Day 32 ~ Tuesday 22nd September, 2015

I slept like a baby – alas Steve did not. We had our breakfast at 8am with Val and Bill, and Rusty. Breakfast was served in the large dining room, and I was sure there were other guests staying as there was so much food, but no, just Steve and myself. I started with fruit and yoghurt and then had home made scones (just out of the oven!) YUMMY!!, home made Cherry & plum jams straight from their own fruit tree's, juice, tea & coffee, breads, bagels & muffins. WOW – what a spread!

We had a lovely chat with Val and Bill, where I might have once again been a tad over excited with things – poor Val and Bill, I am sure they thought I was on drugs! Was hilarious – or Steve thought so!

Steve and I jumped in the car and made our way to Victoria “Down Town”. We parked the car (the furthest place we possibly could park) and started walking along the waterfront. Its just glorious and especially since the sun was out in all its glory! We stopped to book an Orca Whale Watching trip for later that afternoon with Orca Spirit! $109 CAD each ++

We walked inside “The Empress” which is the Fairmont Hotel. Just lovely inside, as all Fairmont's are.  Along the harbour in front of the Fairmont were the little water taxi's which are called "pickle boats" - SO CUTE!!

 From there we walked up the hill a way to Beacon Hill Park. Well, this is now my favourite park as 2mins in we spied a large grey squirrel crossing the road ahead of us. We called to him and he immediately came right to us! A few photos later, we were on a mission to find MORE squirrels! I might have been guilty of getting out a muesli bar to feed the squirrel with! There was also a children's petting zoo, so guess who had to go there too! Mostly farm-yard animals – goats (lots of goats) chickens, Turkeys, Alpaca's & sheep, ducks & pigs.

We stopped to photograph a black squirrel, when a homeless man came and had a chat to us – he was so lovely, he even gave us some of his peanuts so that we could feed the squirrels too!

At this point we were running late for the Orca Whale Watching cruise we had booked earlier, so we had to walk very fast to the Fishermans Wharf area. Past the Legislature Building which looks like a much larger version our Melbourne Exhibition Building, and around the waterfront. The walk was beautiful, if not a little bit rushed.

We made it with just enough time to spare, and then we were on the boat and heading out of the harbour. The sun was shining, and there was a little breeze, but the waters were very calm. Steve and I had prime position on top of the boat, along with 12 other Spanish tourists who didn't speak any english, (well, we think they were Spanish, Steve said they could have been Portuguese) so we had the resident marine biologists Val & Sophia all to ourselves, so we were well looked after.

After 45mins we were opposite an island that was actually in Washington State – USA !! and there they were “L Pod” - which is the smallest of the 3 pods in the waters here. There were approx 10 whales swimming up and down a certain area. Much to Steve's disappointment, there were no “stunt” whales today, so all we got were fin photos – but I didn't care – we saw ORCA's!!! YAY!! They are just lovely, and much harder to photograph than Humpbacks etc who move a lot slower. The Orca's swim with great speed and dont come up for long, so you have to judge their speed and direction and when they are going to come up. 

I got some good photos of 2 Orca's together. Val confirmed for me that the male was “Nigel” and the other was a female – they weren't too sure, but could have been “Female L-96”. Nigel's mum died a few years ago and the males stay with their mothers, so this female could be a sister or a new love interest! The last male we got good photos of was “Cruiser”.

We had a good hour chasing the Orca's, then we were on our way back to the Harbour, but not before taking some photos of sea lions basking on rocks in the sunshine. We stopped once because the skipper saw a Minky Whale, but these guys are notorious for coming up and then going back down for 20mins or so. So we missed seeing him.

It was bloody freezing being up on the top deck, - that boat got some very good speed on the calm waters and because the sun was out, Steve and I weren't wearing the thermal layers of the weeks previous, so we stayed on the back of the boat where it was a bit more sheltered.

Having had such a great time out on the water, and not wanting the day to end, I coaxed Steve to going back to Beacon Hill Park to see more squirrels (Thank You Steve!!! - love you) lol. We decided to walk back to the car first, and got to see a bit more of the waterfront, and then we drove to Beacon Hill. The time was 6pm, and the squirrels were out and very active – YAY!!! I grabbed the big bag of peanuts I had bought on our first couple of days of the trip and we were off to see them.

Many, many, MANY photographs were taken of the Grey and Black squirrels. The Grey's are larger and have the most fluffiest of tails, they are also very curious and are happy to come close to you. These would be the biggest squirrels we have seen so far. The blacks are slightly smaller and their tails aren't as spectacular. The blacks are also quite timid and take a bit of coaxing to get close.

As our trip was coming to an end and we had a few squirrels about, we decided to try the thing I wanted to do most – lay down on the ground and cover myself with peanuts & have the squirrels crawl all over me!! Not sure if we used enough peanuts, but I laid down and waited. 2 Squirrels came close and darted back and forth around me, but they wouldn't get too close. The Peacocks however, were quite happy to come right off and eat the peanuts off me! Steve got a video or two It was good for a laugh - at least we tried!

Did I mention the peacocks? They were EVERYWHERE – never seen so many peacocks before. Saw one lot cross the road and I counted 11 of them!

We went back to the waterfront to find somewhere for dinner. After a few stops to look at menu's for the fussy eater, we found a nice restaurant “The Docks”, on Wharf Street. Steve had steak, and I had clam chowder and Fish n Chips – was a great night. Steve had Turtle Pie for desert – which is an ice-cream cake of sorts – Chocolate with Chocolate Chip on the top layer, Caramel on the bottom, all sitting on an Oreo Cookie base – YUMMMMYYYYY (I'll be making this when we get back home)!!

Back to our lovely B&B to chat to Val about our day and what we saw, before going back to our room to transfer 600 odd photos each onto our hard drives.

I gave Steve a Melatonin tablet to see if that would help him sleep better tonight.