Monday, August 23, 2010

Travelogue part 4. To Victoria

Hey, remember that time I went on a vacation, and was going to write all about it?

Yeah, I'm starting to not remember it, too! But when I'm in the Nursing Home, I'll want to look back on this summer, and remember the good bits. Because by golly, I'm sure all the bad bits are going to get remembered without any help.

So, to recap.

We've driven up to Canada with my friend and her kids. We've arrived at my parents' house, and have spent a nice amount of time at the beach. And in our last episode, we dropped the girls off at Pirate Camp. (It's actually Bible Camp, but that doesn't make you want to form a hook with your index finger and shout "Arrrrrr")


So.

The next morning, we headed off to Vancouver Island. Ken's mom was expecting us, and she was VERY excited that we not miss a concert that was happening in Victoria on Monday evening. She was certain that the boys would be particularly interested in it.

Hmmm. It's 100 middle-aged men from the South, dressed in tuxedos and singing songs from last century. My mom would have loved it, her Gaither fandom being legendary, but I was hoping we could get to my mother in law's house, drop off the boys, and just take her as an 'adult evening'.

Oh well. Let's see what happened...

We drove down to the Ferry, uneventfully, and had a very breezy trip across the Strait.

When we got to Vancouver Island, we made a bee-line for downtown Victoria, so we could do a bit of touristy stuff. We were kind of under the gun with the schedule, having to be back in the Okanagan on Friday morning to get the girls from camp, so we only had 2 nights in Victoria, a tight-scheduling that bothered Ken's mom. I know that she wanted to spend more time with us, but I didn't want to impose with our friends tagging along, as well as the fact that Toni and her son Cole had mentioned that they would like to 'see as much of BC as possible' in the 5 days that the girls were at camp.

So Downtown Victoria it was.

Ah, Cole. Having a great time? Good. Enjoy the Empress Hotel. We'll take a look inside, too.

But first, let's look at the parliament buildings.

And the totem poles!

We also poked around in the tourist district of downtown, and I managed to score some great boxes of Murchie's Tea. I'm kicking myself that I didn't buy a few cool other things in the store, but we were, as I may have mentioned, under the gun, time-wise. We hit downtown at 4pm, and had to be AT THE SUPPER TABLE at mom's no later than 530. We made it. With 5 minutes to spare... and that includes a stop at a local florist for Toni to grab a lovely flowering plant as her 'Thank You" arrival gift.

Dinner was good, but the boys were looking a little tired. They hadn't slept the night before, even though I'd gone down to where they were staying at my folks' place, on several occasions to tell them to tone it down and sleep (I blame Cole. Because I can.)

Alas, mother was not to be swayed, and she INSISTED over supper that the concert would be JUST what the boys would enjoy.

Double alas, she was wrong.

Skip nearly immediately fell asleep. To his credit, he didn't snore. And to Cole's credit, he managed to keep Nate entertained quietly, so that nobody around us was disturbed.

I enjoyed the music. I think Ken's mother did, too. I think Ken would have liked to poke out his ears, but that's just my impression.

We packed it in early, slipping out before the concert was even really finished. It had been a long day, and the morning was promising to be full of adventures to come.

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