Vancouver Dive Bar Guide

Vancouver's Last Dive Bar Holdouts

One of the curses of prosperity is the progressive elimination of dive bars and Vancouver suffers from just such an affliction. A city that was at one time dotted with any number of divey drinking options has seen those numbers dwindle, sacrificed to the progressively cleaner, more upscale, more cocktail lounge-friendly fortunes of Vancouver’s downtown core.

But there are no doubt gems to be found, chief among them perhaps the last true dive bar in downtown Vancouver, the Grand Union Hotel Pub sometimes referred to as Vancouver’s Favorite Country Music Pub thanks to a massive mural declaring as such. The history of the cavernous Downtown Eastside bar stretches all the way back to a first incarnation opened in 1911.

Equally attractive but only slightly less divey, Funky Winker Beans sits directly across the street from the Grand Union Hotel Pub. The floorplan here is dominated by a hugely elevated stage that today plays host to nightly karaoke but was once a key part of Vancouver’s metal scene.

Other dive bar options certainly exist, though venturing out of Vancouver’s dense downtown district is advisable. The selections provided below serve as good jumping off points for an on-foot mission to hunt down the city’s affordable, divey holdouts.

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