Ep 21. Exploring the Charms of North Vancouver: A Guided Tour Through Its Unique Neighborhoods PART 2

Ever wondered how climate change is reshaping your real estate options? Join me as I explore the picturesque and evolving neighbourhoods of North Vancouver. I'll take you through the charming village of Edgemont, ideal for those looking to downsize, and then onto Forest Hills and Canyon Heights, where breathtaking views and top-ranked schools like Handsworth High School await. Tackle the pressing issue of climate change as we discuss the District of North Vancouver's mapping efforts to identify homes at risk from natural disasters, and get ready for an upcoming guest who'll provide the latest insights on home insurance in this changing landscape.

Moving across "the shore" to look at the community spirit of Delbrook and Upper Delbrook, where the Delbrook Community Center offers a treasure trove of activities and facilities for all ages. Hear about my personal journey training for a 1/2 Ironman triathlon, and discover the benefits of memberships to various rec centers in the District. 

We also take a scenic route through West Vancouver, highlighting unique spots such as the Capilano Mobile Home Park and the revamped Park Royal Shopping Mall, before steering our focus to the upscale Ambleside neighbourhood. 

To wrap things up, we address the dangers of secret sauna spots and propose Plunge Wellness in Squamish as a safer alternative for your sauna therapy and cold plunging needs. Don't miss out on these valuable updates and community insights!

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hey friends, welcome back to Keeping it Real, the Vancouver and area residential real estate podcast that aims to cut through all the baloney that you hear when you are talking to people about real estate in the Lower Mainland. And, let's face it, there's a lot of um. I love the word malarkey, such a good word. My name is Jackie McCarnan and I am your host for Keeping it Real. I am a North Shore residential realtor. I dabble a little bit in commercial, particularly leasing, but I like to keep tabs on what's going on all over the Lower Mainland, and that is what this podcast is about usually, although today, like last week, we are going to focus on the North Shore. On the last episode we talked about some of the neighbourhoods on Vancouver's beautiful North Shore and I had to stop because it was getting too long, because there are all kinds of really great places to live here. So on today's episode I'm going to finish up the neighborhoods in North Vancouver and talk a little bit about West Vancouver and what you can expect if you're looking at real estate over there. I'm sure you can feel the love when I talk about North Van and West Van. I really love it here. I live, here, I work here, I raise my kids here. It's a great place. So, without further ado, let's get into the episode. All right, when I left you last week I left you with in Pemberton Heights not with, but in Pemberton Heights, which is a gorgeous area, and it falls into the district of North Vancouver, even though it is south of the highway, which is kind of weird. But there are some other places like this too, and I'm not going to hit every single neighborhood. For example, there's an area over at Marine and Capilano called Park West, which is a series of buildings, a development, and in behind that there is the Woodcroft development, which that one's older, five buildings in there. You can ask your realtor about those, but just you know, very walkable those places.

Speaker 1: 2:21

If we continue north from Pemberton Heights, we're going to get into the famous Edgemont area. Edgemont's beautiful. It has the most amazing little village, edgemont Village, which, despite being pretty much the same for many, many years, it has had a little bit of development in the last few years. That is making it really cool, like they have. They have a new grocery store and they have a lot of senior residents there. That are residences there that are very popular they're. They're the privately owned, kind, and they're expensive but absolutely stunning and any of the seniors that kind of live there many. I think the reason they put so many senior residents there is because a lot of people owned in Edgemont and downsized and wanted to stay in their neighborhood. So this was a way that they could stay in the neighborhood where they raised their kids. And it's a stunner, the lots in Edgemont they're a little bit bigger usually the houses are a little bit bigger. It's quite a lovely place and if you're really lucky you might get a view certainly of the mountains and maybe a peekaboo view of the water.

Speaker 1: 3:49

We're kind of getting into my favorite parts of North Vancouver now. A lot of North Vancouver is obviously built on the side of mountains Grouse Mountain or Seymour Mountain and places like Forest Hills and Canyon Heights are absolutely beautiful. Many times you have stunning views from the homes that are there. There's quite a mix of single-family homes and then on kind of lining Capilano Road you have a bunch of townhomes and condos and some of them are aging. But you know, there's lots of lots of mix there, depending on what you're looking for.

Speaker 1: 4:37

The other cool thing about these neighborhoods is that they have a lot of schools. So and I don't I'm actually have an article coming out on the blog this week about school rankings in North Vancouver, but a lot of the highly ranked schools are up here in these neighborhoods. A lot of the schools are walkable. There's Handsworth High School, which was just fully redone a couple of years ago and is absolutely stunning. I did a job fair there. It was pretty funny because I went to what I thought was the ladies room and it's just a whole bank of toilets but they're all enclosed. And then you come out and it's a bank of sinks and I was washing my hands at the sink and there was a boy three sinks away from me and I thought, oh, my goodness, I think this is a gender neutral bathroom, which is super cool, and I really love that. They're doing that sort of thing with schools in the district.

Speaker 1: 5:34

Speaking of which, these areas fall within the district of North Vancouver, and a fun fact is that a lot of the district homes are considered threatened by climate change, and the District of North Vancouver has a map so you can actually look up your home there, or a home you're thinking about buying, and see if it is considered threatened, for I think the categories are fire, flood or erosion. I think the categories are fire, flood or erosion. These are going to be big things coming in the next, you know, 10 to 50 years or 100 years or whenever I don't know like coming up. Climate change is going to make a big difference to how people purchase homes in the future, because if you buy a house that is threatened by fire, then it's going to be really tough to get fire insurance for that house if it's already, you know, deemed threatened. And I have a plan I was actually going to do a podcast on insurance and climate change, but it's too big a topic for me to talk about on my own, or research on my own topic for me to talk about on my own or research on my own. So I am going to have a guest on in July who's going to talk to us about how insurance home insurance is changing the face of real estate and real estate investing in the province. So that'll be very exciting and I will keep you guys posted on when I'm going to have that.

Speaker 1: 7:01

If you get the opportunity to drive around North Vancouver, definitely take a drive up to Canyon Heights, forest Hills. Even the streets have views, it's so pretty up there and you see such a cool mix of architecture. You don not a ton of ranchers there are some but then you see some just absolutely spectacularly beautiful homes, and there is a home in Forest Hills that's owned by a friend of mine. That is just so beautiful. The house itself is nothing to shake a stick at, but the garden that she has made is a stunner and it was just featured on Art in the Garden, which is this really cool thing that they do here, where you can buy a passport and visit several gardens that people have created for touring. For you know, if you love gardens, you can go and tour these beautiful gardens and they, they do this really cool event, which was last weekend, unfortunately go and tour these beautiful gardens and they do this really cool event, which was last weekend, unfortunately, and it rained the whole time. Well, actually Saturday was nice but it was quite rainy and unfortunately I did not make it to Art in the Garden this year. But my lovely friend is going to allow me to come and take a look at all the cool things that she has put in her garden this year, so I'm excited to do that. That's a cool thing about North Vancouver and I know we find this in other places in the world. But to me it's very similar to how I grew up in Southern Ontario. Everybody kind of knows their neighbors, or you go out for a walk and everybody waves to each other and smiles and puts their dog on a leash nicely, if you ask them to.

Speaker 1: 8:48

I haven't done a podcast about my dog, blue, yet, but she deserves her own full episode. She is a rescue and she is unpredictable, I think is the best way to put it. I walk her on her leash only on surface streets, because if I walk her in the forest, somebody even if it's a place where dogs have to be on leash somebody will inevitably have their dog off a leash. That dog will run toward my dog, scare her and then she will bite that dog. And I have found that people really really hate it when your dog bites their dog. Go figure, who knew? People really really hate it when your dog bites their dog. Go figure, who knew? I'm starting to think this is a bit more rambly than most of my podcast episodes, but here we are Moving along. So if we go east now, I know we're kind of doing a circle now you guys.

Speaker 1: 9:43

Sorry about that, but I just I kind of I didn't miss it, but I just haven't mentioned the areas of Delbruck and Upper Delbruck. As you can imagine, one is south and the other is north, so a couple of things. Between the neighborhood of Delbruck and Edgemont is the Delbruck Community Center, which is gorgeous. It's fairly new I guess maybe seven or eight years old now but really an amazing, beautiful, state-of-the-art facility where you can swim or work out in the gym or kids play soccer there. There's all kinds of classes. I actually really loved it. At the end of 2019, I was Ironman triathlon training which, by the way, I never did do the Ironman because I got injured but I spent a lot of time at Delbruck during that time and it really is lovely. And I don't know if you know this, but if you have a membership to District of North Van rec centers, you can go to all of them and it they have so much to offer. There are some that are a little older, like Ron Andrews, uh, but still a really cool facility and you know, your membership gets you in anywhere, all right.

Speaker 1: 10:56

So Delbrook the Delbrook area, is north of the highway at Westmount and it's very cool and there are. There's a big mix. So there's a shopping mall there. It's not a very big shopping mall but it's got a Safeway and a coffee shop and a liquor store. So all the important things hit on all the important things, and it's got a Remax office, which is uh, I'm biased, but that's important too.

Speaker 1: 11:22

This area has a ton of density. It has the Cedarbrook Village, which is just to the west of the mall, and Cedarbrook Village has probably the nicest pool in North Vancouver in my opinion, has a lot of amenities there but lots of density there, and then also behind the mall there are a couple of developments that have a ton of density. And then most of the rest of that area between Delbrook and Upper Lonsdale is all residential and the lots are also pretty big and there's some really amazing view properties up there too, same with Upper Delbrook. The view is absolutely stunning and lots of single family homes up there, large lots, lots of beautiful homes. You should take a drive up there for sure. So, except for a couple of other small hamlets like Mosquito Creek, I think that pretty much. Well, and Upper Lonsdale Did I talk about that? I can't remember. Anyway, except for those little bits and pieces, I think that pretty much covers North Vancouver.

Speaker 1: 12:41

Once we move west of the Lionsgate Bridge, we are talking about West Van. So there are some interesting things in West Van that a lot of people don't know. For example, the Capilano Mobile Home Park, which is sort of under the bridge and you can see it if you are driving over the Lionsgate Bridge. You can see it better if you're cycling over. But if you're going to cycle over, just know that it is a fairly big hill and it's awful and I've done it a million times and it never, ever, ever gets any better. But the mobile home park. So here's some cool things to know about the mobile home park.

Speaker 1: 13:12

You cannot finance buying a mobile home in the park. I believe you have to have cash. I could be wrong and somebody could comment and make sure that that's correct. But there are some pretty cool mobile homes in there, double wides that have been converted. Some of them are right on the water and are absolutely stunning, like the view. You're looking right at the Lionsgate Bridge and the water and across to Stanley Park and honestly it's so beautiful. It is leased land as far as I know, and no one's ever going to build anything big on there? I don't think, because somebody mentioned to me at one point that that land was created with infill, so it's not going to be able to support a whole lot of development on there. So I mean that's great If that's you know what. Again, you can correct me if that's incorrect. I think it is correct, but who knows? I just do as I'm told.

Speaker 1: 14:15

Moving west from the mobile home park, we are going to find the Park Royal Shopping Mall, which is gorgeous now it's all been redone in, I guess, the last 10 years, maybe a little bit longer Really beautiful. It kind of reminds me of a shopping mall in some of the southern states, some of the wealthy parts of the southern states, like Kissimmee. Anyway, it's really quite nice. You can get anything you want. And then just west of there is the park royal village, which is even nicer, which has got whole foods. So that'll give you an idea of, um, the sort of uh, bougie stores that are in there, um, and then we get to ambleside. Well, actually, between ambleside and park uh, park royal are some really really fancy outdoor athletic facilities that are amazing. I think there's been international field hockey tournaments on that pitch there, and just it's absolutely lovely, but yeah, so as we continue west, we are going to get to Ambleside.

Speaker 1: 15:22

There have been some fairly significant developments in Ambleside, particularly along Bellevue Avenue, which is where my Remax Masters office is, by the way. There's a gorgeous new development there and the rooftop decks are insane, so beautiful. And above that kind of the other side of Marine Drive drive, above that is the Evelyn, which is another lovely development. It's been around for I think nine, eight or nine years. It has terraced. It's a terraced building. So many of the units have large decks that overlook the ocean and it is. It's really stunning. Lots of these are single level, so they're very nice for people who are downsizing and don't want to go upstairs. Like me, I never want to have stairs in my house again. I have six stairs in my house now. It's five and a half too many stairs.

Speaker 1: 16:36

Uh, ambleside to dunderave, which is, I mean, I. I think you'd be really hard pressed to say that any of the neighborhoods in west van are not stunning. So dunderave, also on the ocean, home to my favorite restaurant, the beach house. I really love it there. Uh, the vibe is so calm and cool and there's dunderave village is really calm and little and has lots of lovely little shops and a grocery store and pharmacy and it's just um, it's just a calm, nice, sweet place to be. Big walk scores there, lots of mix of units, so a lot. Above the marine drive there are lots of single family homes and below marine drive there are all kinds of places that are from townhomes to condos. There are some large high-rises along the water. Some of them have been there a long time, like that great big pink building whose name I don't remember, or the big blue building. I have heard rumors that those are going to be redeveloped, which would be a shame because they're beautiful but also nothing lasts forever and they've been there a long time.

Speaker 1: 17:39

We could probably keep going all the way to Horseshoe Bay or even Lions Bay or even Furry Creek or even Squamish, but as we go west, anything close to the water is really expensive but absolutely beautiful. Close to the water is really expensive but absolutely beautiful. And well, I mean, of course you're going to always find the unicorn of the rundown home that hasn't been cared for on a 11,000 square foot piece of land. That is just a gem. But it requires a lot of research and somebody who knows a lot about the area, which I do, and I'm always happy to help you find that unicorn if that's what you're looking for. But I think I'm going to wrap it up here at Dunderave, even though Eagle Harbor is my absolute favorite place. That's where I want to live eventually. But I'm going to wrap it up at Dundarave because that's kind of where the commercial part of like, that's where the last sort of pub and restaurant and that sort of thing really is, so we'll leave it there.

Speaker 1: 18:43

I would love to hear your thoughts on where you live in North Van or where you would like to live in North Van. I think probably I should just do a quick shout out to Lions Bay, because between Horseshoe Bay and Lions Bay there's a bit of a break and Lions Bay is its own thing, very cool place, but also on septic. So they don't have. They don't have municipal water system there and septic systems are very they've come such a long way and they're very sophisticated now, so don't let that deter you. If you're interested in a view property that costs several hundred thousand dollars, less than one in somewhere like Dunderave or Eagle Harbor, alrighty, I think that's going to be it. I think we covered almost all the North Shore neighborhoods. Let me know again which one is your favorite. All right, so I have a little bit of tea, as the kids say, for you. That had a large effect on my daughter's business, plunge Wellness, in Squamish On the weekend the province sent in a helicopter to remove the secret sauna that was hidden in the forest in Squamish because a couple of reasons so I guess, and I wasn't able to find the actual article about this, but I guess people who were using the river to cold plunge there have been some deaths, which is unbelievable.

Speaker 1: 20:17

So people would find the secret sauna, have a sauna like fire it up with wood, have a sauna and then do their cold plunge in the river. And I guess there have been some accidents, terrible accidents, that have happened as a result of that, which I'm mortified for the families. I'm so sorry that that's happened to people. The other reason is that British Columbia is going to be on a massive fire watch this summer. I can't reiterate this enough Do not have any flames, open fires, anything in BC this summer. We are so low on water because we had such a dry winter and I guess one of the things that the province is really trying to mitigate is the possibility of fire. So if you're in Squamish this weekend, you might have seen a helicopter taking away a barrel sauna out of the forest, which must have been a crazy sight. I didn't get to see it, unfortunately, and I feel terrible for people who really rely on that for their cold plunging. But the flip side is that Plunge Wellness is now open and anybody who really believes in cold plunging and sauna the contrast therapy has a place to go that is priced right. So go check out plungewellnessca or check out plungewellness on Instagram, because this could be the answer to the fact that you can no longer go to the secret sauna in the forest, and I'm sorry that you can't.

Speaker 1: 21:58

You guys who listen all the time know that I really like to give you a taste of what I've been watching or listening to, and in last week's episode I talked to you about Dexter. I've been watching reruns of Dexter. Well, it turns out that you cannot binge eight seasons of a show a one hour show in a week. So I am still watching Dexter and enjoying it, and I like to watch it on my Peloton because the weather has been so crappy that I am riding the indoor bike. Let me know what you've been doing. The indoor bike, let me know what you've been doing. Well, friends, that's it for me for this week. As always, you can get Keeping it Real on Spotify or anywhere you get your podcasts, or you can grab it at northvanhomesalescom slash podcasts. You can also access all the other really cool stuff on that North Van Home Sales site, including a free home evaluation and a great buyer's guide and seller's guide. So check it out.