This chaotic night out is the best thing you can do in this city

Sport is rich with stories – of mighty victories and dramatic failures, last-minute triumphs and beaten-by-the clock tragedies. I’m no expert on most sports, but I love the window they give to a country’s culture.

Vancouver right now is rich with a whole world of cultures as it plays host to a series of games in the 2026 FIFA World Cup – including Australia’s famous first round win over Turkey – but outside football season, you’ll find the focus on ice and a night at the ice hockey gives a wonderful window into Canadian culture.

I’m connected to home when the evening starts with dinner at Vancouver’s Elisa restaurant, which specialises in steak. Not just any old steak, but the absolute premium – rib eye from Alberta or Manitoba or strip loin from Prince Edward Island. And wagyu from the King River, Australia. That’s right, the King Valley in the heart of Victoria’s High Country. “We stopped buying beef from the US when the tariffs hit,” says my server. Their loss, our gain.

This is a theme in 2026 Canada – another server told me it was a good year for Canadian Club (whisky). “You won’t find Jack Daniel’s or any other US whiskey or bourbon in Canadian liquor stores right now,” he said.

Rogers Arena, home to the Vancouver Canucks, is a short walk from the restaurant and soon enough we’re inside and seated behind one of the goals. The US might be on the nose in beef and spirits, but sport won’t let tariffs be a barrier. We stand for the anthems – first the Star-Spangled Banner for the visitors, the Dallas Stars, all the way from Texas, and then O Canada for the home team.

Down to business. How can they skate like that? There’s a frenzy of stick-clacking and puck-whacking. I’m sitting next to a couple of locals in their Canucks jerseys and I confess my ignorance to them and, having guaranteed I’ll support their team, they kindly explain the game.

“We’re kinda hopeless right now,” one of them concedes (could have told me that before I signed up), “the Canucks really haven’t been that great for years.”

Each team has five players and a goalie in the play at any one time, but they rotate off a bench of 14 other players that feeds them on to the ice as though they’re spilling off a production line. My Canucks look like bumblebees as they buzz on and off the rink in their black, red and gold outfits (it’s a “throwback” outfit, normally they’re decked out in blue, green and white).

“How long do they stay out there for?” I ask, thinking they’d need a break after going at it with this kind of energy.

“Oh, maybe a minute, two minutes is a very long time for a forward.”

“I was told biffo is OK in ice hockey, is that true?”

“Not in the Olympics! But yes, it’s OK one-on-one, but if you try and join a fight that’s started, that’s not OK.”

With all that padding, it seems to me it’d be like one punching bag hitting another punching bag, but I’m not about to get out there and find out. Apparently the transgressors can get five-minute penalties, but they can be replaced, and so the game goes on.

Speaking of minutes, none goes unfilled here. Singers and dancers hit the ice whenever there’s a break in play and when the Canucks score a goal (spoiler alert, this only happens once tonight, whereas for Dallas, it happens seven times) a drummer named Crazy P gets the crowd going.

Truth be known, Crazy P gets the crowd going whenever he can, invoking the not-so-difficult home town chant of “go Canucks go”.

I ask my experts if there’s anyone in particular I should watch. They tell me number four is good, but he’s playing for Dallas. That would be their captain, Miro Heiskanen, who hails from Finland and was on the Finns’ bronze medal team at the 2026 Olympics.

I’m polite enough not to take the Olympics conversation any further, given all Canada remains deep in despair, having lost the gold-medal ice hockey final to their greatest rival, the United States. They can still come and play hockey, but their beef and whiskey aren’t getting over the border.

THE DETAILS

EAT
Elisa Restaurant is in Vancouver’s Yaletown at 1109 Hamilton Street. See elisasteak.com

STAY
The five-star Fairmont Waterfront is minutes from central Vancouver and within easy reach of Rogers Arena; rooms from $C520 ($527). See fairmont.com

PLAY
For more on the Canucks, including ticketing. See nhl.com/canucks