Enjoying Victoria, British Columbia

Victoria, BC, on Vancouver Island is a beautiful  place.  Our RV park was about 15 miles outside of Victoria but this area has many eclectic small towns so you could keep very busy without going downtown.

Besides seeing the city, we also wanted to see our RV friends Bev and Terry Mattenley who we met last year in Mission, Texas.  And they are the couple who adopted Scottie, the lab mix we fostered for two months while in Texas.  

Desi and Scottie started playing and seemed to remember each other from last winter.

Scottie had lots of loving for us, too.

While we were there we ran into Santa Claus who was vacationing before another busy year end. 

We drove into Victoria to go to the Walmart store which was in an area called Uptown.  It was full of stores and restaurants and in a very busy area.  The amazing thing about the Walmart store was that it was on several floors and had a parking garage underneath it.  

The store was huge and I wondered how one would go from one floor to the next while shopping.  We saw they had an elevator but that didn't seem too workable.  Then we walked over to the escalators and we had never seen this before in a Walmart store.

You push your cart into a center lane and your cart has an escalator, too, so it rides up or down with you. When you get to the bottom you just pull it off the cart escalator and continue your shopping.  Amazing !!!  

Victoria is a beautiful area and we enjoyed the warmer weather but it was also rainy while we were there.  The morning would come up clear and sunny and then you would start to see a few clouds moving in.  Within an hour it would be pouring down rain.  After the rain passed the day would clear up but it could happen again so you had to be prepared for the weather.

We went downtown several times, once with the pups and once without them so we could go into some of the stores and restaurants. Victoria is a dog-friendly town and there were many walking trails to enjoy.  Many of the shops have water outside for the dogs, too, which makes it nice.  

One of the areas we walked through was Chinatown with wonderful shops tucked into narrow alleys.

Downtown Victoria is filled with artwork and displays of beautiful plants and flowers.

Many of the older buildings have been remodeled but kept their years-old facades.

This one was a work in progress.

Along the harbor you could see biplanes landing and taking off.  The walkways enabled you to see different parts of the waterfront.  

While walking along the water we saw this yacht come into port.  I can't imagine what it cost but it had a good sized crew taking care of it.

In the distance are the British Columbia Parliament Buildings.

The harbor area is full of shops, restaurants, and big hotels.  

The most famous hotel downtown and one of the oldest is the Fairmont Empress.  Opened in 1908, it is a luxury hotel with lush beautiful grounds overlooking the harbor. 

The red plants say "Welcome to Victoria"  along the waterfront.

If the Empress was too fancy there were older buildings that had been converted into hotels with great views of the harbor, too.

We walked over to Fisherman's Wharf to see the houseboats and take advantage of the food kiosks selling fish and the sunny day.  We were able to walk along the houseboats but since they were private residences you couldn't venture inside.

While eating lunch we saw this young pup under a table with his family.  He must have walked a lot because he was so tired they had trouble waking him up.  Finally the owner picked him up and carried him out.

We also spent a day walking through the Butchart Gardens.  Robert and Jennie Butchart began manufacturing Portland cement in 1888 and then moved to Vancouver Island because of the rich limestone deposits.  They built a home near the quarry called "Benevito" meaning welcome in Italian.  When the limestone quarry was exhausted, Jennie Butchart turned the area into a sunken garden.  Years later they made an Italian garden replacing the tennis courts.  As the years continued the gardens increased and became the Butchart Gardens which still belong in the family.   

I had thought this time of the year there wouldn't be as many blooming plants but that wasn't even close to being true.  British Columbia seems to be able to grow just about everything in its climate and the plants are exceptional.

Dogs are allowed in the gardens and they even have water stations for them along the pathways.

We fell in love with British Columbia and Victoria.  There are so many things to see and do.  You could spend months just touring around the province and the islands.  We hope to come back here again sometime in the next few years.

And now its time to get back to the lower 48 states.  We had a great time seeing Alaska and the Yukon and all the other places we visited.  But the fall colors are about and soon the snow flurries will begin so its time to move south.  We still have five more weeks before we get home and more places to visit.  Peace!