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bell
Trad climber
Scotland
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Topic Author's Original Post - Jan 30, 2013 - 06:08pm PT
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Alrighty folks. im moving from Scotland to Vancouver in May. Looking to move in with a bunch of climber/back country skiers. first up, anyone got any spare rooms that will be coming available early summer??
if not, what are folks general ideas on good places to stay in Van? i want to get out of the city quickly on friday evenings/summer nights but stilll want to be in a sociable part of town. i will be working at UBC and would like to cycle to work (~45min max if possible)
also, any beta on being close to local climbing spots, hill runs, cool places, that i can do in the evenings - the more info the better!
cheers for all the help in advance!
bell
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bell
Trad climber
Scotland
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 30, 2013 - 06:19pm PT
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yeh, guess places easy to cycle to UBC gonna be expensive..... not worked out ma budget yet but 2k/month sounds pretty daft! half that might be still too much, but ive no idea what it will get me. would happily live out of town to the north if thats cheaper/better/easy to find room mates
actual quality of apartment doesnt bother me, just wanna stay in a place i can store my gear and get to know the mountains/city wi folk who appreciate same things i do (which i like to think is most folk in vancouver)
cheers
EH! what you sayin about scottish folk ??? :-P
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Hoser
climber
vancouver
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Jan 30, 2013 - 07:51pm PT
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I cycle to UBC every day and anywhere east of Main st will put you over the 45 min max. I can get to UBC from anywhere in Van west of Main in 45 min. Rent, if your willing to have room mates I bet you can sneak into a home for no less than 700$ a month. Possibly you could find something cheaper but that would be a good deal.
Your coming at a good time, since the student housing will be vacating.
My small home of three in winter with gas heat and a sweater on and being good with lights gets me a hydro and gas bill about $200 a month, drop a hundred off in summer.
basic internet and cable will cost $120, a smart phone is $100 per month
Food is dumb expensive
There is a major major major major major problem with bed bugs here, DONT screw with these guys, ask the land lord at least 100 times if they have ever had a problem, if they say its been fixed, leave and burn your clothes.
go here to double check
http://bedbugregistry.com/metro/vancouver/
See the place with all the red, thats the west end, super super awesome place to live, too bad every place is infested. DONT GO THERE
Best idea is to find a place to stay temporarily then ride around, often folks place signs instead of ads to weed out the craigslist weirdos from where ever they come from.
The closer you are to UBC the less chance you have on getting on a bus during the school year.
The closer you are to UBC means you are far away from everything else
Main street is full of hipsters, so if you think going to the coffee shop and using a type writer is cool then you will like it.
If I was you...I would poke around on Cambie st, from broadway to 25th and the west to Granville. Alternatively you can check out the "new" stuff in gas town/china town, but its not the safest place for a girl but if your reasonable...it can work.
the sky train runs up Cambie
Good luck
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Khoi
climber
Vancouver, BC
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Jan 31, 2013 - 01:23am PT
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I recommend Main & Hastings.
There's lot of ammenities nearby, lots of options for food, public transportation, banking, laundry, pharmacy, a public library, and it's close to the water, too!
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Hoser
climber
vancouver
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Jan 31, 2013 - 02:29am PT
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Rolf its been over a 100 years since you could find a reasonable one bedroom for $1000 on the west side.
That link is for $1050 for a 500 sq foot 2nd floor no elevator apt building.
One bedrooms start at $1300...and you really have to be careful taking the bottoms...
Of the four listings in your link two are in a building registered as a problem building in the BB registry.
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orle
climber
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Jan 31, 2013 - 10:35am PT
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YER GONNA DIE!!!!
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bell
Trad climber
Scotland
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 31, 2013 - 03:15pm PT
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cheers for all the info guys!! a wee bit more expensive than i had hoped but looks like cheaper options can be found and am happy to share with a few folk
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Hoser
climber
vancouver
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Jan 31, 2013 - 03:30pm PT
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Dont pay $1100 for a 500 sq ft apt with no laundry or elevator. That part of town is reserved for the bridge and tunnelers in the summer.
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Rolfr
Social climber
North Vancouver BC
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Jan 31, 2013 - 11:06pm PT
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Vancouver is an expensive place to live, tough to have it all, cycle to work, close to urban ammenities and access to the outdoors.
If you can share, try Craigs List. http://vancouver.en.craigslist.ca/roo/ I can't vouch for any of the listings, just hope this helps points you in the right direction.
If you aren't familiar with the areas, feel free to ask help , a lot of well informed people online here.
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harryhotdog
Social climber
north vancouver, B.C.
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It's going Los Angeles, like, "cover me, I'm going to change lanes..."
Cry me a river, try driving a Boom truck and chipper around those neighborhoods with cars parked on both sides of the street.You have to drive by feel on your right side. Then there's the drivers that really should only have a hotwheel licence at best.
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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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The Economist just published its semi-annual "World's most expensive cities" list, and Vancouver made the list as the most expensive in North America. Not up there with Tokyo etc, but at #21 it was well ahead of Los Angeles and New York (tied for #27)
Summary of the article is on the CNN website at http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/04/travel/cost-of-living-2013/index.html?iid=article_sidebar
Top ten in the world (and movement from last year) are:
1. Tokyo, Japan (+1 place)
2. Osaka, Japan (+1)
3. Sydney, Australia (+4)
=4. Oslo, Norway (+1)
=4. Melbourne, Australia (+4)
6. Singapore (+3)
7. Zurich, Switzerland (-6)
8. Paris, France (-2)
9. Caracas, Venezuela (+25)
10. Geneva, Switzerland (-7)
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Hoser
climber
vancouver
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$15 for a gallon of milk and small block of cheese..plus tax
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Baggins
Boulder climber
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Im from the UK... lived in van 2007-2009, worked at UBC and lived in pt gray. First of all I rented a basement studio for $1000/mtn that was on UBC campus. This sucked hard, as it was essentially a locked off section of someone else's house. I moved to pt gray and paid $1300/mnth for an all-inclusive (utils phone inc.) 1 bedroom. This was a lot of money, but I was having such a hard time finding anything that I went up a bracket.
I wish Id found good flatmates, that wouldve been a better way to go, ie. live with grad students, but its tough to do when you've just got off a plane and living out of your suitcase.
In addition to everything else, the alcohol is also really expensive in canada. And their beer... leaves something to be desired lets just leave it at that. Sorry canada. But the mtns are frikkin amazing as is squamish. MEC rocks too. Enjoy.
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Baggins
Boulder climber
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Well that sucks. Im now in the states and REI is a pale, plastic imitation of MEC, at least the old MEC I should say.
I dont know why Canada, or BC at least, isnt on board the microbrew revolution that exists down here. Granville island brewing is pretty poor and very conservative when you compare it to Oregon, Colorado & california's finest brews.
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bell
Trad climber
Scotland
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 5, 2013 - 05:23pm PT
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would love to find a wee water front shack and paddle to work every day, and wont be anything new if the locals thought i was nuts!
guessing where ever i go im going to be closer to the good stuff than here in Scotland, or at least bigger stuff! so being able to commute to work easily will probably be the first priority, then i can look at getting my waterfront shack!
I assume there is a lot of crags accessable in the evenings after work? would i be right in thinkin it gets dark about 9ish in the summer - no super long evenings :-(
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Hoser
climber
vancouver
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would love to find a wee water front shack and paddle to work every day, and wont be anything new if the locals thought i was nuts!
Well stand up paddle boarding is huge here so you would have to get in line to find a place to paddle to work.
The walk up from the beach to UBC is a biatch
I assume there is a lot of crags accessable in the evenings after work? would i be right in thinkin it gets dark about 9ish in the summer - no super long evenings :-(
Dark at 9 at the peak of summer, crags close to van....ya there is a collection of crap nearby, nothing to impressive except the traverse.
Better bet is to just make the drive to Squamish.
I was going to say have you checked out st johns college, as I heard good things about its residence but holy moly they want $950 a month for 250 sq feet WOW
http://www.housing.ubc.ca/files/van/pdf/contracts/st_johns_contract_12_13.pdf
http://stjohns.ubc.ca/live/life-at-sjc/faq/
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