Elite Event: Come And Tour Prohibition City!

This was my VERY first international Unilocal event! That day I actually flew from San Francisco to Seattle and then drove all the way to Vancouver to attend the lovely event! :D
I haven’t been to Vancouver since I was a little kid! I’m really glad I’d signed up and participated in the walking tour! Not only did I learn about the Prohibition in Vancouver, I also had a lot of fun interacting with everyone. It was a beautiful day after the rain that evening to walk around town to the different sites and imagine what it was like back in the days!
HUGE thank you to Ayla for organizing such a fun evening! Thank you, Guilt & Co. for the great drinks after the tour! :) Always wonderful meeting Unilocalers and getting recommendations on where to eat and what to do around town!!!

Just when I thought I knew my Vancouver history, this event appears and knocks my socks off.
Our tour guide Will was friendly and had some serious swagger. He even dressed the part. With a bit of role playing action, we were all transported back to the early 1900s, when Vancouver was a seedy and dangerous place, full of drug dens and crime lords.
The tour weaved through the downtown core, with many historic buildings pointed out. The facts were quite interesting too. For example, not too many people would know that the Mayor of Vancouver (L.D. Taylor) was in on the action during the Prohibition years. And now I know why that rickety old fence at the Cambie separates the bar and the restaurant areas. The man has clearly done his research, and everyone had a good time and learned a few things.
Lastly, the flasks handed out are hands down the coolest pieces of swag I have ever received from Unilocal.Yes, that awesome. My life is forever changed. Thank you Ayla.

Ayla C is a genius! How else could she have come up with such a perfect elite event?
I had zero idea that downtown alleys of Vancouver were seeped with such interesting facets of history! Equipped with vintage photos that go back a century, story-​teller Will Woods’ engaging narrative techniques made us feel like we were undertaking a time travel to the Vancouver of late 1890’s and early 1900s, the times of gold rush, the first world war and prohibition! (Prohibition is the legal act of prohibiting the manufacture, storage in barrels, bottles, transportation and sale of alcohol including alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to periods in the histories of countries during which the prohibition of alcohol was enforced.) At the end of the evening I realized that even after living in a city for long, you are sometimes oblivious of it’s old world charms.
We got a flask as souvenir, and, the event ended with us going for a round of complimentary drink! ~ What a perfect way end an event themed on Prohibition! :D

What a great time to get down and dirty in VanCity!
It was a fascinating, fun, and informative tour about Vancouver during Prohibition era. I loved the idea that we were all reporters from different newspapers, and I loved how the five mysteries weren’t super easy to figure out.
Drinks at Guilt & Co. was awesome, but it was too bad my beau and I had to peace out early. Next time it would have been smart to have us all mingle in an open bar area, instead of everyone sitting down at their separate tables.
The walking tour is definitely something I’d recommend to do for my friend or anyone who’s interested in Vancouver and down for a bit a walk.

Wow who knew that Vancouver had such a scandalous history! The Prohibition City Tour was eye-​opening and engaging. I learned a lot about the city I now call my home and will look at buildings and pubs in a completely different light. And I will always be thankful that the prohibition era is long over!
Stopping at Guilt & Co. for a drink was the perfect end to the Prohibition tour. Thanks Ayla for an awesome event!

Something unexpected happens when you put Unilocal,Elite and Prohibition together… you experience Vancouver as it was back in 1898.
On this tour we viewed buildings that were over 100 years old, (learned historical facts about each structure) including the Sun and Dominion building. All located near the downtown Eastside including the old Woodward’s building.
My family will be visiting from out of town this fall and I plan on taking them for a walk on the wild side! To experience Vancouver as it was back in 1898.
Thank you Ayla for organizing this event!

Thank you to Ayla for organizing another fantastic Unilocal Elite event! Will was our group’s tour guide and he did a great job of showing us around Vancouver’s seedy prohibition past – a subject I never knew about despite being born and raised here. The tour gave me a better appreciation of some of our oldest buildings, and now I feel like I have something extra to share with any friends or family members that will come to visit Vancouver. I wish I could have stuck around longer to enjoy the free drink at Guilt & Co.
PS. Ayla, you made one of my dreams come true yesterday. I had always wanted a flask!

When I signed up for this event I had no idea what was coming. Now that is been a day later, I’m still in amazement what an incredible event this was.
The walking tour was nothing short of epic. Our tour guide was enthusiastic, engaging, and full of energy. The tour itself was about 90 minutes long, but it all went by so fast when you’re immersed in Vancouver deep and darker history. Not too mention it was also great exercise for your legs and your mind! No spoilers here!
It’s almost embarrassing for myself being born and raised in Vancouver, yet I know so little about the city’s history. I would definitely highly recommend this tour to anyone who has any sort of connection to Vancouver. I’m not a big history person myself, but I absolutely loved the tour. I think it should even be required for history students to go on this as a field trip! Thank you Ayla putting on this awesome event!

Meeting up with the effervescent Ayla at Cathedral Square was just the teaser for a great evening of exploring and learning with Giselle, our animated group leader. Vancouver’s early history was presented in an exciting and informative manner, with true tales of Vancouver during prohibition, and great stories about the buildings which remain today, such as the Sun Tower and the redeveloped Woodward’s site.
Nice to meet up with fellow Unilocalers and discover Vancouver’s history!
Thanks to Unilocal,Forbidden Tour and Guilt & Co for being gracious hosts!

Once again, hats off to our rep. Ayla! (and our guide Will)
I pride myself on being up on Vancouver history and the Vancouver Heritage Foundation. I have to admit. the first 2 stops,. I swear those buildings weren’t there last week for for the first 43 years I lived in Vancouver! I simply had never seen them. I also didn’t know that Vancouver had prohibition… so there you go… tons to learn and such a well crafted tour to learn it on.
Great guide, perfect length, and glad that I «scooped» the prize in the end to boot! :)
Loving the event appropriate flask btw.
Yours truly,
Al. Coholac
Granville Street Gazette

I have never done a walking tour and I loved every second of it. Our tour guide was Will. He made History Class 101 painless.
I have a lot more appreciation for the «old buildings» around town. The tour had a good flow and I learned a lot. An hour and forty minutes flew by quickly. There were a lot of visuals, including laminated black and white photos from the past. People had BUSHY facial hair then wow.
The tour was made interactive where participants had to solve the answers to five investigations. Our brains were churning. I like my history lesson this way — fun and interactive.
Thank you to Ayla for organizing the tour. It was an eye opening experience and I wouldn’t hesitate to tell others about it.

This was my first Unilocal Elite event and I wasn’t sure what to expect. I’m so glad I went! The Prohibition City tour was really interesting. We all gathered and checked in with our Vancouver host, Ayla, (and got our cool Unilocal schwag… a logo-​embossed flask)! Our tour guide, Giselle, really knew her stuff. She took on the character of an early-​century newspaper reporter and was very entertaining as we wandered downtown’s streets (and alleyways). As a Bellinghamster, while I visit Vancouver often I didn’t know a lot about the city’s history. It was interesting to learn that it has a similar background to my hometown of Seattle, with roots in the Alaska Gold Rush and the timber industry. Along the way we learned about several historical buildings, visited a World War I memorial (that I’ve driven past many times but had never noticed), and learned about the roots of Prohibition. Then we learned about some fascinating characters of the time, including one who ended up being a US television star. The tour was entirely on foot, and mostly outdoors (with a couple of interesting indoor stops along the way). I was glad I wore comfy shoes and brought a jacket.
We ended the event at Guilt & Co, an appropriately speakeasy-​like bar with a modern vibe. It was fun getting to know other Unilocalers, and enjoying a delicious cocktail (mine was called «An Untold Secret»). I’m glad I finally got to attend an Elite event, and look forward to more in the future!

Another awesome event Ayla !
It was pretty cool waking around gastown/​downtown learning about the history of our beautiful city during the prohibition era.
There are things and places I wouldn’t normally set foot in, or knew that the Cambie Pub has been serving beer for over 100 yrs (started as a beer parole and still has the relic fence which separated females/​males); or that the world tower used to be owned by LD Taylor who was the longest held mayor in Vancouver.
Drinks at guilt and co wasn’t too shabby either.
Yay to free flowing alcohol !

Another fun-​filled event! Thanks to Unilocal,Forbidden Tour and Guilt & Co as our hosts. It was fascinating to walk around and learn about this fine city’s prohibition history. The tour ended (guilt-​free) with a complimentary drink at Guilt & Co. and thanks to my new swaggy Unilocal flask, the fun juice will always forever be flowing!

What an entirely new and awesome idea. My friend and I were enraptured with the wonderfully woven historic adventure ending in guilt & co in gas town.

I have to admit at first when I saw the name of the event prohibition city, I was not sure what it was. This is a tour from Forbidden Vancouver .
The tour was very educational and fascinating. Being a Vancouverite all my life, I was surprised how little I knew about Vancouver’s history.
This event is Definitely worth going again. Because Forbidden Vancouver has made it very interesting with the emotion and the acting skill the tour guide has put into the tour. It’s as if you are the in the 1900. (eventhough we are not dress like it at all)