CANADA: Victoria's Fisherman's Wharf

Victoria’s Fisherman’s Wharf is one of our morning walk destinations along the inner harbour.

It is about a 15 minute walk from downtown.

Fisherman’s Wharf began as part of Victoria’s commercial fishing harbour where fishing boats brought in salmon, halibut and crab from local waters.

In the 1990s the city redeveloped the docks into a public waterfront space.

 

There are around 30 floating homes moored here and some people live on these houseboats year-round.

With their bright paint I think their reflections on the water on calm days are really pretty. 

There are holiday rentals.

There are casual food stalls where you can find fish and chips, oysters, ice cream and coffee. 

This Mexican restaurant always makes me smile. 

We love our Tex-Mex food served with margaritas. However, because of local liquor license laws on the marina they can only sell beer and wine. After having lived in Texas it is just not right to have Mexican food without margaritas!

There are little gift shops.

Pleasure boats dock here.

Fisherman’s wharf is still home to commercial fishing boats. 

 Fresh salmon, halibut, crab and prawns are sold directly off the docks. Apparently, you can see the boats unloading their catch or heading out through the harbour early in the morning. I say “apparently” because we’re not early morning people anymore, so we have never got to witness it firsthand. We will just have to assume that’s the case.

In summer, harbour tours and whale-watching boats depart from the wharf, heading out toward the Juan de Fuca Strait looking for humpbacks and orcas. There are also kayak boat rentals available to explore the harbour, which we haven't done yet.  

The Victoria Harbour Ferry, small green-and-yellow water taxis, connect points around the harbour to Fisherman’s Wharf.

We have also never been on the small boat ferries.

I guess we will have to spend more time in Victoria so we can do these things.

No arguments there.