West of Victoria

I have itchy feet. A week home working and being as busy as I always am and I feel the itch. And then the sun comes out and I just must get away. Luckily, I live in one of the most beautiful places on earth, so finding lovely places to go is easy.

Today I headed south from Nanaimo towards Victoria. After a short visit to Mayfair Mall, I left my usual tourism spots and headed west to Esquimalt. I stopped at a store and bought a good map as this part of Greater Victoria is not familiar to me. I saw a small park marked and made my way there.


It is called Saxe Park and is on a headland overlooking the Royal Roads (Roads meaning a partly sheltered anchorage). The sailing ships anchored here in the early days. This is the view looking to Sooke and out to Asia....

Vancouver Island is a very large rock. The RCMP do a charity bike ride down the length of the Island called 'Tour de Rock'. Here the south end of the rock meets the sea.

Many of the trees show the force of the wind from the ocean.

There are still quite a few hardy flowers around, and the holly berries above the attractive rock.
This little park has lots of places to sit and enjoy the views.

Then, a drive farther west across the Esquimalt harbour, to the long spit. The seaward side of the spit has lots of logs brought in by the storms.

Inside of the spit is a sheltered lagoon. Someone must have put out some bird seed or some other treat, because there were oodles of feathered critters along the shore.

There were hundreds of Canada geese, two swans, seagulls, pigeons, crows, and several different types of ducks.

I don't recall seeing a goose smile before..... but this one looks quite friendly.

Looking across the lagoon is Hatley Castle, now housing Royal Roads University. If you tune in tomorrow I will take you over to the castle and the lovely gardens around it.