We arrived into Victoria on Friday evening and checked into our hotel, Delta Ocean Point Resort & Spa, only to discover we had been upgraded to a room with a harbour view! Sweet! This was our amazing view!
Mom checked out the comfiness of the beds...
and Mara and I were pretty excited about the Philosophy freebies in the bathroom!
After a quick dip in the pool where we had this amazing view below, we headed out to check out downtown!
We stumbled upon an awesome Mexican restaurant, Cafe Mexico, and we were able to be dropped off there by the hotel taxi service - fancy fancy!
It was the cutest little place inside, full of old skool Mexican charm! It was very rustic...
and the food was completely delicious! Plus we got free chips and salsa which us Jones girls love!
Mom, of course had to carry on her seafood obsession with prawn flautas, because there was no clam chowder in sight this time!
The next morning I woke up and found Mom in her favourite little spot! sitting in the bay window, taking in the view!
This massive ship sailed on into the harbour!
and we enjoyed being able to watch the floatplanes take off and land too!
I couldn't resist taking a pic by my fave trees!
We were a bit sad to find out the hotel didn't serve breakfast...so we walked into town to see what we could rustle up! I had spotted this bakery the night before as we were wondering around and then in our guide book I had read how it was the oldest bakery in the whole of British Columbia as it was founded in 1887. Being the bakery buff I am, I decided we had to give it a whirl!
I will forever be grateful that the hotel didn't serve us breakfast because every mouthful of our breakfast at Willie's was amazing! We all agreed we would come back to Victoria again and again for this breakfast alone!
The girls got 'benny's' as they are known here, that's eggs benedict to you and me!
Mara got a Southern style one served with home made corn bread!
I got the best french toast that has ever touched my lips with raspberry compote, icing sugar and melted maple cream cheese. Maple cream cheese?! How amazing does that sound! It was also served with bacon because we're in Canada after all. We all agreed it was the very best way to start the day!
We walked to The Empress to burn off a few of those breakfast calories! It is so beautiful from the outside! It's a pity it's so old fashioned on the inside otherwise we would have loved to stay there!
They did have some beautiful gardens though...
Unfortunately, we had planned to do the Butchart Gardens but of course it rained and so these gardens were as good as it got that day!
We came across this very beautiful tree, Mom was quite taken with it! We read that it was called an Arbutus tree and is native to Canada but only found in certain areas. It's quite distinctive because of the way the red bark peels off to reveal a slightly different colour bark underneath. Of course when we got back to Vancouver, the forester in the family was able to tell us all about it!
Mom and Mara posing in the lush green gardens, I guess all that rain we get has to come in handy somehow!
Here is a view of our hotel (the cream building in the middle of the two lampposts) across the harbour peeking out from under my umbrella!
Of course it never takes long for me to discover a cupcake shop! This one came highly recommended by my cupcake loving friend Cassie who used to live on the island.
Don't you just love their cute little Eiffel Tower name cards!
I tried the 'triple bypass' - a rich brownie cupcake filled with caramel and topped with caramel frosting and skor bits (skor is a chocolate bar similar to dime).
Their cupcakes got the Jones girls seal of approval!
and just around the corner we stumbled upon a macaron shop!
Apparently the treat shops in this town were a bit obsessed with the Eiffel Tower!
Bon Macaron was a rather hip little macaron shop, specialising in crazy flavours...
bacon cream cheese anyone? or curried mango chutney?! We went with some safer flavours like lime, hazelnut and a bit of a crazy strawberry and balsamic one! Surprisingly even though they got crushed in Mara's handbag they were super tasty!
Victoria seemed to be catering to all my favourite things! even down to my obsession with Chuck Taylor's! Here in little old Victoria there just happened to be a shop called Baggins Shoes that had the largest selection of Converse in the whole world! We loved browsing around, but were happy enough with the bargaintastic pairs of Cons we'd bought a few days before in the Seattle outlets! Well at least I was, Mara went and indulged in another pair...just because!
I loved everything about Victoria, and not just because they had all my fave foods! Just the feel of the town had way more charm and charisma than anywhere in Vancouver!
Even down to their tree lined streets!
and when we came across this shop, it was like it had been made just for me!
Milkshakes, and floats are my favourite drinks in the whole world! It was super retro and quaint inside!
and we all indulged! Sometimes you just can't beat a chocolate double thick shake and a root beer float!
For our finale of the day we headed down to Fishermans Wharf, yes apparently they have one in little old Victoria as well as San Fran!
I was so glad we came to check out this cute little place. Despite the overcast weather, we absolutely loved how vibrant and bursting with colour this little community was! I can only imagine how fantastic it would be on a sunny day!
Again, it was like it had been made just for me...a little stall selling ice cream,
this stall sold pulled pork and hot dogs and there was even a little Mexican restaurant just behind it too!
We spent ages checking out every little house down on the cute docks...
I love that instead of having your car parked outside, you have a kayak! and as I took the pic a seagull flew in right on cue!
There were some rather fun house names like 'Toad Hall' and this one...
We all decided it would be oh so fun to own one of these little houses!
Imagine waking up every morning to these guys on your doorstep!
You could buy little fish scraps from one of the huts that sold fish and chips to feed them...
and then when you're ready to head back to town, you just hop on this adorable little water taxi! job done!
After a rather long stop in at Michael's, because they were having a rather amazing sale on all their scrapbooking stuff and so Mara and Mom stocked up, we headed back to the ferry!
Ferry rides with views like this are the most kind of fun!
We also got some pulled pork sandwiches from the White spot on board!
So let's just recap for a minute...my weekend on Vancouver Island consisted of my FIVE favourite things:
1. Cupcakes
2. Milkshakes
3. Floats
4. Mexican
5. Pulled Pork
It's safe to say I was a little bit smitten!
We hopped out on to the deck just in time to catch another beautiful sunset. I'm pretty sure I've never seen a bad sunset here in B.C!
Some nice army boys took this picture for us!
So that was why we fell in love with Victoria! and in the end it was a pretty good thing it rained because I don't think a day at Butchart would have been as fun as our day was being the foodies we are!
So 3 days into Mom and Mara's fun filled trip and we haven't even got to Vancouver yet!
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