On Wednesday (2/5), we left the hostel all together in one big group and walked to Beacon Hill Park, the city park in Victoria. It is big, considering that Victoria is quite small, and it’s really well kept and pruned and cut. Beautiful, really. Not wild, like Stanley Park, but neat.
Pretty soon, though, we realised that we had totally different speeds. While the others were out on a brisk walk, I always looked for nice photos to take and could disappear into a bush without a word just to look at the tiny little flowers underneath. So eventually, when I imagined seeing irritated smiles on the other’s faces, we decided to split up. I’d continue with my slow explorations on my own, and then we’d meet up after lunch.
We might have arrived on the Island at just the right time. It’s spring, and everything is blooming. Everywhere.
The last part of the park, just down by the ocean, became more wild and unkept. There, I found this field of blue flowers and small oaks. Lovely spot.
On a sign by the field, I learned that this beautiful blue flower was called Great Camas and that it had been used by the First Nations on the island for many many years.
Down by the ocean, the wind was fresh and the coastline was made up of small beaches and flat rocks. And crazy amounts of driftwood. Like, sick crazy. I don’t understand where all that wood comes from. It’s like huge, white tree skeletons.
I made my way back to downtown Victoria by the waterside, and ended up eating an expensive fish n’ chips lunch at a place with floating houses and a family of seals that they fed, to keep them coming back. They are beautiful creatures, the seals, so fat but still amazingly graceful in the water.
The place where we had decided to meet up was in front of the Legislative Building. There she stands, Queen Victoria, all proud and serious. For some reason she fascinates me. I hear so many things about her that don’t really fit together. Her love for Prince Albert, the colonialization of Africa, her many years on the throne. I might have to find a biography about her. When I have the time. Anyway, the Legislative Building behind her is an interesting piece of architecture – I can’t really decide if it’s Victorian cool, or just over the top boastful. It looks English, though, more than anything else I’ve seen in Canada so far.
The reason for meeting up in front of the Legislative Building was because we wanted to catch the free tour. And really, it was even more pompous from the inside, with gold and a lot of colour everywhere. Coloured glass windows with strange Christian quotes and flags. The above photo is of the main entrance hall (which isn’t the actual entrance hall for most people, since the only person who is allowed to use the main entrance is the Queen, and the Chairman once a year, when the Legislative Assemely opens. For the rest of us, there’s a small side door). The flag is British Columbia’s.
It was nice, but nothing special, the building. I guess they all look more or less the same, these things. Walking around there, I kept thinking of the Riksdagshuset in Stockholm. It’s also got high ceilings and pillars and stone floors. The difference is that the one in Stockholm is so much bigger.
No, the most exciting thing about the tour was the tour guide. He told us stories about the architect of the building, apparently a twenty-three-year-old (or something, can’t remember) who won a competition and then through scheming and rumours managed to get the job of designing this very important building, even though he’d barely had a single commission before. It wasn’t so much the stories that the guide told, as the outfit he was wearing: a maroon suit with a white shirt and a big, striped bow tie. And glasses, the hipster kind. Adorable. A sight for sore eyes, if you’d excuse the klische.
Dinner was sallad, eaten in the hostel. And once I sat down in my bed, I couldn’t get out of it. Touristing is a tough occupation, don’t try to say anything else.
Katja Malmborg 