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Victoria, British Columbia
It's the room, the sun and the sky
From Seattle I boarded a Victoria Express catamaran ferry to, well, Victoria, the capital city of British Columbia, the largest city on Vancouver Island and the most British city in all of Canada. The tourist friendly part of the city and most of its unmistakable five star attractions are centered on the Inner Harbo(u)r, whose corner is framed by the Fairmont Empress Hotel (Fairmont Hotels are an especially big deal in Canada) and the British Columbia Parliament Buildings (designed by the same architect despite looking nothing like the other). In between are all of the expected street performers, big time museums, cheesy one star tourist attractions, double decker buses, busy sea planes, horse drawn carriages and wandering tourists all doing their best to distract you from all those unmistakable five star attractions you came to see in the first place.
While the Empress Hotel certainly is gracious and all, the nicest signature building by far on the Inner Harbo(u)r is the BC Parliament Building. Complete with stately domes and carvings of animals and lit up at night with little twinkling lights just like it's in Tivoli Gardens, unlike the boring floodlights most Americans settle for on their capitols.
This picture of the Parliament Buildings was taken from the adjacent and surprisingly architecturally boring Royal British Columbia Museum, a reasonably comprehensive natural history museum that was home to a special Titanic exhibit that was both alternately moving and especially uncomfortable. The moving part featured well presented stories and surprisingly poignant artifacts while the uncomfortable part consisted of actors dressed up in costumes walking around pretending that they were on the boat and somehow not dead. That and the fact that in the iceberg room (yes, they had an iceberg room) there was an actual touchable "iceberg" that sadly looked more like the inside of my grandmother's old freezer than any big bad killer iceberg ever could.
When dusk finally starts to set in (and luckily for all it actually still does set in at that part of British Columbia) all of the lights that hug every line, turn and edge of the Parliament Buildings come to life, at least on the front facade (the lights come to their noticeable end as soon as you breach a corner). A wonderful sight to behold, both in terms of the lighting and the darkness. Victoria would be the last time I witnessed anything that resembled nighttime until well after my return from the always sunny (or at least always bright) Alaskan wilderness.
There would be no Victoria without Victoria, the first cousin marrying Queen of England and the monarch who just happened to be in power when the city was incorporated. I guess they're lucky one of the King Georges wasn't in charge at the time. This statue (which looks rather flattering when compared to the portrait images you'll find on Wikipedia) is on the front lawn of the Parliament Building, eternally looking across the Inner Harbour and up the hill right toward that shopping mall with the (Hudson's) Bay store in it.
While I guess it makes perfect sense that there are indigenous local elk, bighorn sheep and even George Vancouver himself (the little gold guy up top) on the front facade of the British Columbia Parliament Buildings, I still think that little tiny lion feels at least a bit out of place.
Designed for the mighty Canadian Pacific Railroad by the same guy that designed the British Columbia Parliament Buildings, the Empress Hotel is home to $50 (US) afternoon tea and Miniature World, as bizarre an attraction as you could possibly imagine.
A last picture of the Inner Harbo(u)r, although definitely not the last picture of Victoria (don't worry, the slideshow will be well into the promised land of Alaska before you know it).
