Help with itinerary - WA & Vancouver
 

We are planning a trip in late July for a week. Starting in Seattle, renting a car there, we'd like to go to Victoria, Vancouver, Whistler, Grouse Mountain. We mostly like nature activities (hiking), not much shopping :-). Any suggestion of how to spend the week?

We did this trip two summers ago and had a wonderful time-we want to do it again. The 1st item I notice is your timeframe. One week is really stretching it if you need to be back in Seattle on day 7. We spent 11 days and found it about right for not having to rush too much. We spent 2 full days in Seattle, 3 days in Vancouver, 2 days in Whistler, and 3 days in Victoria, returning to Seattle the evening before our flight the next day.
Frankly, I'd reassess your itinerary. If you could add 2-3 days it'd be much better. If not, perhaps you might consider dropping Victoria this go round. What with driving to the ferry terminal, waiting for the ferry,and riding the ferry, you eat up the better part of half a day each way.
Spending 2 days each in Vancouver, Whistler, and Seattle, will get you a small taste of each location and will just about consume your allotted trip.

July 28th and 31st are two of the Festival of Lights Fireworks annual extravaganza on english Bay in Vancouver. If you like fireworks, (and this is much, much more than your average 4th of July show), then it's a good time to be here. If you don't then on those nights stay away from the West End where almost half a million people gather just on the English Bay side alone.

By the way I also agree with waltd that you're spreading youself too thin. Vancouver, to be done properly requires at least three days and nights. The North Shore, wherin lies Grouse Mountain as well as Seymour & Holleyborn, could take two days of hiking and exploring alone while the many beaches and lush gardens would take days to explore and I havn't even touched on Stanley Park yet. And that's just the nature loving part.

Whistler also is a hiker's paradise and you could spend days exploring there.

Victoria's attractions - other than Butchard Garden - are mainly touristy urban charm and if that's not your thing
then perhaps you should drop it as well as Seattle which is very nice but basically just a generic big American city with freeways and tall buildings in an attractive setting.

I have a suggestion that will take you one whole day.

My almost-adult kids and I just spent 8 days in Seattle and Vancouver. The MOST fun was driving to Leavenworth, Washington, for a white-water rafting/kayaking trip on the Wenatchee River. The 2 1/2-hour scenic drive is beautiful. Rafting and kayaking with Osprey Rafting Co. ($50-60/person) were a blast! We were in the river about 3 hours; we'd never tried this before (we're "city" people), but we all loved it.

Leavenworth is a beautiful Bavarian town -- many colors and flowers. Looked like something out of Alice in Wonderland. Great German food available at many restaurants.

I'd like to know what you think of Grouse Mountain in Vancouver, when you get back. We chose to do a horse-drawn carriage tour through Stanley Park, rather than going to GM, because we had a train to catch and were getting short on time. The park is beautiful, the commentary quite interesting, but my son was bored to tears. In retrospect, I wish we had done the mountain or Capilano Bridge instead.

Hope you have a great time!

Donna

An additional suggestion: We saw lots of people kayaking on Lake Union and Lake Washington in Seattle. It's supposed to be a fun way to explore the houseboat communities.

Donna

As a Canadian now living in the Seattle area I disagree with calling Seattle just another big American City. If I had a choice between doing Seattle and Vancouver I'd do Seattle. Other than Stanley Park I think Vancouver is more of a "just a big city" place. What I really like about Seattle is that it has a lot of character.