DAY 36/37 - Victoria & Vancouver!
DAY 36 - A Rainy Day in Victoria BC
Thursday morning (day 36) we woke up a little chilly to the sound of raindrops on the truck roof. We knew it was a good idea that we had decided to head for Victoria, and we were in no rush. We hungout in the truck for a bit on our phones and trying to figure out where the day will take us.
When we were ready to go we grabbed our bowl of cereal and headed for Victoria! We drove back through Nanaimo BC, which is where we got onto the island. Since we didn't have a Nanaimo bar on our way in, we knew we had to before we left. We stopped at a little Italian cafe called Bocca Cafe. They have won numerous awards for their Nanaimo bars, including best in the city for 2017!! So we enjoyed a cup of coffee and split a delicious nanaimo bar that definitely lived up to the best in the city. But to be honest, there isn't that much you can do different with them so they pretty much all taste the same hahaha
We also checked out a local, private liquor store to see what they had and the price comparison. It was pretty similar to Ontario, but maybe a couple dollars less. However, they did have wicked sales on alot in the store so that's where they differed for sure. The lady that ran the store was also telling us how hard it is to compete with the government run liquor stores around here. Just this past long weekend one of the ships didn't come in on time and the one that did was ordered to delivery to only the government run stores, which screwed the rest of them for the long weekend! So we grabbed a couple local craft beers to support them and took off.
We drove the rest of the way to Victoria and got rained on the entire way there. Once we arrived we stopped near their China Town to check it out. I've been trying to bring Melinda to Chinatown in Toronto since we've been together so I was pretty excited to say the least. As we walked in through the palace front gates, I could tell it wasn't as good as the Toronto one. It didn't stop us from having fun though. We went through every store we could and I even got some confetti (guns?) to possibly shoot at Melinda while she was driving, or surprise her while we were walking. We then went onto a bubble tea place that smelled like a hockey change room, and had a bathroom with about 12 incents burning. We got a honeydew with tapioca and lychee jellies and carried on through the alleyways. As we circled around Chinatown and headed back to the truck, I sneakily pulled out one of my new confetti guns and shot it at Melinda. With an obscenely loud bang, scaring half of Chinatown into thinking I just shot a real gun, I realized how happy I was I didn't shoot it at her while we were driving 😂 After getting in the truck I fired off the other two so I wasn't tempted to use them later (which was another terrible idea, my ears were ringing for an hour afterwards and it was all stuck in Melinda's hair).
We headed towards the ferry terminal in Sidney, BC so we could catch the boat off the island back to Vancouver. We stopped in at a little pub called Christie's Carriage House Pub house for some food quick and carry on. I decided to give my buddy Brock that I met working in Halifax a message to see what he was up to, and him and his lovely girlfriend Emily came for a quick beer. After a quick catch up we realized that we wouldn't quite make the ferry so we headed to the terminal anyways and stayed close by for the night awaiting our ride tomorrow morning!
Day 37- Vancouver and the Hunt For Beer
Once we woke up (on the side street in a random neighbourhood) we headed to the Ferry Terminal and actually made it on without being one of the last ones to board. We grabbed a muffin and headed to the top deck. This time we sat by the windows at the back of the boat and watched the island dissapear into the morning fog. Melinda fell asleep on my arm (while I was trying to take a nap) and I was just waiting for her to start snoring so I could have a good morning laugh before waking her up. Unfortunately she only had a couple quite ones so I waited until the boat was about to hit Vancouver before waking her. Once we hit the coast again we headed into downtown Vancouver to checkout some stores. We were also hoping to redeem some faith in the Vancouver Chinatown that's supposedly the best and largest in Canada. This one was even more disappointing than the island, with really only market shops (that sold huge amounts of shark fins 😔) and lots of restaurants. They did have an amazing memorial section/Chinese garden where we watched the massive coy swim by and hungout by some willow trees in the middle of a busy city. So that was really cool! Though the entire downtown Vancouver smelt like extremely strong, stale pee everywhere you walked so we weren't too eagar to stick around there.
After leaving it was time to find a beer store where we could find some Red Racer Low Rider Raspberry beer. We had a pint in Whistler and it was one of the best flavoured beers we've had. It reminded us a lot of a beer called fruli but a little more tart. The first store had red Racer but didn't have the low rider so we had to move on. After being disappointed again, I decided to call the brewery liquor store directly and see if they had any in stock. The woman on the phone was super nice and told us they had trouble keeping up brewing so they ran out of stock too! She did let us know to give the actually brewery a call where they might have some and to our luck, they did. We drove 40 minutes to Surrey to the Central City Brewing Company to maybe do a tour and get our delicious raspberry beer. Once we got inside and looked at the amazing brewery I told Melinda that I had to have a nap before I could take it all in, so we went back to the truck, grabbed our pillows and had a quick power snooze in the front seat. It's funny, who would've thought trying to shove 10 days worth of stuff you wanna do in BC into 5 days would be so tiring?
After waking up an hour later we went inside to maybe do a tour, which we opted out of, and grabbed a flight of beers they had on tap. This included; hoppy cider IPA, low rider raspberry, cherryl milkshake beer, and a pumpkin spice beer. All of them were pretty good, but none were worth buying except the glorious raspberry beer! So we loaded up and went to their Brewpub about 10 minute down the road. Melinda and I both got an incredible pizza (with lots of leftovers) and a beer/gin fusion and then headed for Okanagan Valley.
Since we were both still super tired and arriving late, we decide to book a last minute hotel for tonight (we figured since we have two more days until we drive 4 straight days home, we might as well enjoy a shower and have a good sleep before that). Guess who booked a hotel over an hour past Okanagan Valley? This guy 👌 So after calling the Holiday Inn and getting it cancelled, I booked one only 20 minutes away from the wine tour we have booked for tomorrow, great success.
Anyways, tomorrow is unfortunately the last day of our great Canadian adventure and then we return to reality. Enjoy our potentially last blog tomorrow of our amazing wine tour in Okanagan Valley!
We also checked out a local, private liquor store to see what they had and the price comparison. It was pretty similar to Ontario, but maybe a couple dollars less. However, they did have wicked sales on alot in the store so that's where they differed for sure. The lady that ran the store was also telling us how hard it is to compete with the government run liquor stores around here. Just this past long weekend one of the ships didn't come in on time and the one that did was ordered to delivery to only the government run stores, which screwed the rest of them for the long weekend! So we grabbed a couple local craft beers to support them and took off.
We drove the rest of the way to Victoria and got rained on the entire way there. Once we arrived we stopped near their China Town to check it out. I've been trying to bring Melinda to Chinatown in Toronto since we've been together so I was pretty excited to say the least. As we walked in through the palace front gates, I could tell it wasn't as good as the Toronto one. It didn't stop us from having fun though. We went through every store we could and I even got some confetti (guns?) to possibly shoot at Melinda while she was driving, or surprise her while we were walking. We then went onto a bubble tea place that smelled like a hockey change room, and had a bathroom with about 12 incents burning. We got a honeydew with tapioca and lychee jellies and carried on through the alleyways. As we circled around Chinatown and headed back to the truck, I sneakily pulled out one of my new confetti guns and shot it at Melinda. With an obscenely loud bang, scaring half of Chinatown into thinking I just shot a real gun, I realized how happy I was I didn't shoot it at her while we were driving 😂 After getting in the truck I fired off the other two so I wasn't tempted to use them later (which was another terrible idea, my ears were ringing for an hour afterwards and it was all stuck in Melinda's hair).
We headed towards the ferry terminal in Sidney, BC so we could catch the boat off the island back to Vancouver. We stopped in at a little pub called Christie's Carriage House Pub house for some food quick and carry on. I decided to give my buddy Brock that I met working in Halifax a message to see what he was up to, and him and his lovely girlfriend Emily came for a quick beer. After a quick catch up we realized that we wouldn't quite make the ferry so we headed to the terminal anyways and stayed close by for the night awaiting our ride tomorrow morning!
Day 37- Vancouver and the Hunt For Beer
After leaving it was time to find a beer store where we could find some Red Racer Low Rider Raspberry beer. We had a pint in Whistler and it was one of the best flavoured beers we've had. It reminded us a lot of a beer called fruli but a little more tart. The first store had red Racer but didn't have the low rider so we had to move on. After being disappointed again, I decided to call the brewery liquor store directly and see if they had any in stock. The woman on the phone was super nice and told us they had trouble keeping up brewing so they ran out of stock too! She did let us know to give the actually brewery a call where they might have some and to our luck, they did. We drove 40 minutes to Surrey to the Central City Brewing Company to maybe do a tour and get our delicious raspberry beer. Once we got inside and looked at the amazing brewery I told Melinda that I had to have a nap before I could take it all in, so we went back to the truck, grabbed our pillows and had a quick power snooze in the front seat. It's funny, who would've thought trying to shove 10 days worth of stuff you wanna do in BC into 5 days would be so tiring?
After waking up an hour later we went inside to maybe do a tour, which we opted out of, and grabbed a flight of beers they had on tap. This included; hoppy cider IPA, low rider raspberry, cherryl milkshake beer, and a pumpkin spice beer. All of them were pretty good, but none were worth buying except the glorious raspberry beer! So we loaded up and went to their Brewpub about 10 minute down the road. Melinda and I both got an incredible pizza (with lots of leftovers) and a beer/gin fusion and then headed for Okanagan Valley.
Since we were both still super tired and arriving late, we decide to book a last minute hotel for tonight (we figured since we have two more days until we drive 4 straight days home, we might as well enjoy a shower and have a good sleep before that). Guess who booked a hotel over an hour past Okanagan Valley? This guy 👌 So after calling the Holiday Inn and getting it cancelled, I booked one only 20 minutes away from the wine tour we have booked for tomorrow, great success.
Anyways, tomorrow is unfortunately the last day of our great Canadian adventure and then we return to reality. Enjoy our potentially last blog tomorrow of our amazing wine tour in Okanagan Valley!
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