I’ll be honest, I’m not a shopper. I outsource that to my family. But I do attend shopping experiences when travelling because I sometimes look for fun things to send family members who live elsewhere. The main Harrison Hot Springs shopping area is on, around and between the Esplanade and Lillooet Rd. However, for you seasoned shoppers, the pickings are not great. There’s a cool store called Casa that has a variety of gifts and they must have a lot of fun doing their sourcing. Next to it is a shop that had a heavy emphasis on incense, which is […]

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For our last breakfast at Harrison Hot Springs, we decided to try Chuck and Kitty’s. We’d seen it the previous day when shopping in the area. I was hoping it would be a bit better than Lakeview Restaurant. Well, we were not disappointed. On Saturdays and Sundays they do a Waffle Bacon Benny, which was quite fun. You could barely see the waffle for the eggs, sauce and bacon. At our table a baked blueberry oatmeal dish was had, which was very much appreciated. And, compared to our first breakfast, it seemed a better deal financially. They are located at […]

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The first morning in Harrison Hot Springs had us looking for breakfast. We like to try local places and The Esplanade, which is the street right along the edge of Harrison Lake, has a number of places to choose from. Lakeview Restaurant had a more down to basics diner look, so we chose that. I think you are paying more for the view, which in our case for half the time was obscured by a large truck which, ironically, belonged to a company that delivers food for restaurants. The food for breakfast was fairly basic. I have to say I […]

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Village Pizzeria is a 10-minute walk from Harrison Hot Springs Resort, very close to Harrison Hot Springs‘ lonely street light. (101-160 Lillooet Rd.) They specialize in take out more than dine-in, to the point where they don’t have a washroom for customers. However, our dine-in experience was fine. We enjoyed both meat and veggie pizzas and it was a nice way to dine on a very wet and cold weekday evening. If you are in one of the nearby hotels and want to grab big pizzas and watch a movie in your room, this would be a way to go. […]

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The Harrison Hot Springs Info Centre is on Highway 9 as you head into town. As you approach Harrison Hot Springs, you will find that the Sasquatch (a.k.a. Bigfoot) is a big part of Harrison Hot Springs’ Tourism. The area is also home to the Sts’ailes band who have a long history with Sasquatch as indicated by paintings of “Sa:sq’ets” dating back thousands of years. The creature is considered super natural. See www.sasquatchcrossing.ca/our-lodge/history/story-of-the-sasquatch for more. There are many non natives who believe Bigfoot is a real as yet undiscovered primate living in the Pacific Northwest. This little museum in the […]

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We were driving out of Vancouver on a weekday morning and wanted to have breakfast out and avoid rush hour traffic. Because I can’t make waffles to save my life, I looked for a waffle place. We found Yolks on West Broadway between Ash and Cambie. Around mid-morning on a weekday, it was pretty busy. There wasn’t a wait for a table but it was full. We were driving and managed to find street parking, but it’s a short walk from the Cambie Skytrain station, making it easy to reach from downtown Vancouver. Waffles, pancakes and granola were the choices […]

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When I lived in Toronto in the 80s, there were a ton of places where you could get desserts late at night and really hammer that glycemic index. When I moved to Vancouver, the overall tone was either more about fitness or more about how you looked and, either way, there were fewer super powered dessert places. However, True Confections at Broadway and Alma, which is in the very western edge of Kitsilano, is a wonderfully high calorie place to truly shove one’s diet and health plans down the drain. We were there on a rainy Tuesday around 8:30 and […]

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What do you think of the renovations to the Empress Hotel in Victoria? On our recent trip to Victoria, we wanted to walk through the Empress Hotel to see what’s changed after it’s 60 million dollar renovation. (See www.timescolonist.com/business/empress-hotel-owner-celebrates-60m-renovation-1.20818547) It’s a significant change but the stately and grand nature of the place is still there. You now enter through a different entrance with high ceilings and a crazy chandelier. Where you have tea seems unchanged but it’s the front that really strikes you. Here’s the current new exterior. The main feature in the old exterior was the endless ivy. Of […]

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We stayed at the Chateau Victoria this past New Year’s and it was a functional choice in a fantastic location. It’s on Burdett Ave with an interesting topography due to it being on the side of a hill. When I was using Booking.com’s link for Victoria, it showed me square footage for the various choices. This was important for me and Chateau Victoria was consistently showing more space than others. We had a suite with a queen bed and another room with another queen and a pull out. This served our family of four well. We did not have time […]

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At while ago I complied a list of Victoria breakfast places and I’ve been meaning to actually try them all. Eventually. We lucked out on a Wednesday morning and squeaked into the Blue Fox Café on Fort Street in downtown Victoria. It’s a smallish place and rather popular. A couple of years ago, when we were compiling the list, the line-up was too big and we did not try. It was worth the wait, even though it was a three-year wait. The staff is attentive and they managed to squeeze us into a table. We had arrived around 10:30 AM […]

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