How to get to Victoria Island from Vancouver independently

[djtx2]

We are looking to see if we can go a day before the cruise to Victoria to the gardens.  Anyone done this independently?  All the tours do not give you enough time to enjoy the gardens.  We are staying in Vancouver.

[cruiseryyc]

Well Victoria Island is in the High Arctic, so you're going to need more than one day to get there.  

 

Vancouver Island, where the city of Victoria is located, is easy to get to independently.  You could rent a car and take the ferry over and back - but that is going to be a 14 hour day and ferry reservations must be made.  

 

There is the BC Ferry Connector bus which drives right onto the ferry and takes you into downtown Victoria. Then you'd have to taxi out to the Gardens, so another long day.

 

https://bcfconnector.com/

 

With only one day, the easiest would be fly Harbour Air there and back, expensive but an easier day with great views.

 

https://harbourair.com/tours/spend-the-day-in-victoria/

 

Or just spend a relaxing day in Vancouver visiting all the lovely gardens there.

[Aquahound]

IMO, the gardens are not worth the time and hassle you will need to endure in order to get there.  

[mom says]

I agree with the PP. While it is physically possible to take the ferry or fly to and from VANCOUVER  Island as a day trip, it is very expensive to do. And most of that very long day will be spent just getting there and back.

 

If you want to see beautiful gardens, then just visit the UBC Botanical gardens and the Nitobe Memorial Garden. Both in Vancouver.

[lenquixote66]

I have been to the gardens twice .They are absolutely beautiful.

[mom says]

1 hour ago, lenquixote66 said:

I have been to the gardens twice .They are absolutely beautiful.

Which ones?

[lenquixote66]

12 hours ago, mom says said:

Which ones?

Dr.Sun Yat-Sen and Bloedel Conservatory

 

My family and I have vacationed in Canada 17 times .We have friends living in Toronto and have been all over our second favorite country.

Your National Anthem is spiritually beautiful.

[mom says]

Excellent choices Len. The Sun Yat-Sen garden is certainly unique (or close to it) outside of China. I saw something like it in Shanghai,  but the weather wasn't as favorable at the time. Bloedel is nice, but we have probably spent a lot more time in the Queen Elizabeth Park, which surrounds the Conservatory. There's a good reason why the QE park is a favored spot for wedding pictures. 

[SelectSys]

 

4 hours ago, mom says said:

Queen Elizabeth Park, which surrounds the Conservatory. There's a good reason why the QE park is a favored spot for wedding pictures. 

I believe their is also a nice restaurant in the park with views back towards the city.  I went there once on a spring evening to a business dinner and remember thinking it was a very beautiful spot.

[martincath]

^Yup, while the wedding photo lineup has dropped quite a bit at QEP thanks to the waterfall being turned off (we're trying to get it compliant with new rules about water re-use, so hopefully it returns soon - back in the day every summer visit I'd see a queue of wedding parties waitingf for their turn at the 'bride and groom in front of the waterfall' shot!) the resto, Seasons in the Park, is undoubtedly the most scenic resto patio view within the city being right up at the highest point of Vancouver.

 

I always tell folks who ask this question the same thing - if you can fly in to YYJ instead of YVR (or out, post-cruise) then only having one full day in Vic might be worthwhile. If you're locked into your Vancouver flight/hotel/both, then the only way to actually get plenty of time at Butchart is an independent visit rather than a coach tour. Throw money at the problem for flights both ways and you can easily get a decent visit to the gardens, enough time downtown to do the museum, a gallery or shopping or whatnot, even a whalewatch within the same length of day as the day trips by bus/ferry which only give you 2 hours tops at Butchart. It's a helluva long day though, exhaustingly so - we did this on our first visit as tourists, enjoyed it at the time but it really wiped us out so we ended up having to cut back on planned Vancouver activities the next day so in hindsight, it was a bad move. Flight prices now are almost four times what we paid back then as Harbour Air have bought up all their competition and jacked up prices to match HeliJet, and flying offpeak times cripples a trip like this - you really need to be on the first and last flights, and that first one is often packed with business travelers heading to Vic for morning meetings as that's where oh so many of our provincial government departments, big unions, etc. have their HQs.

 

If all you want to do is Butchart, taking public transit to and from the ferry makes for a cheap day, and you can stay much longer at Butchart than the day trip coach tours - $5pp for a day trip bus ticket on the Island, about $20 each way on the ferry as walk-ons (senior rates differ), transit costs on the mainland depend on day, time, age of traveler but worst case an Adult day pass is less than CAD$12. Still a 12 hour day, but you can have 4+ hours at Butchart.

 

But personally I'd stay in Vancouver - while Butchart packages several excellent gardens on one site, they do charge a hefty fee for entry on top of the required travel time and expense. Unless you literally have Butchart on your bucket list and will never return to these parts (many RT Seattle cruises allow an easy Butchart visit for example), it's a waste of both your time and money. You can spend a fraction of the money visiting all of the great gardens in Vancouver, even if you take cabs between all of them, and fill every daylight hour with pretty plants right here.

 

Free Rose Gardens at both UBC and Stanley (which also offers the Shakespeare and Rhododendron gardens among the more tree-filled parts of the park), VanDusen Botanic is even better than UBCs from a garden perspective (traditional English Hedge Maze, but UBC does have a better Arboretum with the Treewalk), you can save a buck or two with a combo ticket for VD and Bloedel (the rest of QEP is all free). Nitobe is an even better Japanese garden than the one at Butchart (which is the middle one of three designed by the same man, so it's not even the best one in Greater Victoria!) and you can take in a traditional tea ceremony at Nitobe if you time your visit right.

 

Sun Yat-Sen is literally the best Chinese Scholar's garden anywhere outside Suzhou - it was completely constructed of traditional materials by Chinese master artisans using entirely traditional methods for Expo 86 and fully renovated just before Covid (still costs less than $20 with free docent tours to explain the ludicrous complexities of its construction!) Even the freebie park next door, which shares the Koi pond, is pretty damn nice despite being built inauthentically on the cheap.

 

Anoither way to think about this - if you were visiting London, England would you even think for a second about visiting a site in France, Belgium, or the Netherlands for the day? If not, abandon Butchart plans, because whether flying or taking Eurostar you're looking at a similar logistical effort to do that as to get to Butchart for the day from Vancouver!

[clo]

14 minutes ago, martincath said:

^Yup, while the wedding photo lineup has dropped quite a bit at QEP thanks to the waterfall being turned off (we're trying to get it compliant with new rules about water re-use, so hopefully it returns soon - back in the day every summer visit I'd see a queue of wedding parties waitingf for their turn at the 'bride and groom in front of the waterfall' shot!) the resto, Seasons in the Park, is undoubtedly the most scenic resto patio view within the city being right up at the highest point of Vancouver.

 

I always tell folks who ask this question the same thing - if you can fly in to YYJ instead of YVR (or out, post-cruise) then only having one full day in Vic might be worthwhile. If you're locked into your Vancouver flight/hotel/both, then the only way to actually get plenty of time at Butchart is an independent visit rather than a coach tour. Throw money at the problem for flights both ways and you can easily get a decent visit to the gardens, enough time downtown to do the museum, a gallery or shopping or whatnot, even a whalewatch within the same length of day as the day trips by bus/ferry which only give you 2 hours tops at Butchart. It's a helluva long day though, exhaustingly so - we did this on our first visit as tourists, enjoyed it at the time but it really wiped us out so we ended up having to cut back on planned Vancouver activities the next day so in hindsight, it was a bad move. Flight prices now are almost four times what we paid back then as Harbour Air have bought up all their competition and jacked up prices to match HeliJet, and flying offpeak times cripples a trip like this - you really need to be on the first and last flights, and that first one is often packed with business travelers heading to Vic for morning meetings as that's where oh so many of our provincial government departments, big unions, etc. have their HQs.

 

If all you want to do is Butchart, taking public transit to and from the ferry makes for a cheap day, and you can stay much longer at Butchart than the day trip coach tours - $5pp for a day trip bus ticket on the Island, about $20 each way on the ferry as walk-ons (senior rates differ), transit costs on the mainland depend on day, time, age of traveler but worst case an Adult day pass is less than CAD$12. Still a 12 hour day, but you can have 4+ hours at Butchart.

 

But personally I'd stay in Vancouver - while Butchart packages several excellent gardens on one site, they do charge a hefty fee for entry on top of the required travel time and expense. Unless you literally have Butchart on your bucket list and will never return to these parts (many RT Seattle cruises allow an easy Butchart visit for example), it's a waste of both your time and money. You can spend a fraction of the money visiting all of the great gardens in Vancouver, even if you take cabs between all of them, and fill every daylight hour with pretty plants right here.

 

Free Rose Gardens at both UBC and Stanley (which also offers the Shakespeare and Rhododendron gardens among the more tree-filled parts of the park), VanDusen Botanic is even better than UBCs from a garden perspective (traditional English Hedge Maze, but UBC does have a better Arboretum with the Treewalk), you can save a buck or two with a combo ticket for VD and Bloedel (the rest of QEP is all free). Nitobe is an even better Japanese garden than the one at Butchart (which is the middle one of three designed by the same man, so it's not even the best one in Greater Victoria!) and you can take in a traditional tea ceremony at Nitobe if you time your visit right.

 

Sun Yat-Sen is literally the best Chinese Scholar's garden anywhere outside Suzhou - it was completely constructed of traditional materials by Chinese master artisans using entirely traditional methods for Expo 86 and fully renovated just before Covid (still costs less than $20 with free docent tours to explain the ludicrous complexities of its construction!) Even the freebie park next door, which shares the Koi pond, is pretty damn nice despite being built inauthentically on the cheap.

 

Anoither way to think about this - if you were visiting London, England would you even think for a second about visiting a site in France, Belgium, or the Netherlands for the day? If not, abandon Butchart plans, because whether flying or taking Eurostar you're looking at a similar logistical effort to do that as to get to Butchart for the day from Vancouver!

Thank you immensely. We live in Seattle.

[martincath]

3 minutes ago, clo said:

Thank you immensely. We live in Seattle.

You're welcome, although I think it was entirely coincidental that my post in any way helped someone from your neck of the woods!

 

For Seattlites, I'd recommend driving your own car across on the Black Ball for several days on the Island (transit around Vic, and to and from ferry/airport, is decent but everywhere else especially going town to town varies from god awful to "What is this transit you speak of? I do not know this word!" levels) and getting to the bits that cruisers and daytrippers never see. Compare and contrast Cathedral Grove with your own woods out on the peninsula, which I understand now have both Quiet Park and Dark Sky Preserve status in parts of Olympic NP, stormwatch or surf in Tofino (watch out for the beach wolves though - do not take that delicious-looking dog in your pic!), check out the roofgoats of Coombes, etc. etc.

 

Or for a quicky Just Vic weekend, the Clipper from downtown to downtown has a stellar convenience factor!

[clo]

7 minutes ago, martincath said:

You're welcome, although I think it was entirely coincidental that my post in any way helped someone from your neck of the woods!

 

For Seattlites, I'd recommend driving your own car across on the Black Ball for several days on the Island (transit around Vic, and to and from ferry/airport, is decent but everywhere else especially going town to town varies from god awful to "What is this transit you speak of? I do not know this word!" levels) and getting to the bits that cruisers and daytrippers never see. Compare and contrast Cathedral Grove with your own woods out on the peninsula, which I understand now have both Quiet Park and Dark Sky Preserve status in parts of Olympic NP, stormwatch or surf in Tofino (watch out for the beach wolves though - do not take that delicious-looking dog in your pic!), check out the roofgoats of Coombes, etc. etc.

 

Or for a quicky Just Vic weekend, the Clipper from downtown to downtown has a stellar convenience factor!

Some Seattle-ites cruise out of YVR .

[SelectSys]

2 hours ago, martincath said:

Just Vic weekend, the Clipper from downtown to downtown has a stellar convenience factor!

My first "cruise ship" experience growing up as a kid in the Seattle area was on the Princess Marguerite II plying the waters daily between Seattle and Victoria.  It was definitely a fixture on the Seattle waterfront for many, many years.

 

https://mynorthwest.com/386854/memories-sailed-away-marguerite/