SUMMER TRIP - VICTORIA BC#2
Happy Monday my little kitties!
I am going to make you travel today in order to keep the holiday spirit as long as we can. Let's go to Victoria, a small town of British Colombia, my new favorite place, and I could easily have stayed one or two more nights!
It has been a crucial dilemma to choose the pictures I wanted to show you, more than for Vancouver! For this reason, I also created a Facebook album with all the HD pictures. If you didn't see the post about Vancouver, you can find it here and the Facebook album is here!
It was a real adventure to go to Victoria. We took a seaplane and it was a good surprise. I am not a big fan of planes. I am not that scared but I don't really like when there are some turbulences and I always text people I love before taking the plane... But I am not scared! About the seaplane, I told myself: we are just 10 in the plane, it is going to be complicated, the takeoff, landing, why don't we sink, ok there are floats but we are still talking about steel, it is not a plastic plane... Well, finally it was so nice! No turbulence, no chock while landing, it was just like cotton, literally... And then a breathtaking view from the beginning to the end... I almost would like to try again!
Victoria is the capital of the British Colombia in Canada. It is located at the South of the Vancouver Island and has a border with the United-States. This was for the geographic part because it is always good to know... The city name is Victoria because of the name of the Queen Victoria, obviously... I let you imagine a city with little houses in a British cottage style with many different colors. It immediately made me think about the Main Street of Disneyland...but for real!
When we arrived at Victoria, we discovered a lovely hotel, the Magnolia Hoteland everybody was so adorable. We spent a few hours discovering the city and then we went to an excursion to see some killer whales! We followed your advice and addresses and we ate many French toasts at Willie's. More than looking like a technicolor dream, this little city is obviously full of flowers, and blackberries as big as apricots grow like weeds at every street corner...
There are so many adorable addresses for stationary, jewelry and also concept stores around Douglas Street, Yates Street and Wharf Street, close to Willie's Bakery, and I recommend you to go there and get inspired! I don't know what to say but Canadians are very good at typography and handmade lettering! A frontage with crazy lettering, and I could buy everything in the shop...
After eating and seeing all these beautiful and colorful flowers, we did the sea tour with Orca Spirit Adventures and I was a bit curious to see how these organisms can organize excursions in which we can see these mammals for sure! Anyway, it was amazing to see them! We were at 200m from them, but in the boat hold we could hear them communicating... It was crazy! Eleonore talked to me about the great "Black Fish" documentary about captive killer whales and I directly watched it the same night at the hotel (I recommend it if you did not see it already) and it made the experience even more magical because we saw these wonderful wild animals!
I advice you to dress warmly even if it is still summer in Victoria and sunny outside... I was so cold with my "Mon petit chat" sweatshirt and my jersey skirt that I would have killed for a pullover!
Once back from our sea tour, we wanted to visit the little fishing village we talked about, see the botanic garden and go back to the city to take some pictures with the light of the end of the day... We obviously couldn't do everything; I wish we could stay longer!!!
The port of the Orca Spirit Adventures boat was really close to our first option so we decided to go to Fisherman Village, and we were not disappointed by these little float and multicolored wood homes, I could have stayed for hours taking every detail in picture... I just loved the ice cream there: yogurt, maple syrup and pecan, and I am so hungry writing these lines...
The heart stones collection... The inhabitants of this little village are so nice and this place was a real treasure for us, photographic gold seekers!
We went back to town, still with our cameras, and we felt like children during a treasure hunt! Everything was adorable... and then, I saw a small alley, I turn round and call Eleonore. Tan Fan Alley is a spatiotemporal breach that brings you in the Chinese district of the city but a Chinatown that looks like Disney...
It was completely crazy! In order to have the best Instagram pictures, we went up benches and climbed (yes yes) to find the coolest shots! Everything was so photogenic there (even the phone booths) and the light was perfect... As you see, I am in love with Victoria.
One last... I am sorry, this post is so long but I could not decide because this day was really magic!
We had dinner in a delicious seafood restaurant called Ferris's Oyster Bar & Grill. The food was fresh and I loved these ukulele lamps... Are you interested in a DIY? Then, we came back to the hotel, tired by all these incredible things we discovered, and here we saw the Parliament monument completely illuminated by thousands of small lights and the sky was purple... DISNEY I said!!!!
I send you big kisses and bring you to Tofino next time!
Lisa
Translated by Coralie Clair
To read this post in French, click here !