vancouver’s Lonsdale will be a harbour-side gem, and the hub of a parks and shopping esplanade there.

• 3 Vancouver Art Gallery 35 min

  Western Canada’s largest and most prestigious museum of historical and contemporary art, it is housed in a magnificent former courthouse building adapted by architect Arthur Erickson.

• 4 Britannia Mine Museum 43 min

  Mining is one of British Columbia’s most important industries, and this national historic site on the Sea to Sky Highway has lively displays and a mining car ride deep into the mountain.

• 5 Audain Art Museum 75 min

  This brand new gallery designed by Patkau architects is nestled into the woods near Whistler Village, being the only museum devoted entirely to British Columbia art, from First Nations masks to avant-garde contemporary photography.

Anglers and boaters everywhere recognize British Columbia as having some of the world’s most gloriously diverse coastal waters. What few realize is that opportunities to fly-cast, pier-fish or chase big salmon and tuna on a charter can be undertaken so close to an urban area. Horseshoe Bay and area have everything a fisherman could desire, from equipment stores, lessons, charters and most of all, clean harbour waters, and lively cascading trout and salmon streams. The same is true for boaters, who have ready access to intimate bays or wide open ocean, places to test sail-trimming or speed along the waves.

• 1 Fishing Harbour fishing Charters 2 min

  What better way to cap a busy day than a relaxing pre-sunset fishing charter (starting right off your own pier) cruising the waters of one of the world’s most spectacular harbours?

• 2 Over-night Fishing charters 2 min

  North from Horseshoe Bay along the Inside Passage are some of BC’s most renown salmon sports fishing areas. With the best of advice from skilled and well-equipped charter operators, few return empty handed, but everyone returns slack-jawed from the natural beauty they encounter.

• 3 Ambleside & Dundarave piers 12 min

  Any day you could drop a line from one of West Vancouver’s publicly owned piers, the ideal setting to pick up tips from other anglers or get kids started in the sport.

• 4 Capilano River 19 min

  This active salmon stream with a major hatchery forms the eastern border of West Vancouver, with fishing open year-round. Because of easy access it is actively used, but is also actively managed, with a catch-and- release program for the coho, chinook, steelhead and other fish found there.

• 5 Boating Union Steamship Marine Resort 20 min

  Across the harbour in Snug Cove on Bowen Island is this full service marina, with pubs and cafés a short walk away.

• 6 Poet's Cove Resort 3 hrs

  More than just a marina with moorage, this is a full service luxury resort on Pender Island in the sailor’s dream of the Southern Gulf Islands.

• 7 Dent Island Resort 5 hrs

  On the Mid Coast past Campbell River is one of B.C.’s best-regarded sail- in and floatplane-in salmon fishing resorts, with every amenity available.

Horseshoe Bay is the hub of a stunning network of parks that both preserve the surrounding mountains, rainforests and beaches in a pristine state, and also provide locales for outdoor activities, be they extreme sports or birdwatching. These parks are well-maintained and accessible to all. Living in Horseshoe Bay, this string of parks becomes your vast ‘back yard,’ offering every opportunity for solitude or group activities in inspiring natural settings.

• 1 Whytecliff Park 5 min

  Get another perspective on Horseshoe Bay from the nearby Whytecliff Park, easily reached from Marine Drive. Because there are over 200 animal species living in its sparkling waters, it is popular with scuba divers and was honoured as Canada’s first Marine Protected Area.

• 2 Lighthouse Park 8 min

  After a gentle hike through some of the North Shore’s only remaining old growth rainforest, the reward is the National Historic Site lighthouse plus Point Atkinson’s dramatic Vancouver harbour panoramas.

• 3 Ambleside Park 13 min

  Flanking West Vancouver’s prime retail area, this is a full service urban beach, with restaurants, galleries, golf, sports-fields and a skate-park. The views from its sandy beaches to UBC, Stanley Park and the Lions Gate Bridge are spectacular, and summer evenings it is turned into a spectacular concert venue.

• 4 Capilano Suspension Bridge Park 16

  For good reason this has been one of Greater Vancouver’s leading tourist sites for over a century. Impress your visitors with this heart-stopping walk along a cable-stayed wooden-planked suspension bridge, the waters of the Capilano river raging below.

• 5 Porteau Cove Provincial Park 21 min

  Porteau Cove has the distinction of being the southern-most fjord in all of North America, blessed with great views of Howe Sound and some acclaimed scuba diving location.

• 6 Murrin Provincial Park 28 min

  A small provincial park just south of Squamish, it boasts a fine swimming lake and a collection of rare petroglyphs created thousands of years ago.

• 7 Stawamus Chief Provincial Park 37 min

  “The Chief” is one of the most acclaimed rock climbing locations in British Columbia, but for those who want a stroll to the panoramic views at the top, there are also hiking and bike trails on easier grades through the glades.

• 8 Alice Lake Provincial Park 47 min

  Whether for day trips or overnight camping, the string of four linked ponds at Alice Lake are a magnet for families wanting an alpine setting to swim, fish and stroll.

• 9 Whytecliff Beach 5 min

  Access to this beachside stroll could not be easier – just out your Horseshoe Bay front door and up into the peninsula’s Evergreen and Arbutus tree forest, with well-marked trails leading to this quiet beach, with its picturesque islet accessible at low tide.

• 10 Stearman Beach 9 min

  This is a small rock and pebble beach that is perfect for kids to explore the natural realm.

• 11 Brunswick Beach 18 min

  A less-visited beach adjacent to the railway track in Lions Bay that is a restful retreat from the world.

In Greater Vancouver golf is a year-round sport, blessed with a temperate wet climate meaning that greens are constantly green and it’s rarely either too hot or too cold to catch 9 or 18 holes. The super natural mixture of mountains, ocean views, lush forests and rolling topography produces golf courses that match any style or level or play.

• 1 Gleneagles Golf Course 4 min

  It is a testament to West Vancouver’s outdoors lifestyle that this is one of the highest-rated courses in the region but it remains a municipally- owned, public course.

• 2 Capilano golf country club 13 min

  Established in 1938 on the British Properties west of the Capilano River, immaculate greens and the Tudor style clubhouse mark this as a prestige course.

• 3 Furry Creek golf course 28 min

  Perched above the Sea to Sky Highway and built in 1993, Furry Creek has an enviable reputation as one of BC’s most scenic contemporary golf courses.

• 4 Fairmont chateau Whistler golf club 76 min

  Designed by the renown Robert Trent Jones Jr., this par 72 18 hole course is the summer hub of one of the leading resort hotels in Western Canada.

• 5 Nicklaus North Golf Course 76 min

  This is a creation by the world’s other most famous player and course designer, Jack Nicklaus, it boasts a wonderful balance of lake/mountain views with playing challenges.

Whistler-Blackcomb has been rated “Best North American Ski Resort” by the readers of influential Ski Magazine for the past two years running. Visitors from all over the world flock to skiing there and at the smaller resorts on Vancouver’s North Shore mountains, so living at Horseshoe Bay means an astonishing range of choices. The superb “Sea to Sky Highway” past Squamish to the Callaghan Valley and Whistler literally starts at Horseshoe Bay, meaning it takes under one hour to reach Whistler’s slopes.

• 1 Cypress & Hollyburn mountains 24 min

  Horseshoe Bay’s closest ski area shames many Eastern and European resorts with its snow, grooming and urban vistas. The lifts are open from November to April, with night skiing daily until 10:00. Nearby Hollyburn Mountain offers spectacular and free cross-country and snow-shoeing opportunities by winter, and a hiking paradise all summer-fall.

• 2 Grouse Mountain 20 min

  There is no ski experience anywhere like Grouse, with its stunning wrap- around day and night views of a city of 3 million, and beyond to the lush Gulf Islands and Washington’s volcanic Mount Baker. Vancouver’s keep-fit obsession is the long, steep hike up this mountain, with bars and restaurants and a gondola ride down serving as welcome rewards.

• 3 Callaghan Valley 55 min

  Constructed as a world class winter sports zone for the 2010 Vancouver- Whistler Winter Olympics, everything you can do on snow or ice is possible here. The Nordic centre is a favourite with families, with all varieties and sizes of outdoor equipment available for rental.

• 4 Whistler Blackcomb Mountains 60 min

  Globally recognized as one of the best four-season comprehensive ski resorts, multiple faces of two mountains provide for a fantastic variety of terrain to thrill boarders and skiers at every level of ability. Non-skiers can enjoy the Gondola and Peak-to-Peak rides, and Whistler Village is a gourmet paradise with lively nightlife.