Sisters, Seafood & Sunshine

Last weekend I took a mini vacation to Victoria. My mum, my sister, and I had two days of mother-daughter bonding while we helped my sister move into her new apartment.

On the ferry!

The last time I went to Victoria I was 11 years old and it was for a school field trip. So I sort of felt like I was visiting for the very first time.

I quite liked Victoria. It was very quaint with great architecture - it had a bit of an English feel to it - and lots of cute boutiques and independent restaurants. 

The downtown core is so fun and colourful!

How cute is this store sign?

See what I mean by an English feel?

One of the highlights of the trip was eating at Red Fish Blue Fish - a takeout place located right on the wharf.
Why?
1. They use sustainable Ocean Wise seafood.
2. They're housed in an upcycled shipping container!!!

3. The food is amazing!

THE best Fish & Chips I have ever had. EVER.

The batter on the fish was super light and crispy - and not greasy at all!
And the chips were very, very close to being as good as the fries I had in Amsterdam.
I have this theory that eating fries in Amsterdam has ruined all fries for me because nothing will ever be as good. Damn you, double-fried fries!!

Seared Albacore Tuna and BBQ Fanny Bay Oyster Tacones

Tacone = taco + cone
Tacone also = delicious
The Tacones were super good. They single-handedly revolutionized oysters for me. And there's something about seared tuna that I just can't say no to.
I look forward to visiting my sister again just so I can more Tacones - they have 8 to choose from!

Spicy Pacific Fish Sloppy Joe

We ordered the Sloppy Joe out of curiosity, not really knowing what to expect.
It ended up being a delicious mix of various fish (tuna? salmon? I don't really know...) with a tomato sauce that had just the right amount of kick.

Everything at Red Fish Blue Fish was great, except for one thing.
Good food draws a crowd...

I have this thing about waiting in line to be seated at a restaurant...I don't like it.
Especially if you have to stand outside and only get served mediocre food.
BUT, I would wait in line again for Red Fish Blue Fish.

When I took this photo we were right at the end of the line. It took us 1 hour from when we arrived to when we started stuffing our faces with deliciousness. That may seem like a long time, but I equate it to waiting 30 minutes for a table at a restaurant because since Red Fish Blue Fish is a takeout place, there's none of the usual get seated, server vanishes, server reappears to take drink order, server vanishes (maybe they had to draw your water from a well?), server returns with drinks and takes food order, server leaves and spends ample amount of time tending to every table except yours, server actually vanishes, and finally...food arrives.

Anyway, the point is, I loved Red Fish Blue Fish.
So much that I think I'm going toaccept the challenge posed by my sister's boyfriend: try everything on the Red Fish Blue Fish menu.
IT'S ON.

While waiting in line, we decided to have dessert before lunch and shared a salted caramel sundae from Jackson's Ice Cream Truck. Delicious.

Salted Caramel Sundae

Last, here are some other snapshots I captured while playing tourist in Victoria.

Decorated (and useful) electrical boxes
(at least I think that's what they are...)

Fan Tan Alley in Canada's oldest Chinatown

Summery tableware

Enjoying patio beers and the sunshine at Canoe Brewpub

Just letting you know...

I'm going to be travelling for the next few weeks and probably won't be able to update my blog.
But, fear not.
I'll be sure to blog about my adventures when I get home :)

I'm ready to go!

The Lake District

A couple of weeks ago Paul and I went on a day trip to the Lake District.
We didn't have the greatest weather, plus the Lake District is known to be very temperamental, but it was still a good day.

First we went to Keswick.
I have never seen so many sports stores in one little town.
Or dogs.
I have seen very few animals while in Leeds and while in Keswick I saw about a million dogs and a bajillion sheep.

We didn't do much in Keswick, just walked around the lake and through some forest, had lunch, and avoided some torrential rain.

A fallen tree :(

Bowness on Windermere was basically the same as Keswick.

Except Windermere is a much larger lake and Bowness is a much smaller town.

There were also a lot more tourists and a lot fewer outdoorsy people with their gortex outfits, hiking boots, and dogs.

We went for tea at a little cafe, which was really nice, especially since it was pouring rain.
I had a raisin scone with jam and whipped cream (mmm...whipped cream) and Paul had a chocolate muffin.

Oh, and I saw Canadian Geese! 

They followed me all the way to England!
And, I saw ENORMOUS swans.
They were slightly terrifying.

Berlin

The last stop on our European Adventure was Berlin.
Berlin was really interesting, the city is full of so much history.
It was like AP Euro History had come to life.

The Brandenburg Gate

We went on a bike tour, which was a lot of fun and really informative.
I learned that...

• Berlin was completely destroyed by WWII, so the city is almost entirely new
• A lot of the old-looking buildings were just made to look old by burning the stones
• The hills in Berlin are actually piles of rubble
• Synagogues and other Jewish centres have 24/7 security people patrolling the building
• The Victory Column is adorned with cannons stolen from the French and was moved to its current location by the Nazis
• The Holocaust Memorial is just down the road from the site of Hitler's Bunker
   

Humboldt University
Some famous alumni: Einstein, Marx, Engels and Bismark

The Reichstag

Otto von Bismark

The Victory Column

A REAL old building

Hotel Adlon
aka: the hotel where Michael Jackson
dangled his baby off the balcony

"Luxury apartments" in East Berlin and the site of
Hitler's Bunker (it's just under the parking lot)

We did our own tour of the Berlin's Cold War history.
Basically, we went and saw all the things related to the Berlin wall.
Every so often the murals on the Berlin Wall are whitewashed and new ones are painted, pretty cool, huh?

Checkpoint Charlie
(for crossing from East Berlin to West Berlin)

Paul on the East Side of the Wall
(Cobblestones run throughout the city that mark
where the Wall once stood)

We went to Museum Island (but not inside any of the museums...)

The best quote from the trip: "The best view of Berlin in from the TV Tower because you can't see the TV Tower". (The TV Tower is that disco ball on a stick on the right).

We also went to Europe's largest chocolate store - Fassbender & Rausch!
(I thought Belgium or Switzerland would have Europe's largest chocolate store, but no, it's in Berlin).

We went to the Holocaust Memorial which is this giant piece of interactive art that has no set meaning, but is very, very cool.
The blocks are all different heights and they get progressively taller as you move towards the middle.

We went to the Reichstag on our last night to climb up the glass dome.
The view was amazing and the whole experience was super cool.
You walk up with looong spiral ramp while listening to an audio guide that describes the view to you.

We also did other German things like...

Drink a litre of beer in a beer hall

Wear Birkenstocks

Appreciate Ampelmännche
(the little crosswalk man)

  Oh, and beer is cheaper than water in Berlin.

Paul, my dad, and I also went on a Berlin Underworld tour, which was SO cool.

We went into an old bunker, which was pretty scary, but cool at the same time.

Some of the rooms were set up to show how they would have looked back when they were in use, and other rooms had various artefacts from WWII.

It was really neat.
Sadly I don't have any pictures because cameras were prohibited :(