Flea The Race

This morning  I decided to take a rest day in Victoria so I got up at 8am and went down to the hostel reception to check in for another night.  My current room was booked out but they had a free bed in another dorm so I had to check out at 11am and check back in at 3pm.  I went to John’s Place next door for breakfast, this place is somewhere i’ll think about again at some point along the road when i’m starving!  After you sit down they bring you warm homemade crusty bread in a basket with a pot of real butter to chomp away on while you decide what you really want to eat.  I ordered a huge meat Omelet with Fries and English Muffin and a double shot Americano….taaashty!

For the rest of the day I hung out with Niki a Scottish girl who is staying a while and working some hours at the hostel for free accommodation.  We strolled about the city and ended up at Fisherman’s Wharf, a colourful busy area along the harbour with buskers, fresh fish restaurants and seals.  You can buy a half dozen fish at the fish restaurant on the pier for feeding the seals so this I did to try get a few videos and photos of them.  There was 2 seals and sea otter just waiting in the water to be fed.  After we sat about the wharf for a while people watching, listening to a busker and eating ice-cream.

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Later on we went to the government buildings to have look around I found out that Victoria is the capital of British Colombia and not Vancouver as I has assumed.  The public are allowed into the building where they hold their parliament and trapse about the place, it was odd as a tourist walking by rooms where groups of politicians could be seen holding meetings.  We got into the viewing gallery of the parliament and spent 10 minutes or so looking at the proceedings.  It was pretty dull and we didn’t know any of the politicians, I’m sure this will probably change a little bit after living over here for 2 years.

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Niki took me to this funny little laneway between two buildings in chinatown called Fantan alley that she found the previously, its like a little hipster warren of trendy shops and bakeries.

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My first impressions of Victoria was that it’s a little grottier than Vancouver and it does have a pretty big homeless population in the hostel area but after walking about it today I got to see it’s better side and it was worth staying a while longer to leave with a good impression of the city.  No doubt I’ll be back here again at some point, without the bike!

Later on I had a few beers in the hostel bar and met all the same group that was there last night, there are some seriously interesting characters staying at this hostel, it was a lot of fun chatting with them.  This is my last night in civilisation for a few days so i’ve loaded up on my human interaction and I’m ready for another few days of wilderness, good thing for the sake of my budget!