The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald

The final full day of the cruise was pretty anticlimatic, and the Canadian authorities my brother Rod thinks so highly of did not distinguish themselves.  At least it was truly sunny for the first time since we left Seattle (to be fair, there were periods of sunshine in Ketchikan, and maybe some sun in Sitka for two-three minutes, but not real, full on sun!)

The day was pretty quiet -- Carol wasn't feeling so good, so we all slept in.  I went to the morning CPAC session featuring Donald Rumsfeld, Grover Norquist, and my friend Ralph Reed.  They each talked about their areas of expertise -- Rumsfeld on national security, Norquist on economics, and Ralph on values issues. 

Later in the day, Carol threw up (and felt better).  Maddy, Torie, and I did a 5k walk to raise money for the Susan G. Komen Foundation -- it was nine times around the 3rd deck (which, by my calculations is a tad less than 5k, but who's counting?).  I don't even know if we contributed -- I dropped off the form at the front desk but we didn't get our free t-shirts.  We'll live, and hopefully they did take our money! 

Partway through the walk, my stomach started feeling queasy -- not from the boat, so I'm not sure why.  But it got worse through the day -- even spotting some whales showing off didn't make it better.  Given that Carol's stomach was flippy until she barfed, her theory is that it was the lobster bisque.  (The happy ending to the story?  I lost three pounds on the cruise, probably by eating no dinner Friday night, and by eating light the next day too!)

We got into Victoria, British Columbia around 6:30pm -- kind of late to do anything.  The on-shore excursions were fairly lame, and we had dinner plans for 9pm at the Pinnacle, the very nice restaurant on ship.  To maximize our time, we got in line by the gangplank and waited.  And waited.  At 7pm we were finally allowed to go ashore. 

According to the ship's brass, the Canadian authorities weren't ready to clear us -- they were still doing paperwork.  So, they didn't know the ship was coming?  Or, maybe they just forgot?  Or maybe they were on a union break?  And the way my bro talks about Canada, I was expecting a lot more government efficiency than this.  According to Rod, Canada has the best roads, hospitals, gas prices, food, weather, and tax system.  That may all be true (not! -- heck, I'll give them the "best hockey" title, and "among the best beer" -- although American microbrews have turned our country's beer fortunes around in the past 10-20 years) but their port clearances procedures leave a LOT to be desired. 

(To be fair, their hockey has led to the best sports insult of all time: http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/Here-s-your-anniversary-doughnut-you-fat-pig?urn=nhl-81086 -- and yes, I know he was coach of the NJ Devils at the time, but Jim Schoenfeld is Canadian.)

We took a cab to downtown Victoria -- right at the heart of the town -- and got dropped off between the impressive Empress Hotel and the provincial Parliament building.  The Parliament building is more impressive than any state capital I've seen.  By a ton.  Now, it doesn't have a beautiful gold dome like some states (such as Vermont), but the building is beautiful.

We walked through the shopping district, back down along the harbor.  Very pleasant -- nice outdoor restaurant, British pubs for which the town is famous, and various shops, shoppes, and stores.  We stopped for a bit at a chocolate store so the girls could get these huge chocolate covered apples.  To show how sick I felt, I turned down not only pieces of their chocolate covered-apples, but free samples the store owner was passing out.  (Thank you for your expressions of concern as you realize I was even too sick to eat free chocolate!)

When we got back to the main harbor, we saw there was an area right down along the water with booths set up selling various artwork, crafts, food, and trinkets, so we walked down through it.  A busker was playing one of the great seafaring songs -- "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald."  I turned to Carol and quipped -- "I bet the cruise ship industry loves it when they play this song."  She laughed. 

It was a beautiful night in a beautiful town.  Earlier in the season, it probably stays quite late quite long.  Here, it was after seven and you could tell it would be dark by 8pmish.  The town is filled with beautiful flowers, they had the Parliament building all lit up, and then we stumbled on an antique boat show -- an awesome display of older wooden boats from years past that were maintained beautifully by their owners.  It's the Classic Wooden Boat Festival -- held every Labour Day.  It's sponsored by the perfectly named Classic Yacht Assocation (the CYA). 

Maddy noted that she wanted a boat like this when she grows up.  Me too. (Just kidding about me -- too much work to maintain these beauties.)

After finishing with the boat show, we headed back to the boat, walking past the huge "Welcome to Victoria" sign made out of flowers, the lit up legislature (hopefully I've got a decent picture to post), the Fisherman's Wharf section (which was kind of sleepy).

When we got back to the boat, Carol said those words I'd been longing to hear -- "why don't you skip dinner?"  I immediately took her up on the offer, and went to bed.  They had a nice dinner -- Carol had surf and turf, Torie had a monster Porterhouse that even she couldn't finish, and Maddy had some flaming stick of meat (I haven't gotten the full description, so that's what I'm going with!).