I spent just over three days in Vancouver, Canada, but still managed to sample a fair bit of the city's coffee culture. Here are my four favourite coffee bars.

I had a 12-hour layover in Vancouver on my way back to London, but I didn't mind too much as I could leave my suitcase at the left luggage and take the Sky Train into the city. It takes about 20 minutes and a day pass, which gives you access to most public transport within the city, is under $10. My first destination was the Lululemon Lab, a design hub on West Broadway, where local designers collaborate to produce technical clothing that is a little hipper (i.e. less colourful) than the regular Lulu kit. It's all locally made — very locally, in fact: in the room adjacent to the store.

Yesterday was our last day in Vancouver — for now, at least — but our flight to Saskatoon wasn't until the afternoon, so we had a little bit of time to spend in the city. I did my usual run along the waterfront, followed by coffee at Revolver (still my favourite Vancouver coffee bar so far).

Yesterday morning, I decided it was time to see a bit of the south-west side of Vancouver's waterfront, so I ran along the jogging path past Sunset Beach and into Stanley Park, where I paused at Third Beach to stretch before running back to my hotel via a caffeine stop at Timbertrain Coffee Roasters on West Cordova for a most excellent pourover made using a gorgeous copper-coloured Kalita dripper.

Jet lag be damned: I woke up at 7.30 yesterday morning and went for a run along the waterfront and into Stanley Park — a huge, green, sprawling nubbin on the northern end of downtown Vancouver, and the largest urban park in North America. Jogging and cycling paths circle the sea wall around there perimeter of the park, and there are plenty of sights along the way, from totem poles to Vancouver's Little Mermaid equivalent, also known as Girl in a Wetsuit.

Yesterday was a long day. The eight-hour time difference between London and Vancouver meant that when we landed at 2 pm Pacific Time, there was still a lot of day to get through in order to beat jet lag. Although I usually try to avoid travelling on national holidays, arriving in Vancouver on Canada Day was actually really fun. It helped that the weather was beautiful, so after we'd checked into our Downtown hotel, we walked down to Canada Place on the waterfront where some of the festivities were in progress.