26 JUNE 2006 : MONDAY
I don’t recall what I did in the morning and afternoon, but I later went running and continued clearing, tilling, sifting compost, and otherwise dorking with our garden plot. I had also been spending quite a bit of time treating the unfinished wood shelves I had recently acquired for my office. Amanda and I later had lemonade and hung out with some of our neighbors. We also looked about our various townhouses as there are quite a few differences between them.
For example, one that were first built had much bigger bathrooms on the third floor… which is why they have doors on their storage space in the bathroom. Ours in much narrower and does not have a door. In consequence, their third floor hallway is very narrow.
The first townhouses also have their heating grates way too low in the wall as apparently the builders screwed up. I did not remember seeing that when we first looked at the unit, but it is more or a cosmetic flaw.
We then packed for our upcoming vacation.
27 JUNE 2006 : TUESDAY
We got up very early and caught the 7 bus at around 5:50am to downtown. We stopped at a Starbucks after leaving the bus at around 3rd and Pike for some coffee for Amanda and a couple of danish-type items for bfast. We then walked down to Pier 69 to catch the Victoria Clipper. We miscalculated the walk (as there are only a few ways from downtown to the waterfront due to the viaduct blocking direct access), but eventually made it.
There were scads of people waiting. Apparently both clipper ships to Victoria and Friday Harbor in the San Juan�s were full. Even though it was early, it was getting pretty hot, and waiting in line in the stuffy dock terminal sucked. Regardless, we eventually got on the clipper and were off to Victoria.
One of our neighbors had been on the clipper before, and he said he would not describe the ride as “fun”. Apparently, someone got sick and set off a chain nausea reaction in the main cabin.
I would agree with it not exactly being fun, but if we had not been as tired, we could have hung out on one of the outside decks to take in the scenery. We did do that later on our return trip.
We slept for most of the three hour trip, though. As part of our vacation package, we got a champagne breakfast, which consisted of one of two vegetarian packaged baskets with a single serving fizzy wine. We ate the bfast and kept the fizzy wine for later.
It was very windy; there had been a gale warning posted at the docks. The workers kept walking through offering barf bags. It was quite choppy through the Straight of Juan De Fuca between the US and Canada. The ride itself did not bother me, but I got a massive headache trying to read some of the promotional materials, so I just tried to sleep more. Amanda slept most of the way.
Unfortunately, a guy across the aisle from us eventually threw up his bfast. He was sitting at a table, so there were other random people sitting across from him. I sympathized with them as they cowered back away from the table. The guy caught some of it in a magazine, but it spewed out over the table and on to the floor. Yuck. Clearly he should’ve gotten a barf bag, but later said he had not thrown up in over thirty years.
I was just glad that we could not smell anything.
We got to Victoria a little before noon. We stopped by our hotel, the Hotel Grand Pacific, to drop off our backpacks. They had a room available early, so we were able to go ahead and check in. The hotel itself was pretty nice, but we just dropped our stuff and went walking around.
We stopped by the Fairmont Empress Hotel. Amanda thought about staying there but it would have been $150 more; she asked the guy who booked the vacation if it was worth it and he said no. We also looked at their restaurants for possible evening dinner, but decided not to bother. They also serve a high tea thing which we considered going to, but we also bailed on that. I don’t think we had the proper dress with us anyway.
We basically just walked around. It was warm but not hot… what Seattle weather should have been like before we left. We had lunch in their small Chinatown area at a dim sum place that was not very vegetarian, but they made us some stuff anyway. I tried to look for another waxed cotton hat because I saw a lot of them around, but I failed to find one. We stopped at a tea/bath/aromatherapy place, the Silk Road Aromatherapy and Tea Company, and Amanda discovered they had cheap massages (relatively), so she scheduled one for later.
Victoria had a lot of bear sculptures around. I guess they were part of some art initiative as various groups made them. They are to be auctioned off later this year.
I got a pair of cycling gloves at their local MEC.
Eventually we went back to the hotel because we were both tired and took naps. That is what vacation is all about after all. We woke up in time for Amanda’s massage; I continued walking about and exploring during her hour massage treatment.
We did not want to dork about too long looking for restaurants, although there were a couple of vegetarians one that I heard about before we left, so we ate at a tapas place (“the Tapa Bar”) that we had seen advertised and that we happened to pass by. The advertisement itself of the chef and owner with a plate of food was vaguely disgusting, but the menu and food seemed alright.
As it turned out, the food was fine, although perhaps a bit touristy. Although perhaps that is not surprising considering that we are tourists who saw their advertising. We had a variety of small plates which were slightly bigger than what I think of as tapas. I remember the food as being good but not remarkable. I did like their freshly made sangria and their mushroom tostada was rather excellent.
We walked around more. One of the guys who pedal people around in little carriages said to us, “Didn’t you know? There is a new bylaw that forbids walking. You need to get in now!” We did not go to any cultural sites or museums; that would have to wait for another day. We went back to the hotel and watched a bit of TV before I headed down to the health center for some (well, more, what with all the walking) exercise. Amanda went swimming in their pool. I did that later as well, and then we just sat in their wet and dry saunas.
Amanda said there was a lecherous man in the whirlpool, but I did not notice his lecherousness.
We went to sleep early. Vacation, you know.