Tofu-Family VICTORIA Vacation: Day 5 - Headed Home!

Yes, our final day in this beautiful city. We had so much fun!! And except for a few purchases cleverly disguised as "back-to-school-shopping" we stayed well within our budget. Which makes it more fun for stingy ol' me!

The girls woke up early, excited about t

he prospect of ordering room service. I think they were slightly disappointed the bellhop didn't dramatically sweep a white cloth off the cart and present us with champagne or something... not to worry, it was still delicious!

There were several vegan options on the room-service menu, but nothing noted specifically for breakfast. I called and asked if there was anything and the kitchen staff told me their potato pancakes just happened to be vegan (just fried mashed potatoes and onions) as well as the English muffins, home-fried potatoes, oatmeal and fruit (obviously). I ordered the potato pancakes and fresh mixed berries (yum!). My kids chose waffles, french toast, and vegetarian eggs Benedict (with mushrooms instead of ham). And breakfast included orange juice! You can't beat that!

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My 'pancakes' arrived as this 1 HUGE pancake/fried-mashed-potato-patty... I was a little surprised but it was wonderful, crisp on the outside and actually tasted like real potatoes! Needless to say, we were absolutely stuffed, but it was a good way to start our last day...

After checking out - (and playing with the luggage cart and hugging the bear), we made our final drive thru the city of Victoria, stopping a few places for pictures and finally making our final sidetrip to Beacon Hill Drive In.

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The place is evidently a landmark and I'd promised the Sprouts they could try some of their famous Soft-Serve Ice Cream (not vegan, so I skipped it, I'm not a huge soft-serve fan anyway).

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We'd heard from several people that we couldn't leave town without trying it - 100% natural, no funky ingredients, supposedly the "best ice cream in the city" and on and on.... Ordinarily we try to stick to soy based ice-creams, and all of us like those just fine - but this was something the Sprouts really wanted to try. Yes, I make lots of "exceptions" on vacation - and the Drive-In is such a cute little retro sorta place, it's worth it for the atmosphere alone!

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Was it "the best"? I don't know, after some discussion we determined that we weren't really sure we remembered what dairy ice-cream tasted like any more. That said, the kids did think it was very good - far richer and creamier than they remembered most ice cream being. "At least it didn't smell like a cow, like real milk does" was my youngest Sprout's final assessment.

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We wandered back roads out of Victoria and made it to the Custom's check-in and

Ferry Terminal well ahead of schedule. More snacking (is that all we do?) more watching

the boats and the birds, more brain stimulating DVD's, more Kodak moments and more crosswords...

The weather was perfect for a ferry trip once again.

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9:00 PM we arrived home safe and sound. Time to get ready for school and work and all those responsibilities we've been avoiding for the last week. Would we do it again? In a heartbeat.

Thanks for re-living our memories with us.

Victoria Vacation Continued and Continued

We're still vacationing.

But hey - the room is inexpensive, we brought our own food... we're doing so much better with the budget than most vacations half this length...

Speaking of budgets, My Middle Fashionista Sprout was still determined to blow hers and a little worried that we hadn't hit the famous Canadian ROOTS store yet. "We just HAAAAVE to Mom, this is our last chance". How sad!

OK, our first exciting event: we were nearly run down by a "parade" of Hemp Nationalists (they called themselves).

Now, I don't know exactly what that means except they felt the need to march noisily down the sidewalk waving Hemp Power flags, probably wearing Hemp underwear too, and who KNOWS what they were smokin'...

My oldest Sprout thought it was hilarious and snapped a picture just as they were rounding the corner.

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After that we trudged back downtown to the shopping district for our last bit of (note my excitement!) shopping. I would rather lie on the Interstate than shop two consecutive days in a row, but my Sprouts convinced me this was, somehow, a VERY important and overlooked stop.

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Plenty more photo ops along the way too - every shop and trinket store seems to have it's own mascot out front and my very UN camera shy Sprouts enjoyed every minute!

Well, we finally procured the precious and much coveted ROOTS sweatshirts... Oh, sorry, my children are appalled at my lack of fashion vocabulary. They're "HOODIES" of course, not sweatshirts. Whatever you call them, my kids live in these things, regardless of temperature. It can be 80 degrees and they still freak out if they don't have their "hoodie". That is why all the vacation pictures show my children in jackets... It wasn't cold! But I digress.

Hoodie -shopping finished, we grabbed lunch at a little sidewalk Hot Dog Kiosk. Yes, they had vegetarian (VEGAN actually!) hotdogs, all cooked and stored totally separate from the others. I was impressed! And it was fun to find vegan "fast food" for a change.

Then we headed to the Beacon Hill Children's Farm.

I'm sometimes hesitant of petting "zoos" and such, but this facility is actually part of BC's Animal Protection and Rescue League as well.

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All the farm's furry residents have been rescued from some situation or another. They make their homes at the farm or are adopted out.

It was our luck that right now, the Farm had quite a few babies. My Sprouts just fell in love with them.

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I personally liked watching the funny little Vietnamese potbelly piglets, and a sweet little Shetland sheep caught my Middle Sprout's attention. Every time she walked past the pen, the sheep ran over and bobbed it's head up and down and 'baa-aaa-ed' until she scratched it's head. We told her she'd have to stay there as official "Sheep Scratcher"!

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There was also a whole pen of goats and the Farm staff let us climb in and hold the kids. So fun!

After we'd loved on the darling little goats for a while and talking to the nice staff at the Farm, we hiked some trails in the park, stopped by the duck pond and then headed back to our hotel.

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While I was making supper, the Sprouts pointed out the VEGAN options listed in the room-service menu (hinting that they were tired of my cooking? Surely not!).

I told them we'd do room service for breakfast tomorrow as a special treat before leaving. (It was a treat for me too - That way I could pack all the kitchen gear ahead of time and no breakfast clean up!) Ordering room service sounded pretty exotic and exciting to them, though they definitely didn't want to leave!

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We played in the hotel's game room for a while tonight, learning valuable skills like shooting pool and playing chess and hoping the "hot guys" would happen by. (My Sprouts, not me!!) Swimming and a long, welcome soak in the hot tub ended our day.

Tofu-Family Vacation, Day 2

Day two we woke up bright and early, made ourselves breakfast in our suite and headed out for the day.

First stop, Butterfly Gardens.

In typical overzealous Mom fashion, I was excited. I have to admit I scheduled this because it was listed as a popular and Kid Friendly place.

It sounded perfect, I thought my kids would love walking among tropical flowers, palm trees, orchids and hundreds of beautiful free-flying butterflies, just like the brochure suggested...

Well, the brochure and I didn't take fully into account that my younger two Sprouts are VERY "bug phobic". Bless their hearts, they did try, (see? I have proof, she's smiling for the picture) but the sight of all those fluttery wings, wiggly antennae and creepy long legs was almost more than they could handle...

So we didn't spend nearly as long as I would have liked in the Butterfly Gardens, but it was still worth it - it was interesting and beautiful and we did see (and photograph) many of the 50+ species (some rare and endangered) that are free to flutter, eat and land wherever they please among the plants, trails, and visitors to the center.

Next stop, and the one I was most anticipating for the week, was the world famous Butchart Gardens.

The weather was beautiful, almost too warm for strolling around looking at plants (which were a little boring, according to my kids). I knew this wouldn't be their favorite part of the week and was prepared to spend less time with the pretty flowers than I would have liked.

I thought the gardens were, of course A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. I could have spent a couple days here.

We returned to the city and found a great little sandwich shop for a late lunch.

My grilled panini even had vegan cheese which the kids thought was so cool they had to photograph. Pfffft. Mom eating, how exciting is THAT?

After doing a little tourist-y type shopping and sightseeing and silly picture taking, we headed back to our hotel.

I'd promised the girls a ride in one of the city's eco-friendly Prius taxis so we grabbed one for the few blocks back.

The bear is in front of our hotel. He's part of a collection of decorated bears throughout Vancouver Island called "Spirit Bears". We loved how this guy welcomed us home every evening...

After the most healthy supper of ramen noodles and a fresh fruit salad in the room, we hung out in the pool for the evening.

The girls loved the cushy hotel robes and think they would make excellent souvenirs. I had to explain they were definitely NOT part of the 'take-home' goodies provided for the guests!

Wheeee! Mom's going on vacation!

No posts from this computer for a week. Try to cope. I know you'll be OK.

The girls and I have the mini-van packed and we're headed north to the border. Canada. The beautiful city of Victoria, to be exact.

I absolutely adore Victoria, and have spent several weekends there with friends and co-workers, seminars, conferences, etc - but my kids have never been. They haven't even been to CANADA and we live only a few hours away. Sad, isn't it? So they're excited, I'm excited, it's a VERY big deal in this household... Our last free week before school starts - we're going to ENJOY!!!!!

We haven't gotten away anywhere for a real "vacation" in years - mainly 'cause dammit, the things cost MONEY! This just happened to work out due to a friend's loan of their time-share condo, some great coupons and a summer bonus from work...

I promised the kids I wouldn't drag them to strange vegan restaurants or obsess over the food our whole time. I'm pretty OK with them being as lacto-ovo as they want to be when we're out. Yes, it's easier, I admit it! Most meals we'll be cooking ourselves anyway - those will be vegan of course - because I'm the cook and I'm the boss. Bwa-ha-haaa.

Otherwise, I know I can find vegan food anywhere, so I'm not too worried if vacation consists of cheese-free pizza and salads. I'm with my kids, they actually want to be with me - and we're on vacation, that's all that really matters!!

Oh, we are going to Rebar. My favorite veg. friendly restaurant in Victoria (and the city has tons of great places!). Check out their menu, they can veganize most anything if it's not already - and the desserts are insane!

Have a great week. Really.

(The pictures are ones I took last year when I was in Victoria for a weekend with Froggy...)