The Cold Plunge: Victoria Day One

Fun fact: Victoria, not Vancouver, is the capital city of British Columbia.

It is one of two places I visited on my Canadian travels that shares a name with a state or region back home in Australia.

I made a slow start to my first full day in Victoria. My first two and a half weeks in Canada were jam-packed, and were catching up with me. It was a chilly, overcast day, and for the first time on the Cold Plunge I was actually feeling cold. I donned a beanie, scarf and gloves. It was hard to believe only two and a half weeks earlier, I had been walking around Downtown Vancouver in a tank top.

I started my exploration of Victoria close to home, in Cadboro Bay, a short walk from my accommodation at the Univeristy of Victoria. After brunch at Moka House Coffee, I took a walk through the foreshore parklands. The calm grey water lapped gently onto the pebbly beach, where Canadian geese and swans foraged on seaweed on the shoreline. This beach scene was vastly different to the warm sandy beaches I had left behind on the Gold Coast only weeks earlier.

I walked along Seaview Road admiring the historical mansions for a good hour or two.

I found a narrow beach access and followed it between the houses to a rocky headland. There alone, a peaceful silence enveloped me. I sat in the stillness, letting it soak into me and ground me. Here in this spot, I felt like I had finally ‘arrived’ in Canada. The distances I had travelled were catching up with me, in my exhaustion, but also in a feeling of contentment in that solitary moment watching the geese glide along the water’s surface.

On the walk back to Cadboro Bay, I happened upon a free little library, which I would find all over the city. I was delighted to find a copy of Miracle in the Andes by Nando Parrado and Vince Rause. I had a copy of this book at home, which I had purchased as research material for a short story I was working on. I took the copy with me.

I had my sights set on one of the university eateries for dinner, but hadn’t realised my phone clock was still on Penticton time, one hour behind Vancouver. The Grill was closed, and I ended up at Felicita’s Campus Pub for their happy hour special, a pulled pork sandwich and chips.

There was a toilet and shower opposite my room, and I thought there was potential for noise disturbance if there was anyone else using the facilities through the night. As far as I was aware, there wasn’t anyone else staying on my floor, and if there were, I certainly couldn’t hear them.

Despite the lack of a fully-equipped kitchen, I was so far delighted with my accommodation at UVic. I basically had a private bathroom and lounge to myself. The toilet and shower were separated, which meant switching between cubicles to wash my face after my shower. I found the disabled toilets nearby had a shower and toilet with sink combined, and started using it instead, which saved me switching between the two cubicles. I was always in and out as quickly as possible in case there was a guest needing to use the disabled facilities.

Late that night someone arrived in the room next to mine, and my delight at having the floor to myself was diminished. I thought that would be just my luck, that there would be no one else staying on the floor, and the one new guest would be located in the room beside mine. I did have to shush her at 6am the following morning when she was having a loud phone conversation in the corridor.

Despite the minor annoyances that come with sharing common spaces with other humans, student accommodation was turning out to be a revelation. I pledged I would never stay in a backpacker’s hostel again.