The Sooke Potholes

We made a lot of effort this morning to get out and on the road early on a mission to visit a few cute towns and end the day at the butterfly gardens. We did none of that. What we did end up doing was to take a wrong turn which gave us the opportunity to visit the fisherman’s wharf of Victoria, a quirky jumble of houseboats and whale watching tour operators. 

After a quick slide break at a cool playground we hopped back into town and drove for about an hour to the highly recommended “Sooke Potholes.” We had understood these to be holes of water that you could sit and swim in. Sounded cool and reminiscent of tide pools so we were picturing a beautiful ocean setting where we could picnic and relax while the kids searched for shells and crabs. 

Unfortunately Diane was showing signs of carsickness on the way over so we skipped the town of Sooke and our picnic and instead ate burgers and pizza from a food cart (side note: when Zach ordered the pizza straight off of the menu the guy looked at him like he was crazy and said, “OK…but it will take 7 or 8 minutes…” Dude, if you don’t want to make it, take it off your menu!). Then we leaned that the park is not on the ocean, and that the potholes are just deep sections of a small creek, and you have to hike to them. Not far, but still rough with the kids. And the water was VERY cold. Fun.

We did end up having a nice time wading in the water with the girls and skipping rocks, but honestly it was a lot of driving for something we can do back in Virginia any time we want. And then the girls fell asleep on the ride back and we were treated with one of Melina’s hysterical hissy fits when she woke up. Ugh.

Thank goodness the day ended with lots of fun in the pool and a trip to the Sidney street fair, which was kind of like Fridays After Five, so was right up our alley. The parade of dogs fascinated Diane and Melina scouted out every free sample she could find. We even chatted with Alan, the owner of the lavender farm who had been so kind to us yesterday, and running into someone we knew mad it feel like C-ville, and for the first time I realized our trip is almost over. Bittersweet.