Day 8

After breakfast we set out to Butchart gardens. It’s on the way to the airport. It was created in 1921 in an exhausted limestone quarry. It’s probably the most popular tourist attraction in Victoria with over a million visitors each year. It seems like most of them are Chinese. Most of the visitors we saw in the gardens were Chinese, and most loud and rude. The garden itself is lovely with beautiful displays of millions of colorful flowers. All the flowers are lush and big, and the greenery is vibrant green -- so different from what we see at home. Impressions of Vancouver Island (which does not contain Vancouver city): Very pretty and well maintained; lots of water (see satellite photo); lots of greenery and large parks with abundant wildlife – birds and tons of deer everywhere. Victoria is an interesting city with many things to do and places to visit. You can get through the city itself in every direction in 20 minutes or so, but there was more urban sprawl outside and more traffic than we expected. It could have been because of many road construction projects. Everybody we encountered was very friendly and helpful. We saw a lot of happy and content people everywhere, and dogs, too. Not surprisingly, there’s a lot of great fish and seafood, but also beautiful organic fruits and vegetables that you can by at farms along the roads.