Monday - Today's agenda was the city bus tour of Victoria, but we started off with a stop at the world's best donut place -- Tim Horton. Threw the diet out the window and indulged! Yummy.
We found our way downtown, found the parking lot nearest the bus stop, and got our tickets. We took the 10:50 bus, leaving from in front of the Empress Hotel.
Joe's selfie. He almost missed himself.
Panoramic shot. For those who have been here in the past, they removed the ivy from the walls last year (I think) and now it is clean-shaven. The bus driver said the raccoons were upset.
Canadian flag on top of hotel.
On the front corner is a nice shrub shaped like a whale with a baby.
The streets were busy. Traffic was solid but moved along. No one goes real fast, so the traffic isn't too much of a problem, just getting turned onto all the angle streets.
We drove through Old Town and passed Bastion Square where we shopped the other day. It was all closed up today (Monday).
Next was Chinatown, which was readily identifiable, with its banners and red gates.
This was the school for the Chinese children, since they were not allowed to go to public schools.
They do the horse-drawn carriages here, and we took lots of pictures of the horses, even Matthew that we met the other day.
The next stop was the Coho Ferry. We didn't get off here, but decided we should have, to make arrangements for our ferry ride back to Washington. So we rode around the second time to this stop and took care of that. We are returning Wednesday on the 3:00 p.m. ferry, there were only 2 spots left (I assume for the high profile vehicles), the 10:30 a.m. ferry was already full.
Plants growing on top of the roof.
We next drove past the Hotel Grand Pacific, which is huge, and through Fisherman's Wharf and Beacon Hill Park.
At Beacon Hill, we saw 2 peacocks. There is a petting zoo here, and a totem pole that is 126 ft. tall, which sometimes (not today) has an eagle perched on top.
We went past Mile 0, the start of Canada's Highway No. 1, which stretches through all 10 provinces of Canada between the Pacific and Atlantic coasts, and is one of the longest national highways, spanning 4,990 miles. With all that, Joe missed most of the sign.
Our next stop was the Christ Church Cathedral and we decided to check it out. It wasn't of the caliber of a basilica, but it was very lovely. Although this is the third one built here, they had artifacts dating back 500 years. And beautiful stained glass windows, and a lovely organ.
The bus came around every 45 minutes, and he was late, so this stop took a little while. But we continued on, past the stop to Craigdarroch Castle but we didn't have tickets for that and couldn't really see it from the bus stop. We drove through Oak Bay Village, Marina and Hotel, which had a beautiful golf course. Barbara, when you come out to Butchart Gardens, Maurice can play golf here.
We made our way back to the first bus stop, and just stayed on to go back to the ferry terminal. We watched the busy harbor for a while, and saw the ferry come in that we will be taking.
Our ferry.
After waiting for the bus ride to begin again, and riding it around to this 4th stop, we realized we could have walked here from the Empress Hotel in about 5 minutes. We got our ferry tickets taken care of, then walked down the street for lunch. We ate on the patio, and the restaurant even provided blankets for their patrons, one blanket per table. They had one of the gas heaters on, but it wasn't necessary today.
Joe had red snapper and I had halibut, but they weren't the best. Nice setting, though.
There was a cute saying on the menu, I got a chuckle out of it, anyhow.
And there were lovely flowers hanging on the edge of the roof. Victoria is also known as the City of Flowers.
The jelly basket on the table, in addition to grape jelly and orange marmalade, included cheez whiz and peanut butter. We found that unusual.
We watched planes, boats, the ferry, water taxies, all kinds of traffic in this small harbor. The bus driver said they had to shut the harbor down in the past because whales got in there and sort of blocked the traffic lanes. I would have loved to see that!
We walked from here, passed the Parliament building and back to the Empress Hotel.
This awesome Sequoia is on the grounds of the Parliament building.
We walked through the Empress Hotel, peeked in at the afternoon tea, and window-shopped some of the shops. Not my cup of tea.
A set of China for sale.
The bear statue was my pick. Forget the fur coat.
And there was a totem pole inside too.
We found our car and Joe wanted to drive back down to the wharf, so off we went. And we found it.
They have floating houses here too, like in Seattle, but the ones in this area seemed to be businesses.
We worked our way back to the campground in 5:00 traffic, and I stopped at the office and extended our stay here by one night. Tomorrow we plan another drive, up the east coast of Vancouver Island this time.
It is quite warm here today, probably in the 80s in the late afternoon, although it was only in the high 50s when I got up this morning. Victoria is having its driest summer ever, 43 days without rain, which I think is the 2nd longest period on record. Air conditioning in homes is a rarity here, so the news said that fans are flying off the shelves in the stores. But by the weekend it is supposed to be cooler. We are thoroughly enjoying their lovely weather, cloudless skies, sunny days and warm temperatures. But they think they are HOT!
We finish up here in Canada tomorrow and head back to the mainland to meet back up with Collins and Marilyn on Wednesday. News on Mazie, she does have a fractured hand from her fall in Chiloquin. She sees the doctor on Wednesday about that.
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