Yesterday was the Royal Victoria Marathon. I’ve never had much interest in these before, but I might have changed my mind yesterday. The enthusiasm of the crowd is amazing. The determination of the runners inspiring! The weather was beautiful too. It was a treat to be part of this event, because unlike the summer months, this seemed to cater more to the locals (even though there were many people in the race from out of town). Perhaps the reason it is popular with the locals is because if you live in James Bay you are essentially held hostage in your neighbourhood from 4 am to 4 pm.

Michael and I picked our way through the clappers and cheerers and woo-woo ers, and found our way to the coffee shop beside Fisherman’s Wharf. We had a nice sit and relax moment, then returned along the marathon route to the Royal BC Museum to see what’s what.

We asked two lovely seniors who were manning the information desk what was going on at the museum. They both were wearing red blazers, and looked similar to one another. Turns out, they are sisters, formerly from Calgary and Edmonton, and found themselves in Victoria after their husbands retired. We spent a good 20 minutes with these two delightful women learning about Edmonton and the ice company in the river valley, the ski jump and other bits of historical trivia from them. Michael had them in stitches, and they in turn had us laughing as well. It was one of those moments you can never plan for or expect. But it’s marvellous when it does happen, and I will remember it for a long time to come.

We had our afternoon tea at the Butchart Gardens, then returned back to our room for a wine and cheese celebration. We had a mystery on our hands. When we arrived at our room on Saturday, there was a bottle of wine left for us. We were so certain it was Flo’s doing, we didn’t give it a second thought. In the morning, we went to the office to say thank you, and Flo vehemently denied having anything to to do with it. After some questioning, she said she thought it was my Mom who left it.

This made Michael and I think. The mystery began. My Mom knows I can’t drink reds… so who could it be? We thought perhaps my Auntie Ann had something to do with it, and the more we thought about it, the more certain we were.

Anyway, to honour the surprise, we had a nice assortment of cheese, crackers, nuts, fruit and the wine, and sat at our table out back and enjoyed our wine. This was followed by a horrible game of gin (for me, Michael is still smug), a lovely game of Old Maid, Speed, and Go Fish.

We surprised ourselves by NOT having a nap, and went into town for a nice dinner at the Harbour House Restauant. It gave me the feeling of our old haunt in Calgary, Gaston’s. But here, the wait staff although professional, seemed a bit rushed. But the world stopped with our dessert of creme brulle. Although our meal of steak was okay, the dessert was heavenly.

The day concluded with a visit to McDonald for our evening tea (we don’t have tea making facilities in our room). For the third time, they screwed up Michael’s tea, and for some reason, I became unreasonable about this, and called up the manager. Anyway, I’ll leave the details out, but the end of our story is happy one. Michael and I enjoying our evening tea, and fell asleep watching telly.