VICTORIA’S SECRETS

Looking at genteel Victoria now, it seems impossible that this city was once a rough-and-tumble frontier town that catered to fur traders and gold prospectors with the kind of merrymaking that would make a well-mannered Brit cringe.

On a recent spring afternoon on the corner across from British Columbia’s Parliament buildings, a kilted bagpiper played a Highland tune. In front of the ivy-draped Empress Hotel, tourists boarded a double-decker tour bus or passed by in horse-drawn carriages. Copper-clad spires, gables and domes, weathered green, enlivened the Victorian skyline, and every patch of available ground to the water’s edge was carpeted in freshly mown grass or brilliant tulips.

It is all so elegant and so English--and so obviously an effort to attract tourists. But if Victoria is not subtle about its desire to please visitors, neither is it phony, unlike lesser destinations that pander with faux facades and tricked-up attractions. Victoria cleaned the frontier mud off its boots and, with an exception or two, remained true to its British roots.

This compact seaside city of 75,000 on the southeastern tip of Vancouver Island has a slow, retiring pace, more protected green space than any other Canadian city and more than 700 buildings and homes dating from the 1860s to the turn of the century. Downtown and Old Town, merging seamlessly into each other, are cradled by waterfront neighborhoods, giving Victoria the residential charm of an English country town. To experience it, pack your walking shoes, your best British manners and something to wear for afternoon tea.

My partner, Maria, and I did just that for a recent weekend respite. We know Victoria from many visits (we live just an hour away), but we had never spent time here as overnight tourists. In May we had the chance to return, using a belated birthday celebration as an excuse, and in doing so, we revisited some favorite places and discovered some new ones.

We stayed at the 92-year-old Empress, the mistress of the beautiful Inner Harbour. Romantically retro and refined, it has domed ceilings, stained-glass skylights and maze-like corridors, and wears its cloak of ivy like royalty. When the Empress opened in 1908, it had just 190 rooms. Today it has about 490 (with nearly 100 floor plans).

Our room had Victorian furniture, a slowly revolving ceiling fan and a great view of the harbor. After settling in and enjoying the bustling scene out front on the causeway (the granite promenade at the head of the harbor), we decided to try one of the double-decker tour buses parked nearby. We chose Royal Blue Line Motor Tours (tickets $12). The tops of these 1964 British buses have been chopped off so that passengers sit upstairs in the fresh air with nothing around them to obstruct the scenery.

The bus swayed slightly as it made its rounds, and it felt as though we were on a river cruise, with the breeze (and sometimes the low branches of the trees) in our faces. We floated through downtown and Old Town and beneath the 1882 Gate of Harmonious Interest in Chinatown.

We cruised east along Antique Row (a string of Tudor-style antique stores along Upper Fort Street) and meandered through the residential Uplands of Oak Bay. We hugged the scenic shoreline, driving past historic Ross Bay Cemetery. The bus finally drifted past Beacon Hill Park and landed us back at the harbor.

City Hall was built just 35 years after James Douglas and his Hudson’s Bay Co. adventurers (mainly Scotsmen) erected Ft. Victoria in 1843 (two wooden bastions surrounded by 18-foot pickets), a new foothold on a daunting frontier. The real birth of the city was the Cariboo Gold Rush in 1858. Miners and entrepreneurs from the declining California gold fields funneled through Ft. Victoria, creating an overnight boomtown out of what was still just a fur and whaling port. In 1885 the transcontinental railway was completed, linking Vancouver to the rest of Canada.

As Vancouver mushroomed, Victorians watched, appalled, and decided they preferred their traditional rural charm and rose gardens. Soon well-educated and socially discriminating (and wealthy) Brits and Easterners arrived, building lovely retirement homes, many of which we glimpsed from the bus.

The motorized tour was good for an overview, but Victoria really is a walking town. During the day, Government Street is a parade of tourists and window shoppers. At Murchie’s on Government (importers of teas and coffee), we ordered two cappuccinos to go and turned the corner into Bastion Square, the original site of Ft. Victoria. Thursdays through Sundays, the square hosts the “Festival of the Arts,” and we picked our way among painters, carvers, jewelry makers and musicians. We ventured into the Maritime Museum, a three-story 1889 building that holds a fascinating collection of pirate, whaling and fur trade displays (admission $3.50).

On the harbor below Bastion Square, Wharf Street contains some of the oldest buildings in Victoria, brick warehouses dating to the early 1860s and now renovated into restaurants and stores. One block north, we turned onto lower Johnston Street, a beautifully preserved 1880s street scape. Half a block up, we took a shortcut through Market Square and crossed into Chinatown by way of tiny Fan Tan Alley. Named after a gambler’s board game, Fan Tan Alley once housed gambling clubs and opium manufacturing (licensed until 1908). Now it holds artists’ and potters’ studios upstairs and, at ground level, a few shops often missed by tourists crowds.

We exited onto Fisgard Street, the heart of Canada’s oldest Chinatown. In just three tight blocks you can find deals on bronze statues from Nepal, sarongs, tights from London, tea strainers from China, fans, noodles, sushi and Oriental herbs and spices. You also can find lunch. We’ve enjoyed dim sum here, but this time we were in the mood for something new.

We had heard about a new restaurant and brew pub just a block north of Chinatown right on the water: the Harbour Canoe Club, which occupies what once was nothing more than a roofless turn-of-the-century brick warehouse. Now we entered a spacious club with brick walls, exposed beams, potted plants and bright skylights.

We ordered one of the original brews on tap (made in the copper vats below the bar) and settled on roast garlic and mushroom soup, pesto chicken pizza and Caesar salad (about $35 for two).

All around downtown Victoria directions are given in relation to the Inner Harbour or the Empress. Something or other is “just two blocks from the Empress.” The picturesque residential neighborhood of James Bay is just a block from the Empress, occupying the peninsula immediately south of downtown. On a quiet walk here, we found many beautiful historic houses, some turned into classy bed-and-breakfasts, others still private residences.

Starting just a block from the Empress, Beacon Hill Park, which dates to 1889, has 183 acres that extend to the grassy bluffs overlooking the Juan de Fuca Strait. The waterway separates Vancouver Island from Washington state’s Olympic Peninsula. Beacon Hill’s graceful pathways wind among formal flower gardens, water fountains, duck and swan ponds and open meadows, as well as through shady stands of huge firs and cedars.

Of course, for the grand champion of flower displays, you must visit Butchart Gardens, family owned since 1904. Here you’ll find 50 acres of themed gardens, streams and ponds complete with dining, afternoon tea and entertainment. (It’s 13 miles north of Victoria, and you can take one of the Gray Line double-decker buses from in front of the Empress. The $26.50 fee includes the $11.50 Butchart Gardens entry.)

After a day of wandering neighborhoods and parks on foot, we eased into one of the butter-soft leather chairs in the Bengal Lounge on the ground floor of the Empress, just off the rose garden. At 6:30 we had our pick of tables, and chose one in front of the flickering gas fire (below the tiger pelt). The popular curry buffet smelled tempting and, although we had tentative plans elsewhere for dinner, we still peeked under the silver lids (mild curries of meat and vegetables, spicy-pink tandoori chicken, basmati rice, fresh greens, cheeses and fruits, and a thick and creamy-looking chowder). We ordered wine and watched the tables around us fill.

As the sun set, a cool evening sea breeze rustled the ivy outside the arched-stone windows, and we settled even deeper into the cozy British colonial ambience. We soon gave up any idea of going out to dinner. Maria ordered curried scallops and jumbo prawns flambe, and I chose the buffet. The chowder was so good that I went back for thirds. Our total bill, with tip, for dinner and wine and a fancy coffee was about $70.

Which, as it happened, was what afternoon tea cost us on our last day.

We spent our final morning in the Royal British Columbia Museum (just steps from the Empress) with its three floors of creative displays showcasing the human and natural history of British Columbia. We wandered through life-size dioramas of old-growth rain forests (complete with chirping birds and trickling water), stared up at old totem poles, entered gold mines, traveled through time and voyaged under the sea. No wonder this is the most visited museum in Canada. We barely got out in time for tea.

We had reservations for 2 p.m. (they’re required, preferably at least three days in advance; dress is smart casual, and customers in jeans and T-shirts will be turned away), found a table at the window in the Tea Lobby and became two of more than 100,000 people who take tea annually at the Empress.

A pianist played appropriately relaxing background music, and the waiter came around with a tray. “Would you care for any sherry or champagne?” On the whole, it was more restful (the piano was a good touch) and less formal than we had anticipated. I did make a tiny mistake: I arrived hungry. When the tray of goodies was set before us, I was underwhelmed: a fruit scone (“the best I’ve ever tasted,” Maria said), some finger sandwiches (cucumber, carrot and salmon caviar), a cup of strawberries, a wedge of chocolate cake and a smattering of cookies. Apply the Jersey cream and strawberry preserves and you have a lot of empty calories--but no lunch. (Of course, afternoon tea is designed to “tide one over.” It is high tea that’s an actual meal.) Still, $22 apiece (sherry and tip extra) is a hefty price for tea. It was all, Maria said as we left, “really, really, pleasant, really, really, sweet, but . . .”

But it was a triumph of borrowed style over substance. Fortunately, that’s rare for Victoria, a proud pioneer born British but raised to be very much itself.

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GUIDEBOOK

Getting to Know the Genteel Victoria

Getting there: From LAX, United and Alaska fly nonstop to Seattle, where you can board a ferry to Victoria. Restricted round-trip air fares begin at $198. The ferry costs $99 round trip. Ferry information: telephone (206) 448-5000, Internet https://www.victoriaclipper.com. From LAX to Victoria, Canadian International and Alaska provide direct (one stop) service; round-trip fares begin at $353.

Where to stay: The Empress, 721 Government St., tel. (250) 384-8111, fax (250) 381-4334, Internet https://www.fairmont.com. Standard double rooms start at about $120; add $50 to $70 for harbor views. (All prices are in U.S. dollars.)

Laurel Point Inn, 680 Montreal St., tel. (800) 663-7667, fax (250) 386-9547, https://www.laurelpoint.com; summer rates begin at $130. James Bay Inn, 270 Government St., tel. (250) 384-7151, fax (250) 385-2311; doubles start at $55. Beaconsfield Inn, 998 Humboldt St., tel. (250) 384-4044, fax (250) 384-4052, https://www.beaconsfieldinn.com; six rooms and three suites in a restored Victorian; summer rates about $130 to $250. Gatsby Mansion, 309 Belleville St., tel. (250) 388-9191, fax (250) 920-5651, https://www.bctravel.com/hunting don/gatsby.html; 20 suites in the mansion and cottages; from $110. Humboldt House, 867 Humboldt St., tel. (250) 383-0152, fax (250) 383-6402, https://www.humboldthouse.com; from $175.

Where to eat: We liked the new Harbour Canoe Club, 450 Swift St., local tel. 361-1940. Other sophisticated pubs: Spinnakers Brewpub, 308 Catherine St., tel. 386-2739. Swans Brew Pub, 506 Pandora St., tel. 361-3310.

Fun and inexpensive dining: Ebizo Japanese Restaurant, 604 Broughton St., tel. 383-3234. For pasta, Pagliacci’s, 1011 Broad St., tel. 386-1662.

For fine dining, we ate at the Bengal Lounge in the Empress, tel. 389-2727. Also suggested: Victorian Restaurant, Ocean Pointe Resort, 45 Songhees Road, tel. 360-5800; Camille’s, 45 Bastion Square, tel. 381-3433; Vista 18, 740 Burdett Ave. (18th floor), tel. 382-9258.

For more information: The Victoria Travel InfoCentre, 812 Wharf St., tel. (250) 953-2033, fax (250) 382-6539, Internet https://www.tourismvictoria.com.

Canadian Consulate General, 550 S. Hope St., 9th Floor, Los Angeles, CA 90071-2627; tel. (213) 620-8827, fax (213) 346-2785, Internet https://www.canadatourism.com.