"They suck at driving": Bellingham folks respond to Vancouver visitors

Bellingham residents are discussing visitors from Vancouver again, but they’re being nicer than they have before.

A couple of threads have been posted to the Bellingham subreddit in the last week, with people from Vancouver asking questions about visiting the Washington State city.

Compared to previous stories we’ve done about Bellingham, most residents who took to Reddit to respond were a lot more welcoming, with a small dose of passive aggressiveness from others.

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It sounds like our neighbours down south might be warming up a little more to Canadians.

In one thread, someone driving to Bellingham from Vancouver asked for some suggestions on what to do being there for a couple of hours.

Another Redditor asked if there were any breweries, which led to some laughs from a couple of responses since Bellingham has no shortage of excellent beer options.

One question asked if there were any restaurants, which led to the response, “It’s always crazy to me when people leave Vancouver looking for good restaurants.”

They added, “You’re where they all are!”

Someone else joked, “Join all other Canucks at Trader Joe’s.”

In another thread, a Redditor said she and her boyfriend were coming to Bellingham and wondered where they should stop “besides Trader Joe’s.”

“Don’t forget your few dozen gas containers to fill,” said one response.

Some responses were a little harsher, with one user saying, “How about don’t come kanuck.”

Another user said, “Be careful. Lots of Bellingham residents are quite xenophobic to Canadians.”

That comment led to this reply:

“We ain’t scared of them, just how much they suck at driving.”

Still, even in this thread, most people were polite, offering up sushi spots to go to, like Kuru Kuru Sushi.

The user also specifically requested some gluten-free options, which Bellinghamsters was kind enough to offer.

“I recommend that you go to Bellingham’s farmers’ market. You may find a gluten-free option for lunch there as well,” one person said.

“If you need celiac-safe gluten-free, check out Slice of Heaven on Samish Way.”

City of Bellingham welcoming to Vancouver residents

Despite the sentiments of some Bellingham residents, it sounds like Bellingham as a city is happy for folks from Vancouver to come down, even sharing a link to a guide on what to do on a day trip from Vancouver.

In 2021, total travel spending in Whatcom County amounted to $527,400,000. A majority of that was for accommodations, and food and beverage.

Bellingham

In 2023, that jumped to $688,300,000, a major rebound after the pandemic brought down visitor spending.

We’ve contacted the City of Bellingham for a little more information on how it feels about Canadian visitors and how much of the travel spend is from its northern neighbours.