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| Parliament Building, Victoria, British Columbia |
Victoria is a pleasant town ( hardly a city ) with a deliberately British feel to it. The weather was mild and there was even drizzle for most of the time to make me feel at home. It has a picturesque harbour and lots of pubs ( yes, including a large Irish one with live and loud music ) and restaurants and a pretty park. A little bit like a clean version of Bournemouth perhaps, without the drunks. It is the capital of BC due to the fact that it was the first place colonised on the west coast of Canada, in the mid-19th century. Messrs Cook and Vancouver had a bit to do with it. There were/are many Indian ( called 'First Nation Peoples' by the politically correct Canadians ) throughout the area. This part of the Indian nation specialised in totem poles. There are thousands of them, all over the place!
My first night there I met up with the daughter of a cousin of mine ( thanks Nadine ) and her friends and we had a jolly good drink with fish and chips in a 'Scottish' pub. Almost felt like Blighty.
Left: The Empress Hotel, between the harbour and Parliament buildings. It is very luxurious and famous for it's 'British Afternoon Tea' which is vastly expensive and which nobody in Britain does any more.
Right: I caught 'Her Majesty' paying a fleeting visit to meet a couple of her 'First Nation Peoples' friends for a quick drink in the Empress Hotel. Maybe she was dishing out invites for The Wedding, which is a popular topic of conversation here.
Left: A selection of some of the ubiquitous totem poles. I suppose they were popular because of the availability of large trees on the Island.
Talking of which, the logging industry in BC, and Vancouver Island in particular, is vast, although not as big as it was. It is difficult to describe the enormous scale of forestry, mainly Douglas Fir, Cedar and Pine, in the area. I guess that about 2/3 of the Island is forested and very hilly or mountainous. The Island is about 350 miles long by 120 miles wide ( not much smaller than England ), and unspoilt with masses of space. The total population of the Island is about 1 million.
Right: Runway conditions: wet.wet.wet. A bustling float-plane commuter service operates between the Island and mainland Vancouver, and Seattle.
The tourist season had not yet started, although I found several places advertising the, yawn, 'whale watching' cruises. These involve a 3 hour trip ( $99 ) in a semi-rigid boat getting thoroughly wet with, at this time of year, a 50:50 chance of seeing a pesky Orca or Humpback whale and maybe a 60:40 chance of getting seasick. No thanks! Why not stay at home in comfort and watch the goldfish through a magnifying glass? Also other trips on offer; 'bear watching' Grizzlies, despite the fact that they were mostly still in hibernation ( best place for them if you ask me ), or perhaps a 30 min flight around the local area ( $130 ) in a float-plane assuming that at least 3 other people turned up. So I resisted the temptation. I did not notice any 'Mounty watching' trips. They probably, wisely, don't like being gawped at by tourists.
There were, however, what looked like some excellent salmon fishing trips on offer, but not at this time of year. I subsequently discovered, from the people I was staying with, that there are fantastic outdoor things to see and do in the area but, as always, it is best to take advice from them that know rather than the money motivated tour operators.
I was going to travel about 50 miles north by train to the town of Duncan, to visit my cousin and her husband ( P and J ). Unfortunately the train was not operating due to track maintenance, so I went by a bus replacement. As it turned out it was a more speedy service. I first went all the way up to a place called Quanticum Beach and stayed there for lunch. The place is in a 1950s British time-warp! Very old fashioned but utterly charming. The countryside was spectacularly beautiful; lakes, rivers and wooded hills.
Left: Victoria Central Station. Not quite on the scale of the Grand Union in NY........and the train wasn't running anyway.
Right: .........and a similar model in Quanticum Beach.
Left: This was at the station in Duncan ( pop. 5,000 approx ) which, I was informed, had no less than 180 totem poles in town
I was generously entertained by P and J and taken on a local tour by J, who is retired from the logging/forestry industry. He will have to pass as my token 'lumberjack' although, sadly, he was not properly dressed in the correct lumberjacket. I was shown some majestic lakes and rivers where fish abound ( and told of some spectacular salmon fishing elsewhere ) and given a fair insight into the trees and machines and techniques of the logging industry. I learnt that they gave up floating the logs down the rivers, leaping from tree to tree ( as per M Python & Co ), a long time ago. How disappointing. I was also driven through a 'First Nation People's' ( Indian to you and me ) reservation. It is a bit sad. They are given many tax-breaks ( including the running of casinos ) and grants and other financial assistance by the government but choose, it seems, to live on these 'reservations' in abject squalor in what looked to me like rat infested junk yards where alcohol and drug abuse is rife. There must be notable exceptions, but the majority do not seem to wish to assimilate into the 1st world. I also noted ( as I did in Winnipeg ) a barely concealed antipathy towards these people.
I was taken, voluntarily, to the local police station. I was determined to track down a Mounty ( 'the Man always gets his Mounty' is my motto ). When we got there I was told that only the previous day a troop of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had been 'on parade' in full dress at some civic function in town. Nobody had warned me!
To make amends, and probably just to get rid of me, they wheeled out a Mounty in 'working' dress. He was called Craig and was most charming. I think he said he had just been on a holiday in Edinburgh.
Left: One of the old steam engines that transported the logs. They did not go fast but could climb serious gradients.
Right: Craig, of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in working dress. So, I now have my genuine Mounty photo.............
......although I would have preferred something a bit more like this.
.............but not like this!
I spent an afternoon in the museum in Victoria. It was quite smart and held some interesting bits and pieces. Bizarrely, the central exhibit in the entrance foyer was the Yellow Rolls-Royce which had belonged to John Lennon in the 60s ( his 'Yellow Submarine' with a double bed in the back ). As you can imagine there was quite a large section devoted to the Indians, sorry 'First Nation Peoples', although not so dramatic as that in the ROM in Toronto, and another plethora of effing totem poles. By now I was getting a tad bored of totem poles.
Left: John Lennon's old Roller. He had remarkably good taste didn't he?. Not sure what it is that is jumping up and down on the bonnet.
Right: A genuine Indian ( of the Bombay tribe ) guiding us up the escalator.
Left: Indigenous Canadian animals. It saved me going on an 'animal watching' tour.
Right: At last, a beaver. I do not know why it was holding a label. Must be the price tag on it's coat.
Left: A Grizzly, thoroughly hibernated. Much the best way to see them I think.
Right: A woolly mammoth. I took this photo because it was there, and you don't see many of them around nowadays.
Left: A rather amusing statue by the harbour in Victoria called 'The Homecoming'.
Right: ...and a fond farewell to P and J and Mr Nemo in Duncan. They were just making sure I left the property.
So, I just about got my pics of the Mounty, lumberjack, sledge with husky, beaver, snowshoe and canoe. I was quite impressed by Canada and the Canadians. They are a civilised lot but, for better or for worse, without the eccentricities of the Americans ( or Brits for that matter ).
I was now heading back to the land of Uncle Sam and perhaps to re-kindle my relationship with jolly old Amtrac. ...............onwards and downwards.
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