I have a habit that I didn’t fully realize until Kevin pointed it out in San Diego. When I’m a passenger in a vehicle, I read aloud the signs on businesses as we pass them—“Ralph’s Fine Meats,” “Tammy’s Tropical Trees,” and so on. Apparently, a comedian—maybe Louis Anderson?—had a schtick about his mother doing the same thing, even to the point that “fill dirt” would occasionally fall from her lips. As Steve is chauffeuring us around Seattle, I rattle off this or that sign, realize what I’m doing, murmur “fill dirt” and descend into giggles.
I don’t know why I felt like I needed to share that today, but there it is.
Anyway, yesterday was all about Victoria, British Columbia. Mark and I thought Steve was going to take us to Vancouver, but we are happy that he chose Victoria instead. It’s a really really cute small city with lots to see. And I’m sure I will love it even more when we come back in the summer. God it was cold.
We had to get up early—6 a.m.—to make it to the ferry for an 8 a.m. departure. We were still wiping sleep out of our eyes as we navigated the boarding process, during which, one of the ticket agents flirted with Mark. Steve and I just watched and snickered. Maybe it’s the ring, but I think he’s still got it.
The ride over was long—two-and-a-half hours—but pretty peaceful. I never realized how chopped up Puget Sound is. We sailed past lots of big and small islands, not to mention freighters. (It was all I could do to ignore the freighters; my irrational fear of big boats was getting the best of me.)
We arrived in a sunny Victoria at around 11. Here are a few shots I took while we got our bearings.
Our first order of business was breakfast/lunch. One of the mates on the ferry had told us where to find a couple good places, but of course, we forgot where they were, so we had to ask at a store. The clerk recommended a diner called “John’s Place” just up the street. Wow! Was that a great suggestion.
The waffles and bacon were delicious, the service was spunky and fun, but the bread! OMG the bread! I’m going to have to try to find the recipe online, but it was the best herb bread I’ve ever had. Warm, kind of an Irish soda bread. Fantastic!
After lunch, we wandered a little through shops, but it was hard to be outside for long because of the cold. We did see a couple interesting sights around Chinatown, though.
Believe it or not, that last shot is of a public men’s room.
We stopped for a while to tour the Empress Hotel and the popped over to the Royal BC Museum.
We decided not to go in because we wouldn’t have that long before we had to get back on the ferry at 4. We spent about a half hour grabbing coffee and walking through the gift shop, and then we decided to tour the Parliament building. I was fascinated by how little security we encountered. We could roam pretty freely around much of the first two floors; only a few areas, like the legislative chamber, were gated off.
These are some shots of the interior of the building. You can see a shot of part of the exterior in the second photo on this page.
The first shot is of the rotunda. I couldn’t get directly centered under it because the floor is an imported Italian mosaic under glass and is roped off. The second shot is of a stained-glass window commemorating Queen Victoria’s Jubilee. Apparently, someone put it away in the basement and forgot about it. It was down there for sixty years or so before someone discovered it and had it brought up to be displayed. When Parliament is in session, the seargent-at-arms displays an enormous gold mace on the desk in the center of the third photo, which is of the legislative chamber. You can see that Parliament is not currently in session—no mace.