We had perfect weather today. It was cold and overcast when we got on the bus but the clouds burned off by the time we got to Butchart Gardens (the name is English, not french- pronounced butch-ert). We got there before very many people and really enjoyed our morning there. The last time I was there it was busy and crowded.

Butchart Gardens was built on the site of a cement quarry. The wife of the owner didn’t want to leave an ugly scar on the land and decided to plant a garden in the quarry. She had soil hauled in by horse drawn wagon and spent many years planning and planting the garden. She did quite a bit of the work herself, to the point of having the workers at the quarry and plant lower her over the edge in a sling or onto a scaffold to plant things in the crevasses and pockets of the quarry walls. This original section is know as the sunken garden and is spectacular. Over the many, many years since her original work, her descendants have continued to develop and care for the garden and there are many other areas of the garden surrounding and above the quarry. If you are ever in the Vancouver or Victoria Island area it is a “must see” attraction even if you aren’t a garden lover. Here are a few pictures: a small container next to a fountain, a small stream in the Japanese garden and part of the sunken garden.

We also had a really nice lunch catered by Butchart Gardens. Several different salads (so good!), pasta, chicken, salmon, potatoes and vegetables plus a yummy selection of sweets such as lemon or chocolate tarts, layered sponge cake, etc.

Can you tell I like Butchart Gardens?

After we left the gardens, we headed directly out to the BC Ferry to go back to the mainland and into the USA. A couple of interesting things happened on the ferry. First, we watched some bicyclists ride onto the ferry ahead of us. Then while we were on the ferry we looked out the window and saw something in the water. Lots of somethings. I was a really big group of either seals or sea lions swimming alongside the ferry going the opposite direction. Fun! Here is a picture of our ferry pulling up to the dock before we got on and a picture of the inside of the ferry by our bus.

The ferry is huge with room for rows and rows of buses and big rigs on the lower level and rows and rows and rows of cars on the level above that plus the 2 decks of seating and dining and shops above that. We lucked out on the ride back and Dad found four seats next to a big window, facing each other so that the four of us (Wally, Fran and us) could just sit and visit and look out the window.

When it was time to return to the bus we went back down and noticed that the cyclists were all there in front of our bus, ready to go. I stopped to talk to some of them and they said that they had come over to the Island on Tuesday, gone biking on the Island on Wednesday and now they were heading back. I asked if they had been really cold the whole time and they said it wasn’t bad because they were dressed for the weather (never broke above 50 degrees) and stayed in a condo at night. Here is a picture of the bikers and pedestrians getting ready to get off and of the two ladies I talked with. So nice.