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So. Finally, after years and years and years of trying, I finally convinced my mom to take a week off for a good, solid vacation. And she decided to vacation with me. Having never been out of the country before, I decided a trip to Victoria BC would be a good first international vacation destination for her.
Below is a recap of our events this past week, so friends and family can be rest assured that my mom was in good hands during her week away from home.
We woke up at the late hour of 5am Wednesday morning to prep and get ready, and once on the road, enjoyed a leisurely drive up Hwy 16, Hwy 3, across Hood Canal Bridge and up Hwy 101 before pulling into the ferry dock in Port Angeles shortly after 9am.
Port AngelesWe found ourselves 3rd in line for the ferry boat leaving at 12:45pm, which gave us a few morning hours to walk around town a bit. Our first stop was at a restaurant called First Street Haven. I about fell out of my seat after trying their Praline Caramel Latte (oh yeah, it's good). My mom and I stuffed ourselves on french toast, oatmeal and fresh fruit, and waddled out of there after an hour or so. We then wandered through a few gift and book shops and finally wound our way back to our car. My mom was amused by the whole ferry vehicle deboarding process. Four semi trucks and I believe 6 large RVs came off the Coho along with the many, many cars.
Once on board the ferry, we went straight outside along the outer decks. My mom wasted no time in whipping out her new digital camera to capture the scenery, and the ferry experience. She was eager to explore the whole ferry so we found ourselves wandering around all the interior seating areas, as well as the upper deck and all of the accessible walkways. Luckily, the weather is beautiful, which helped sell her on the experience. I also realized that it's the first time I'd been on that ferry during a decent time of year. ( I tend to have a bad habit of traveling to cold places in the dead of winter -- but that's another story.)
Anyway, as we arrived in Victoria, we waited about 30 minutes to deboard and get through customs. While here, I arranged for us to stay at the Marriott directly behind the Empress. The first perk I noticed is that we were just blocks away from the ferry dock, so our drive once out of the ferry terminal took all of 5 minutes. Our check-in process at the hotel was a great one, as we were upgraded to a wonderful corner room on a high floor with a balcony. Suh-weet.
It was well after 3pm once we were settled in to our room. We decided to wander around downtown a bit to explore and grab a late lunch. Not after 10 minutes of wandering, we decided to try the Sticky Wicket and enjoyed some fantastic food and great beer (locally brewed cream ale -- drool). After our meal there, we thought we would try our luck at the Royal BC Museum to see if they had longer hours in the summer. Unfortunately, their museum hours are the oh-so-typical 9 - 5pm, so instead we decided to pose with some nearby totem poles for touristy pictures. Once we were done amusing ourselves, we found our way back to the hotel so my mom could take an afternoon nap, and so I could make some arrangements for the following day.
Visiting the Observatory
As part of our impromptu itinerary, we decided to check out the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory, and we were very glad we did. We were able to take in a tour of the facility, including going inside the dome and seeing the massive 90 year old telescope housed there. We also enjoyed a planetarium show. But my favorite event was the observation time. We started outside on the hilltop (beautiful view, by the way) with a Cassegrain and a Dobsonian telescope to take in some of the planets (saw Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn), the moon and stars. Following that, we were led back into the dome where we were able to witness the massive telescope there being put to work. The dome moved, the telescope turned -- and with all the creaking and groaning, it sometimes felt that something was about to break. But everything worked perfectly. We were able to see stars, globular clusters and some distant galaxies in the night sky via the telescope. At the end of the evening, my mom and I were almost ready to quit our day jobs so we could join the team that explored the skies there for a living.
Butchart Gardens
One of the "must do's" on our trip was to visit the Butchart Gardens. My mom had heard of it, and seen an occasional picture here and there, but had never laid eyes on it in person. It was a treat for me, too, as it's been nearly a decade since my last visit there. We started off being nearly swept down the path by an oncoming tourist group that had just unloaded off a bus, but once we broke away and started exploring the gardens at our own pace, we started having fun. I was able to show my mom a couple of cool features on her camera, and she took no time in applying the techniques as she digitally captured the landscape. One of my favorite moments was watching her reaction to seeing the sunken garden for the first time. After wandering through the entire garden, we determined that we had earned a non-traditional lunch of gelato. She'd never had it before, but was hooked after the first bite. Following "lunch", we did a quick run through the gift shop where I picked up some seeds for my garden back home.
High Tea at the Empress
"High Tea" turned out to be a fantastic experience for us both. I had heard and read a lot about it, but had never been a part of a formal afternoon tea experience. My mom had dressed to the nines, and I had a easy to pack (doesn't wrinkle!) wrap dress that actually worked well with my mom's formal sun hat. My mom suggested I wear it, and I decided to take her up on the offer, as I don't usually (meaning never) get the opportunity to wear nice hats out at home. Upon our arrival at the Empress, I found myself astonished at the beautiful interior. It really is a very elegant place, and the tea room is no exception. I also noticed several other women wearing hats (much more extravagant than mine) so I felt very appropriately dressed. We were seated at a wonderful table next to the window, and enjoyed some fantastic food and tea over the course of an hour. Trying not to seem too "touristy" I snuck some pictures of our experience there in between our waiter coming to attend to us. Overall, the experience was a very fun and enlightening one for me. Formality has gone away in so much of our social gatherings and events, so it was nice to get to feel what it's like to partake in a formal tradition like this. I hope this is something that continues to be offered at the Empress for many years to come.
Shopping
My mom and I did enjoy a bit of shopping around town. She was able to get some fun gifts for folks back home and I found Lush, a great natural cosmetics store I love that I was hoping I'd come upon while wandering around. We both purchased some great stuff there, and continued wandering around town and window shopping for awhile. I briefly got us lost after walking through Bastion Square, but quickly got re-oriented and got us back to the hotel despite a bit of a rain deluge we got caught in part of the way.
Royal BC Museum
We had a chance to take in the Titanic exhibit at the Royal BC Museum, which was a fantastic treat. My mom did a great job recapping that experience. I have to say, it really was amazing to see artifacts that had been at the bottom of the ocean for years, and had originally belonged to people aboard the ship. I also couldn't believe the type of luxury aboard the ship! Apparently, it would cost roughly $80k in today's dollars to travel first class on that ship. Guess I shouldn't consider first class airline tickets to be ridiculously priced anymore.
Return to Tacoma
Due to having reservations ahead of time, we were able to board our ferry quickly. The ride back across the straight gave us some great views of the city as we departed, as well as a chance to see a seaplane take off from the water. Our drive back to Tacoma was a quick one, as no major traffic got in the way, and we eventually got my mom back to the train station for her ride home to Vancouver, WA. My mom seemed to really enjoy herself and I'm sure we'll be back up that way some time again soon.
