Visiting Victoria


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North America » Canada » British Columbia » Victoria
September 15th 2011
Published: September 16th 2011
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There was smooth sailing overnight, and we both awoke well rested. Sharon readied herself for mass, while John worked on finishing yesterday’s blog. He got mostly through it when he dressed to join Sharon in the Wajang Theatre; however, mass finished a bit early and we met at the staircase to the fourth deck. We went back to the stateroom, finished the blog, and posted our sea day adventures.

We went up to breakfast in La Fontaine, and John ordered his almost-everything omelet and Sharon had French toast with bacon. Behind us we could hear people who were complaining about some of our ports of call. One gentleman was saying, we could do without Homer and Kodiak; also we should have skipped Icy Straights altogether, and you would have thought there wasn’t anything to see or do… but then it may be that these ports didn’t have the highly commercialized districts catering to throngs of cruise boat tourists, you know the places: Diamonds International or stores offering tanzanite jewelry and the very places that will be migrating to the Caribbean for winter.

After breakfast we stopped by the library for our Sudoku challenge, with John finishing in under 4 minutes on each puzzle while Sharon had a juxtaposition of numbers on the hard puzzle.

We got dressed for our afternoon tour, and went up to the Lido. We had some bucks to spend on our Coke card, so we both had a Coke. John started with the Derby soup which was very good, but he never found out what was in it (but it wasn’t too far from the carrot and ginger soup he had later for dinner, but it was different). John and Sharon both had the roast beef, and it was very good. We went down to disembark, and there were throngs trying to get off the ship, all at the same time. Things should have been arranged with a Queen’s Lounge meeting, sending out tours to the busses one group at a time, and much congestion could have been avoided on the staircases (you could forget about trying to catch an elevator). There was also a group of people disembarking with suitcases because they live in Victoria.

We didn’t need our passports to disembark, just our room key card and a picture ID. Our tour bus was waiting for us. We drove through downtown Victoria, past Parliament and other government buildings. The bus driver did a very good job of driving while continuously talking and giving interesting tidbits about the sites. Part of our tour was to spend an hour at Craigdarroch Castle. This magnificent brick building faced with stone had incredible floor to ceiling wood parfait, paneling and moldings. The building was initiated by Robert Dunsmuir, a coal producing magnate, to be the home for his family; however, he died just before its completion in 1890. His widow lived here for 18 years, most of the time with one or more of their adult children. There were about five stories and a magnificent view from the tower room. Part of the building was partitioned for several servants. Combined there were about 25,000 square feet and cost a staggering $600,000 in 1890 dollars, taking three years to complete. Many of the rooms have been re-decorated by the historical society that maintains the property today in period pieces that date to the 1890’s to 1908 period the Dunsmuirs were in residence. After the death of the matriarch, the property was subdivided into 141 smaller parcels, and all furnishings of the castle were sold at auction by the family. About 10% of the original furnishings were reacquired, but most of the antiques on display are representative based on the auction inventory list. There are about 96 steps to negotiate to tour the house, and a bit of a walk up to the castle from where the bus is forced to park.

On the return trip from the castle we passed many ocean-side mansions, from various eras including a number of art deco. The 1950’s ranch style homes are being replaced by more modern dwellings.

Back at the ship, we stopped in a gift shop to get something for Sharon’s mom, before re-boarding the ship. Back on board we shared a Coke, and were thirsty having forgotten to bring water on the tour.

We started packing for tomorrow’s return to Seattle. We enjoyed the final dinner, ordered two more Cokes to nearly deplete our soda card. John also asked for the rest of the Shiraz wine from the bottle he had bought earlier in the cruise, and he indeed did get six glasses of wine out of the bottle, so it was indeed slightly cheaper by the bottle than by the glass. John had the smoked salmon spinach salad, followed by the carrot with ginger soup, and then the five spice shrimp (and I’m thinking it was both five different spices and five shrimp that comprised the dinner). All dishes were absolutely delicious. Sharon ordered the chilled blueberry soup, but was surprised to notice seeds in the soup (not her favorite thing to find solid things like seeds and nuts in things from soup to cookies). Sharon had several slices of roast beef with mashed potatoes that was very tasty. John ordered the German Chocolate cake with Kirshwasser icing and cherries, to go with his Neon cordial made of Galliano, Midori and white chocolate liquor. Sharon had the featured pear sundae which was “okay”.

We stopped by the piano bar and listened to the guitarist play several songs, and although he was performing for just a handful of people, he was smiling pleasantly, chatting with the audience, and appearing to completely enjoy what he was doing… and that pretty much ensured that those in the room enjoyed completely what they were listening to. We would have stayed longer, but had to return to our room to finish packing.




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16th September 2011

Visiting Victoria
I have been enjoying reading your blogs. Your trip sounds very interesting. I'm sure you both have a had a great time. Probably planning your cruise. :) Love all the pictures. Thanks for sharing them. Catch you later! Janet

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