Victoria BC question

[kmathi]

looking for some feedback on Victoria. The delemia is...only in port for a short time and if we venture off the ship, by the time we get into town and bum around, we would not be able to get back for our scheduled dinner. Fine if there is anything in port worth seeing...but.... We may be missing something but research leaves us to believe there is little to do? What we dont want is to miss our last night dinner, which we enjoy, dinners....and find we did so for basically nothing. Anyone out there who has done this port and can advise us to jump off ship and sight see? thanks, karen

[gdjoslin]

We felt the same way. It is poor timing for the port, but they have to make that foreign port call.

It is a short walk or ride to town. We were glad we walked around.

[MCPayne]

Has anyone actually gotten off the ship in Victoria? I realize they have to make this port of call, and I have the late seating for dinner, so I was thinking about just staying onboard the ship, and not going into port. If I did do something in port, I'd miss my last dinner on the ship.

[LisaP]

We had a short time in Victoria last summer. From my review, which is located here: Westerdam review - Alaska by LisaP, "Armed with a map, we took a taxi into town (CD$9) and walked along the main street. ... I suggest, if you are not taking an organized tour, to have researched the sites of Victoria, map out the ones of interest, and bring your map with you when you leave the ship. We were here from 6:00 pm until midnight, so we had a 5:45 dinner in the main dining room, left the ship (after the crowds) at 7:00, and were back onboard at 9:30 pm."

We had open seating dining on this cruise, so we were able to dine earlier very easily.

[LisaP]

P.S. I'll look through my papers from this cruise to see how traditional dining times were handled. It may have been open seating for everybody; I honestly don't remember. Plus, each line probably has their own way of handling it.

[MCPayne]

Thanks Lisa. We're there from 7:00 pm to midnight. I think that's an issue for just about everyone that doesn't have open dining (or whatever Princess calls it). Those that have the 6:00 pm seating may be able to see some of the port, but those with the 8:15 seating (which I have) probably don't have much chance of seeing anything if they go to dinner on the ship.

[Nadine]

We just got off the ship, shopped a little while at the gift shop at the port, and returned to the ship. We didn't go into town because we had to finish packing.

Our friends took a ship sponsored tour of Victoria and enjoyed it. I think there are some botanical gardens there that are supposed to be very pretty.

Nadine

[Cruise Fanatic]

The famous Butchart Gardens are approximately 20 minutes away from Victoria. While it is a short visit to see the gardens, many people take a taxi or ship excursion out to the gardens.