Craigdarroch Castle

This afternoon, the CAs organized a visit into a smelly old mansion (well, they called it a "castle", but in my book, it's not a castle, even if there's a tower). Build in 1890, it was originally on a 28 acres area. Now, it's not even an acre wide, houses all around strangle the mansion. The rich wood finished interior was quite impressive. But I can't remove from head that it was built with the sweat and blood of coal miners. The CAs give us a crazy questionnaire on this castle. I think nobody, except of me, try to answer it. Most people runs through the house to escape as fast as they can to downtown.

After I've finished to answer all those silly questions, I went downtown. Always funny to discover some parts of a new city. Victoria it's not as great as Montreal or Quebec City (not a chauvinism think, just because must North American cities were built fast in a utility way of thinking). Well Victoria is greater than most cities at west of the Province of Quebec. But I don't really enjoy to walk in its streets. The town is a little bit too small in my point of view. We can get around the downtown in a few hours. If some part are great, it last just three or four blocks before we are surrounded with crappy buildings and strange guys. My point of view is not accurate, but at first sight, I would qualified Victoria as a mix of snob subburns and the capital of thrift stores.

Anyway, I can still enjoy to discover some great piece of (american) architecture or small pieces of interest. Sometimes they are comical, like I bump in a big Sulley in a front of a drugstore that try to sell anti-snore spray. Or surprising like a Jacques Brel record in a used records store.