I'm back from my trip to Victoria. Which is in the south part of Vancouver Island,
. As you can see from the map, Vancouver Island is a very big island, and through the source of all knowledge, wikipedia, it is 285 miles long and 50 miles wide (at it's widest point). So bigger than Wales then.
Ok so we left Vancouver pretty early (later than planned mind you, the Irish still don't keep time!), and ended up getting confused about what bus to take. The original plan was correct, but a change of plans was incorrect. This worked out for us though, for the bus driver took pity on us foreigners and gave us free tickets to get to the ferry via our next stop from downtown Vancouver, the airport. From the airport bus stop, we took another bus to the Ferry, which is located at a place that I have never heard anyone pronounce, Tsawwassen. Who knows how to say it. Anyways, at the airport stop is where our good deed of the day came from. There was an Englishman who was, well he looked vaguely annoyed and worried. Basically the airport had told him that there was also an airport tax to be paid, and they wouldn't accept travellers cheques as it would have to be cleared first, and they wouldn't accept his mum's credit card over the phone (he had just got of the phone with her). So the tax was about $24, and he didn't have the money, it was his first time travelling by himself, and well, he was a little upset. So we, Sabrina, Alex, Seun and I, decided to give him the money between us. He was very thankful, gave me his email address as he lives in Manchester and works in the Arndale centre, of all places, and said he would have to buy me a drink sometime! But yes, that was the good deed for the day. We felt good about it, and he definitely seemed genuine, and was very thankful, and quickly got the next bus going to the airport terminal he needed.
Right, so bus to Tsawwassen, apparently outside Vancouver is lots and lots of farm land, it looks completely different to what is essentially just a few miles away. Tsawwassen Ferry port/stop/terminal/whatever-it-is-called had one interesting thing to note. Inside the male toilets was a special bin, it was a sharps disposable, for needles and syringes. Yes, you read that correctly, it seemed a little odd, "You, the druggy, be kind, dispose of your needles in the appropriate place please."
Ok, so the Ferry ride, it was, well it was cold, and wet at times. However, the view was good still. All of the little islands on the way to Vancouver island were all pretty. Some had exquisite houses on them, and most had boats. Not surprising that with lots of little islands, transport by boat is popular.
Me and Sabrina looking out on the ferry
For entertainment during the long ferry ride was a few photos, exploring the kids play area and a card game or two. I have learnt a new card game called 41, thanks Sabrina! We eventually reached the stop at Vancouver Island, at a place called Swartz Bay. Here there was rain. Fun. But there was a
sign/advert that shows perfectly how Canadians love the word "Awesome". Well, I thought it was funny. So the bus from here to Victoria is slow, unbelievably slow. However it was a double decker bus, which was unexpected. A Rainy hour later, the rain had stopped, and we walked to the hostel called Backpackers' Inn. It was alright actually, not expensive, nice place, room... wasn't big but adequate. When we arrived it was too late to go do anything, so we decided to walk about. We discovered buildings that were Christmas packages (The Christmas village)
Buildings or really big presents? (The Christmas Village)
, A bridge, some pretty looking views, and the chinatown. Which to be honest was rubbish, it was more of a china-block. It did provide a fancy looking tree though.
it's a fancy tree isn't it?
After a little bit of walking, we were obviosuly hungry. So we decided to look for a place that would provide food and drinks. Enter 'The Sticky Wicket'. This place, was Awesome! There were a few people inside, but when we had the food/drink, we could see why. It was very good. I was actually stuffed full. Lovely. Then we had desert sautéed strawberries in a rum sauce. Needless to say, this was delicious! That and there may have been a mini fight to get strawberries onto our spoons. Cocktails, also good, and the ale too. One of the cocktails I had was called a Pink Elephant. The Pink Elephant that no-body talks about. I hope someone gets that, the barlady said that to me and I laughed, but no-body else got it, but me and her. Some people. *shaking my head*
The Sticky Wicket, if you go to Victoria, you must go here!
After a few drinks, was back to the hostel to play a game I had noticed in the hostel, Jenga! Or as the Irish call it, tumbling towers. We do seem to play a lot of games here. haha. I think the others were getting annoyed with me as my tactic is to play highly risky manoeuvres. Well especially Alex, for his move was after mine. This was happening while there was live music, very funny live music followed by a lady on guitar with a beautiful voice, we liked her music a lot. This ended the first night. Well Ok, Getting into a very squeaky top bed of a bunk bed quietly because there was someone sleeping in the dorm room was how I ended my first night.
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The second day Helen was "hopping over" to see us and to go whale watching, along with whatever else we could fit in. Helen was taking a float plane, for free of course as she works for West Coast Air, and arriving at around 9am. So we decided that we would all meet at 9. Which in the Irish world means after 9. Ha, ok, to be fair Sabrina was ready by 9, Seun and Alex weren't. This was problematic as Whale watching only happens about 3 times a day with the people we wanted to go with, so in the end it was just me, Helen and Sabrina whale watching. This was something to remember. But first, we had to check out a place that Helen has been talking about since she had got here. It was Murchies, a place that does amazing afternoon tea. Although now it seemed that they are under new management and don't do it any more. We were very disappointed, so instead had scones and cake for breakfast. It was delicious. After that it was time to go whale watching.
We look like we should be on the sea. The problem with delayed photo's, you may look like a plonker.
First we suited up in what we called fisherman gear. Sabrina and Helen got orange suits, while I got the more captain style suit with blue on it as well (it's what I like to think anyway). Our captain was cool. We were on a small boat and I sat near the front, making the ride bouncy and exciting at times! Can you tell that I loved it yet? Well I did. Besides from seeing whales, we also saw sea-lions, elephant seals and some crazy sea weed type stuff called Bull Kelp. All of this was by Race Rocks. Some were cute.
Adorable isn't it! Smiling for the camera.After looking at them, we joined a load of other whale watching boats. We were following a brother and a sister (I think), Orca Whales (Killer whales). They surfaced many times, it was quite cool to watch. The boats are only allowed up to 100ft to them. Which makes sense as when you see them they are actually hunting, wouldn't want to get in the way of that! The two we were watching were Transient Orca, meaning that they hunt other marine mammals, like Porpoises, Sea-lions etcetc. The other kind we could have seen are the Resident type, they swim in large family groups and hunt fish. There's a load of info in the
wiki article if you want to read more. So where was I? Oh yes, whale watching, we did get pretty close to them, or should I say they appeared close to us! I would of got a fantastic photo of this too, if I wasn't staring at them thinking, 'wow, they are massive, and soo cool!'. I got some photos.
The Orca coming up one last time before KILLING!Right, that was good, but I think a great part of this was purely being on the boat and skimming through the waves at high speeds. I basically a wide grin while this was happening. Just ask Helen. I was loving it! haha. It was only when we were out in the water that I realised how useful the 'fisherman' suits are. Underneath it I was wearing 3 layers already, that plus the extra gear made me comfortably warm. Unlike on land when walking around like this made you want to melt. So if you ever go out to sea, remember, it will definitely be cold! The other thing I noticed was that my phone got a text message, back at the harbour, I looked at it, apparently I we had crossed into US waters on the boat trip. So I can officially say I was in the USA briefly on this trip now.
So on the way back, bouncing along with the waves, Helen showed us her remarkable ability, she will sleep on bouncy boats like a baby. Kinda odd, but there you go. At the end we chatted to the captain of our little vessel, and asked him if there were any nice places to eat. I am so glad that I did, he directed us to a local fish & chip place by the water (yes, chips not fries!) which tourists generally don't know about. It is called
Red Fish Blue Fish, and it was great! They even had mushy peas! I was unbelievably excited. They also get their food in a sustainable way and are environmentally friendly, so that's good too.
My fish & chips with Mushy peas, oh how I've missed you.
After this we had choices to make, as to what the 3 of us should do. 1st we looked into something we saw by the float planes. Scooters! They were funky old style ones, and had a flat rate after 4 hours. It seemed like a good idea, but we decided that getting up early the next day to go on them would be a better idea. Ride along the coast, then to the butterfly park. It would be a fun day, plus we could take pictures of us in 3 different coloured scooters. I was looking forward to my next day already. After that was sorted, we decided to chill out, take in the sunny sun sun, and the sea air. That and played with Sabrina's camera while she was on the phone to her sister. Mostly because Helen and I felt like playing, and our cameras had died for the day. Took some myspace style photos, and Helen as 'Cousin IT' style too. Apparently being a flame haired vancouverite means that she also gets sunburnt very easily. So after that we called her flame faced vancouverite (mostly as she was calling me dyl-bear, grr). To make sure Sabrina wasn't left out, we called her Ribena. Grabbed some popcorn, chilled some more. Then decided that we would go and see a play at the Fringe festival going on. The play we saw was "The Mechanical Bride", Starring Helen's housemate Kevin. He was M.O.M. and only appeared on tv/monitors. I liked it, it was funny, and importantly, enjoyable. After that we decided that we needed more food, and drinks, and the food should be in cake form, or something sweet. Yes food comes up a lot. Right, so we asked Hostel people, and ended up at a place called Detour Dessert Lounge. I had a London Fog, with lots of cinnamon, and the Bifky cake, full of chocolatey-ness and whipped cream to the side, and a strawberry. I don't have a photo, but I will nick one of Sabrina, who had the only working camera. The girls had wine and other delicious cake, and believe me, they were delicous, and large! The staff there were friendly and helpfull. Me and Sabrina played cards (snap, 41, Black Jack, Rummy), while Helen was feeling sunburnt, tired and had tea. We decided that we should drink stuff because of the games. But being as we are, we didn't want to spend lots of money on drink, and also, it probably wouldn't be the best idea if we were scootering the next day. We decided upon a glass of wine put into shot glasses. We asked the lady, and she had something better to put it in. Imagine a tall beer glass, but miniaturised to the size of a shot. It will brill-o! It turned into 3 shot glasses. After gruelling games of rummy, we ended up sharing the drinks as we couldn't decide if the looser or if the winner should drink! The plan for the next day had also been set, take scooters and explore, and also take float plane back as Helen made it sound very worth it. Also to try and get the student discount, making it $50ish instead of $160ish.
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Friday, the last day in Victoria.
We decided that breakfast should definitely be had before the scooter-ing begun. I had many ideas of photos to take, and with my recharged camera, it wasn't going to be a problem. We decided to eat at a place near to the hostel. It was a place that does an amazing, stomach filling breakfast. Food here is good, all of the time apparently! Ok, so after being stuffed again, we decided to check on the scooters. They were there, in the different colours we wanted. We were excited, we were ready, we needed our driving licences', Sabrina did not have one! AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! stupid stupid stupid! 'Why did we not think about that yesterday!?' Is just one of the many thoughts that I had. Ok, so this meant that we needed a quick change of plans. We did consider having Sabrina take an electric scooter, as you don't need a licence for that. But they don't go as fast, or travel as far, so that idea was scratched. We even considered hiring a fancy old fashioned car, but figured that there would be a ginormous deposit for that. So basically we did no travelling on this day. Instead, we called Sabrina a moose, and then came up with the name Purple Moose, as Purple Moose are prohibited from riding petrol powered scooters. It's a well known fact! After coming up with that, we decided to go to the Victoria Parliamentary Building. It was, urm boring, so we walked out of that pretty much straight away.
Arrogant reflection shot of us in Parliament building
Maybe it would have been vaguely more interesting if we had taken the tour, but the lady talking had a very annoying voice, that we could not stand. So next option, find a park and relax. This worked. We went to Beacon Hill Park, the first thing me and Sabrina did was climb up the rocks and stuff, Helen just walked straight to a bench and stayed away from any sun! We joined up again at the bench, which was facing a pond full of ducks. Ducks that like to stick their heads into the water. It was Hilarious. One duck, which Helen named "Ducky" kept paddling his feet in the air, like he just didn't care. Yea, sorry, bad joke, but it was very funny at the time.
It's Ducky, he likes to shake his legs in the air.
Then we "climbed" a tree, I say "climbed" as Helen leant against the tree. It was now that Ben called me. He was picking up his girlfriend Hayley from the airport, but she was delayed. So he decided to see how things were going for me. Well, I was having this chat on a low branch of a tree, so the girls, being annoying creatures decided to take off my shoes. I could do nothing about this as I had my camera in one hand, and the phone in the other. I have no idea what Ben was thinking while this was happening, but he must have thought I was odd, but he probably thinks that anyway. More talking later, and Helen decided to up the ante. She started feckin pulling hairs out of my leg! Then Sabrina joined. Very much Grr indeed! and Ow sounds. I eventually got of the phone, and out of the tree, and out of being annoyed by the girls. Next we decided that Murchies was too good to not go to again, and made our own afternoon tea. I had Ceylon tea, of for those who don't know why that is good, Sri Lankan tea! It was just like being in Sri Lanka and having tea, minus the climate and surrounding, and the fact I had a massive sandwich. They made a great sandwich, it was odd, there was asparagus inside of it, but it worked.
Then it was time for the float plane ride! Me and Sabrina tried to get in with our student cards, but apparently only Canadian students are allowed. How fortunate FOR THEM. Means a more expensive ride, but my mind was set now, we were going by plane, so much quicker, and a great view. Of course, I was thinking of tailspin during take off and landing. How could I not? The flight was great, small plane it has to be said, but great fun. You fly lower than the clouds, and so can see everything below. I even think I saw Helen's house from the air!
A Shot from the plane of the little islands we passed---
So the plane flight was how my trip ended and I've spent the last two days writing it up. That and planning my next trip which starts tomorrow. I am taking a
5 day Moose Travel Network Bus ride to Banff and back with Sabrina. It will
pass through Shuswap Lake, Banff, Revelstoke, Kelowna, and return to Vancouver. On the way are the possibilities to do
these activities. As I have a Hostelling International card (from my time at Jericho Beach), this trip (bus ride and accommodation) comes to $299. Bargin! If we wanted, we can jump of the bus at any stop, and take the next one for no extra cost (minus the accommodation). However, I do have to do this in one go as I have to get back home, and get ready to leave this wonderful country and city. That and have Christmas dinner with friends. It's an "August Christmas dinner in July". The idea came from Lynda, as Australians like to party in their winter, hence,
Christmas in July. But obviously it's August now so...
Yea, Anyway, I will not be taking my laptop, so the next posting will be a while away. Hopefully the weather will stay good, or at least manageable, today wasn't so great, a bit rainy, but hey, whatever. I will leave you with this, a guy I saw on the Skytrain yesterday, about to get married.
Oh yes, he was loving his friends.
