Vancouver’s 125th anniversary and year as Cultural Capital of Canada will be celebrated throughout 2011. To help kick things off we’re launching a fun Twitter contest to help spread some of that Vancouver love around the Twitisphere.

We’re calling it the Why Visit Vancouver contest!

But hang on – this isn’t your run-of-the-mill Twitter contest where you simply have to re-Tweet to win. This time we’re going to make you work for it (just a little).

Here’s How it Works

Step 1: Find your happy place and sit and think about Vancouver for a few minutes.

Step 2: Grab a pen and paper, or log on to Twitter.

Step 3: Carefully compose a tweet about why you feel Vancouver is a must-visit city.

Step 4: Include the hash tag #VisitVancouver

For those of you paying attention, you’ll realize that after including the hash tag you’ve got exactly 125 characters to work with (it’s our 125th birthday, remember?). You can use fewer, but of course you can’t use more than 125 characters.

We are going to read all those tweets and select the one that we think best expresses why people should visit Vancouver in 125 characters.

The Prize

Thanks to our friends at the Four Seasons Hotel Vancouver, we’ve got a fabulous prize package for the lucky winner:

• One night stay at the Four Seasons Hotel Vancouver
• Dinner for two at Yew restaurant + bar (check out their “Fresh From” menu)

While you are at it, why not follow Four Seasons on Twitter @FSVancouver, and like their Facebook page.

Contest Deadline

Contest launches today and will run until 12:00 noon on April 20. Winner will be announced on April 22.

Good luck, and get tweeting!

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April 20 UPDATE:

We received an overwhelming response to this contest, and had the difficult task of trying to pick one winner from so many creative and inspired tweets. In the end we chose this tweet submitted by @phreeebird:

Seaside breezes, food that pleases, East Van Jesus, cherry blossom sneezes, kayaks, backpacks, Sitka spruces, veggie juices #VisitVancouver

Thanks to everyone that participated, and keep checking back for more fun contests!