we went to the Parkside Hotel to visit the koi pond, which I had seen on an Instagram post… I was not disappointed…
as you walked up to the hotel there were a number of outdoor ponds with goldfish and water lilies in them…
inside you walked across the koi pond on the way to the front desk… part of the hotel was a cafe, that opened onto the street so that the neighbourhood could stop by for goodies…
I had hummus and some lovely bread to enjoy as I sat beside the pond…
every day at a certain time, they divide the food for the fish into containers, which the hotel guests can take and feed them…
a quiet and serene place for a break from all the busyness of the city😊…
these gardens seemed much more relaxed than the others we’d been to and the first few spots we walked through weren’t very exciting…
but then we found the Japanese Garden which had a creek flowing through it with light, shady areas, and ponds… it was quite large and was lovely with little surprises along the way, such as the sleeping mermaid…
the Bonsai Garden had a small building to rest in and was a lovely serene place…
it had close to twenty trees that ranged in age from a few years old to over 150…
it was a quiet place to stop for a few minutes before continuing on through the Japanese Garden area…
when we first arrived at the Butchart Gardens we went to book our High Tea at the restaurant… unfortunately they weren’t open yet, but my daughter convinced them to add us to the reservation list…
when we arrived at the designated time, we were seated outdoors, overlooking the large green open area…
they had blankets at each table, which was great as it was a little cool…
because of allergies we ended up with a tower each…
one of the little cakes on my tower had jelly on the top… it became the favourite for a wasp that really enjoyed the jelly…
everything was delicious… I needed my fork to hold up many of the sandwiches, lol…
but I didn’t eat the jelly part, lol… and it was sweet that they included a happy birthday chocolate on my cupcake 😊…
the staff were excellent and we had such a fun time… first High Tea of the trip…
what an amazing place it is… the first day, we spent six and a half hours wandering the many gardens and had a delightful high tea with a wasp guest…
I was absolutely stunned (in a good way) when I stood at the top of the sunken garden… it is so beautiful it brought me to tears, and what a way to start the tour…
we saw giant trees, beautiful beds, topiaries, and rows of stunning dahlias…
we also saw beautiful Japanese Gardens where I took maybe one picture and then just absorbed the quiet beauty around us…
many water features, a carousel, and so many flowers;-)… awed by the wonderful combinations of plants that made every corner more interesting than the last…
day two, we arrived later in the day with plans to see the gardens lit up at night… we visited some of our favourite areas, especially the Japanese Gardens and took an electric boat tour… sadly, I ran out of steam and we headed back to our AirBnb just as dusk was taking over the gardens…
we booked a train trip from Winnipeg to Vancouver on VIA rail… these trips are so popular, you have to book (and pay for the entire trip) nine months ahead…
the start of the trip was a bit stressful as we were expecting to leave at 9:30 pm and ended up leaving the city at 5:11 am…
it was amazing to see how every inch of space was used… during the day we had two chairs to look out the window and at night the space turned into an upper and lower berth… I got the bottom one, lol…
we found guests from all over and loved hearing laughter and voices speaking numerous languages throughout the days…
we’ve discovered that train travel is completely different here than across Europe, for example… and not necessarily to the good🤪…
the food was delicious and we enjoyed meeting new friends at mealtimes…
we spent a lot of time in the observation car and the morning the mountains came into view, I took two pictures and then just sat and soaked up the beauty😊…
and then we were there😳…
it has been a fun learning opportunity for me, and I see my beloved more and more every day in my daughter, who makes friends wherever she sits, or stands, or, just is🤗… what a delight…
