Inside Prince Harry And Meghan Markle's Special Family History With Vancouver

Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, and Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex, had a night out at a hockey game in Vancouver. Harry even got to drop the puck for the game between the San Jose Sharks and the Vancouver Canucks — ceremonially, of course, he wasn't out on the ice for the actual start of the game. And while Harry and Meghan have stepped back from royal duties, Harry was actually following in his grandmother's footsteps, as Queen Elizabeth II performed the ceremonial puck drop for a 2002 match-up between the Sharks and the Canucks.

Harry and Meghan cheered on the Canucks at Rogers Stadium in Vancouver, where their presence, including Harry's celebration dance after the Canucks scored a goal, made the rounds on social media. The Canucks went on to win 3-1. While Harry and Meghan's visit to Rogers Stadium in Vancouver was a surprise for many, it was actually part of an advance tour for the Invictus Games, which will be held in Vancouver and Whistler in 2025.

It was not their first visit to the Vancouver area either. It's got a special history for the young family that goes back to their son Archie's first Christmas when they spent an extended vacation on nearby Vancouver Island, off the coast of southwestern British Columbia.

Prince Harry and Meghan skipped Christmas with the queen in 2019, and instead, they spent six weeks on Vancouver Island. In Episode 5 of Netflix's "Harry & Meghan," they talked about their vacation, which came a couple of months after Meghan filed a lawsuit against the Mail on Sunday for publishing parts of her private letter to her father. In the episode, they show some home videos of Meghan decorating a massive Christmas tree, the family exploring in nature with their dogs, and Archie seeing snow for the first time while in Canada — quite a milestone! Meghan talked about how lovely it was to be there, "It was so peaceful," she said.

In Prince Harry's memoir "Spare," he talked about how much he and Meghan loved the area, particularly its easy access to nature. "The house was right on the edge of a sparkling green forest, with big gardens where Archie and the dogs could play, and it was nearly surrounded by the clean, cold sea," Harry said. "I could take a bracing swim in the morning. [...] We hiked, we kayaked, we played." Those are definitely the type of activities that Vancouver Island is known for, and it sounds like pretty much the opposite of the media circus they faced in London. While there, they reportedly stayed at the Mille Fleurs mansion, so they would have had some panoramic views of the Saanich Inlet.

Shortly after that trip in early January 2020, they made an announcement on Instagram, which read, in part, "We now plan to balance our time between the United Kingdom and North America, continuing to honour our duty to The Queen, the Commonwealth, and our patronages." But a few days later was the "Sandringham summit," when Prince Harry talked through the situation with his father, brother, and grandmother about whether they could do a half-in/half-out sort of arrangement as royals — living overseas in a Commonwealth country and doing royal work, while also working independently. But their proposed Canadian move and continuing to do work in the name of the queen clearly didn't work out.

While their Vancouver Island trip in 2020 was all about private time as a family, their 2023 trip to Vancouver ahead of the Invictus Games was more about business. Along with the hockey game, Meghan stopped by Justice for Girls, a charity in Vancouver that helps teen girls impacted by poverty. It was her second trip to the charity; she first visited in January 2020. And with the Invictus Games set for 2025, we're bound to see more of Harry and Meghan in the country they once considered moving to. It'll likely be a sweet sight since it was both in Canada and at the Invictus Games that Harry and Meghan made their public debut as a couple.