British Columbia 2016 – Day 8 / Victoria

Walked 14.64 km / 22 154 steps

Expectations firmly lowered, I set out to enjoy the day!…  and I did! (I think my husband would agree…  depending on his mood when you ask him)

We started the day with a Nature Walk through the Gardens of Government House. This put us in a really good mood and I think set the tone for the rest of the day.

On the way there, we saw a really cute bakery on Cook street so we stopped for coffee & a treat. The little custard tart was sensational, but the coffee was so disgusting I couldn’t choke it down! Still, it was a nice stop.

The Gardens at Government House were really beautiful – we spend almost an hour wandering around.

This mama duck thought I was getting to close to her babies and she was not afraid to tell me so!!!

We wandered the gardens for a while longer because we needed to kill time until 10AM when Craigdarroch Castle opened.  I was an interesting visit but really, to call it a CASTLE is a bit of a stretch!  It was a beautiful stately Victorian Home and I especially liked all the stained glass.

   

My husband LOVES LOVES LOVES LOVES animals, and so I thought a great activity to do next would be to go to the Petting Zoo. I am not as enthusiastic as he is – in fact I don’t even like zoos, but my goal here was to do something he would consider “fun” to keep moral up since we were still readjusting our Victoria Expectations.

And it was fun, I have to say that I enjoyed it too!

  

   

… especially the peacocks; they are so beautiful!

After this, it was time for lunch. Still feeling generous and wanting to contribute to the good-mood vibes, I agreed to go to The Old Spaghetti Factory. Ugh. Barf.

It was as crappy as I expected it to be. The service was too fast, my salad was frozen, the pasta was mush.  What does he like about this place??? Ah well, relationships are all about give and take right? LOL

  

After this “sacrifice”, I thought I deserved a reward so I suggested trying the Empress again for cocktails. My husband exclaimed enthusiastically: “yes! great idea” (score!)

This picture makes me laugh, can you tell by my expression and body language that I am trying to appear pleasant and polite with the hostess who turned me away yesterday?

Well it worked because there was room for us at The Bengal Lounge this afternoon

Following the orders in my guidebook and the menu, I ordered an Empress 1908 – a Tea Martini! It was strange to say the least. Not bad, but not something I would order again. I would recommend it for the experience of trying it… they even served it with a scone!

   

The Lounge was nice, but I have never really been a fan of this type of “Indian décor”

   

Before leaving, I needed to order a sweeter drink to offset the savoury one!

It was about 3PM by the time we were done. What to do next? One of the activities in the “Top Ten things to do in Victoria” was a visit to Miniature World.

My honest opinion is that it’s interesting, but it’s an "anywhereville” tourist attraction – like wax museums. I tend not to really like these types of things because they aren’t really representative of the city I am visiting. Still, I can’t deny it’s a good way to kill time.

Here’s my Instagram collage in lieu of pictures – you can go on line for more info.

After this, we decided to walk to Fisherman’s Wharf.

It was a great walk! We enjoyed it a lot; a little overcast but that’s ok, we like shade.

We especially liked watching the seals play!

    

From Fisherman’s Wharf, we took the Ferry to the Canoe Brewpub for supper – Google for some reason doesn’t recognize the small ferries and seems to think that to get there we have to go via Seattle Washington!

But here’s proof we took the local ferry service. I would not want to go to Seattle in one of these…  and it did not take us 11 hours either – more like 15 minutes!

Dinner was great, I loved this place but after that pasta muck I ate for lunch I sadly wasn’t that hungry so I couldn’t pig out like I ordinarily would have wanted to!

THE BEST part of the day was still yet to come! I was able to convince my husband to go out for a nightcap and we discovered an AMAZING place: Bard & Banker.

It’s like I died and went to Fancy Bar Heaven. It was so atmospheric!!! It reminded me of the old banks converted into bars that we had seen in London… and it was!  I loved EVERYTHING about it; I didn’t want to ever leave!!!  And it was so cheap too – I had a double Grand Marnier for only 7$ unbelievable!

Sadly, my IPhone battery was dead so I had to hope my husband loved the place as much as I did and take enough pictures!!  He took some, but was not as enamoured as me!

All in all, we had a MUCH better second day in Victoria. Things were looking up!

British Columbia 2016 – Day 7 / Victoria

Walked 13.26 km / 20 059 steps

Our “tourist” day only started at 2PM since we travelled in from Vancouver, and we were itching to get out there!!

Priority one was lunch. Our plan was to explore the Inner Harbour afterwards, so we walked from hour hotel towards the water and said we’d stop at the first nice place we saw. 

Easiest thing we did all day! 3 blocks from the hotel we found Famoso’s Neapolitan Pizzeria 

Holy Moly that was delicious pizza! Really excellent!

Boy were we psyched to go exploring!!!  For years I have been hearing people talk about how amazing and beautiful Victoria was; when my husband used to go to Vancouver on business in the 80s his colleagues though he was nuts for never visiting Victoria.

It was a bust. We were SO. LET. DOWN. Sure it’s nice, but it’s not holy-shit-oh-my-God-this-is-rocking-our-world!!!!  It was just ok.

Many sections of the pathway along the water from our hotel to the Inner Harbour we closed or under construction so the walk wasn’t nice, and when we got to where we wanted to be – the Prime Touristy Area including “The Leg” (Parliament Building) and “The Empress” (Fairmont Hotel, which incidentally was also under construction) we were underwhelmed. It was like a mini-Ottawa.

We didn’t stick around to take pictures that afternoon, we kept moving and went to Beacon Hill Park to take pictures of “Mile Zero Monument” and the Terry Fox Memorial.

One thing that is “must do” in Victoria is to have drinks at The Empress (well, Tea) and we though that would be a fun activity to do next. We couldn’t get in without a reservation so that put the kibosh on that idea! But I ask you, since when do you need a reservation to have cocktails at a Hotel Bar? I was annoyed.

Whatever, we went to Milestone’s because is was close – I had a Bellini Bowl, he had a beer.

Supper was LOUSY salad at a casual restaurant near the hotel, and then we turned in for the day to adjust our expectations for the rest of the trip!

British Columbia 2016 – From Vancouver to Victoria

When we booked this trip, we didn’t know yet how we were going to get to Victoria from Vancouver. Rent a car? Private transportation? We didn’t have a plan.

We ended up booking a transfer with BC Ferries Connector and it couldn’t have run more smoothly.

The bus would pick us up in front of the Landmark Hotel at 8:30AM which coincidentally was the same place where we rented our car so we already knew how much time it would take us to get there – no stress. We decided we’d just get up, check out, and have breakfast near the pick-up location… turns out there was a Chez Cora right next door. (If only we’d seen it on Day 2!!)

The bus was right on time and since this hotel was the first stop, we got a front row seat. It drove around town picking up people from various other hotels, stopped at the main bus station for about an hour or so (where the bus filled up to capacity) and the off we drove to the Ferry Terminal.

We set sail at 11AM, but since we drove onto the Ferry in the bus, we didn’t get many shots of the boat…  just its bowels!

We stayed outside for a little while to watch it sail away, but the wind forced us back in side.

Here’s a shot of the Ferry going the other way, gives you an idea how big it was!

We got to Victoria (strictly speaking: Swartz Bay) around 12:30, then it was back on the bus for another 45 minute drive to the city – arriving at the bus station a little before 1:30PM.

From the bus station, it was a short 10 minute walk to the hotel.  The whole thing ran as smooth as silk.

Our hotel (Best Western Carlton Plaza Hotel) was very nice…  doesn’t merit a blog post all to itself like Vancouver’s, but we were very satisfied – especially for the price!!!! It’s one of the least expensive hotels we’ve ever had!  Excellent value.

By the time we were unpacked and freshened up it was almost 2PM! It was time to go exploring!