🇨🇦 Canada · West and the Canadian Rockies
Victoria is the elegant, easy-going capital of British Columbia, a small and charming city at the southern tip of Vancouver Island, where a British feel, flower gardens and the mildest climate in Canada come together in a unique atmosphere. Here life goes at a calm pace around the Inner Harbour, where the imposing provincial Parliament Buildings, lit up at night, and the majestic Fairmont Empress hotel are reflected in the water, symbols of its British colonial past.
It is a city for strolling without hurry: the historic centre with its brick streets and shops, one of the oldest Chinatowns in North America (with the narrow, famous Fan Tan Alley), the cafés where you can take the classic English afternoon tea, and the parks and gardens that have made it famous as 'the City of Gardens'. Its great botanical treasure, on the outskirts, is the spectacular Butchart Gardens, one of the most beautiful gardens in the world. And all of it surrounded by the sea, with the chance to go out and watch orcas and whales.
This guide covers the essentials of Victoria with a practical, warm eye: how to enjoy the Inner Harbour, walk the historic centre and Chinatown, visit the Royal BC Museum and Butchart Gardens, go out to see whales and take tea like a true Victorian lady. It is the perfect destination for a quiet, elegant break, and an ideal visit to combine with Vancouver.
The south of Vancouver Island was inhabited for millennia by the Indigenous peoples of the Coast Salish, especially the nations of the Lekwungen people (today's Songhees and Esquimalt), who lived off the riches of the sea and the land. The European settlement was born in 1843, when the Hudson's Bay Company (the great British fur trading company), led locally by James Douglas, established Fort Victoria, a fortified trading post, named in honour of Queen Victoria. The site was chosen as a base to strengthen the British presence against American expansion, at a time when the Pacific border was being negotiated. The Fraser River gold rush of 1858 transformed the small fort: Victoria suddenly became the port of entry and supply for thousands of gold seekers heading to the mainland, and it grew enormously. In 1862 it was incorporated as a city. When the colonies of Vancouver Island and mainland British Columbia were united, and then joined the Canadian Confederation in 1871, Victoria was confirmed as the provincial capital, a rank it still holds today, even though Vancouver far overtook it in size after the railway reached the mainland. Through its history, Victoria cultivated a strong British character and earned a reputation as a quiet, conservative city of gardens. The imposing Parliament Buildings (1898) and the Empress hotel (1908), both by architect Francis Rattenbury, defined its image. Today, Victoria is a tourist, university and administrative city, known for its charm, its climate and its quality of life. The full story is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The province of the Canadian Pacific: land of the Haida and Coast Salish coastal peoples, of the Fraser gold rush and the railway, of temperate rainforests, Rocky Mountains and cities such as Vancouver and Victoria.
Read the history of British Columbia →No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Long before the Europeans arrived, the southern tip of Vancouver Island where Victoria stands today was, for thousands of years, home to the Indigenous peoples of the Coast Salish, especially the Lekwungen people, from whom today's Songhees and Esquimalt nations descend. These peoples lived off the extraordinary abundance of their surroundings: the sea and the straits rich in salmon, shellfish and marine mammals, and the land that provided game, berries and, notably, camas, an edible bulb plant they cultivated in meadows managed with controlled burning.
The Lekwungen had permanent villages around what is now the harbour and its surroundings, with cedar longhouses, and a rich social and ceremonial life, symbolized by the potlatch. Their material culture — the cedar canoes, the carvings, the weaving — and their deep knowledge of the land were part of a sophisticated way of life adapted to its environment.
The arrival of the Europeans, first as traders and then as settlers, radically transformed this world, with devastating consequences through disease, dispossession of land and the imposition of a new order. Today, the presence and culture of the First Nations remain a fundamental part of the region, acknowledged ever more explicitly, and Victoria sits on their traditional territories. The traditional name of the harbour area, in the Lekwungen language, recalls that long occupation that came before the city.
The European settlement of Victoria was born in 1843, when the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), the great British company that dominated the fur trade across much of North America, decided to establish a new fortified post in the south of Vancouver Island. The task fell to James Douglas, a senior company official who would be a central figure in the history of British Columbia. The fort was named Fort Victoria, in honour of Queen Victoria.
The choice of location had a clear strategic and political motive. In those years, Great Britain and the United States were negotiating (and disputing) the border on the Pacific coast of North America. The HBC's old regional headquarters lay further south, in an area that would end up in American territory. So the company sought to strengthen the British presence to the north, establishing Fort Victoria as a new base in an area that would be secured for the British Crown. In 1846, the Oregon Treaty fixed the border, leaving Vancouver Island on the British side.
In its early years, Fort Victoria was a quiet HBC trading post, devoted to the fur trade and to farming, with a small population. Vancouver Island was declared a British colony in 1849. Nothing suggested the turn that the fate of this peaceful fort was about to take, changed forever by gold.
The event that turned the quiet Fort Victoria into a real city was the Fraser River gold rush of 1858. That year gold was found on the Fraser River, on the mainland, and the news set off an avalanche of fortune seekers, many of them coming from California (where the earlier gold rush was fading). Tens of thousands of people rushed towards the diggings.
Victoria, because of its position, became overnight the gateway and supply centre for that whole crowd: the place where miners landed, got their licences, bought supplies and equipment, and from which they set off for the mainland. Within weeks, the small fort of a few hundred people was overwhelmed by thousands of newcomers, and a bustling city of shops, warehouses, bars and hotels sprang up around it. It was explosive, chaotic growth.
The gold rush had lasting consequences. To control the mainland territory in the face of the mass arrival of foreigners (above all Americans), Britain created the colony of British Columbia on the mainland in 1858, separate from the colony of Vancouver Island. Victoria, growing fast, was incorporated as a city in 1862. Although the gold frenzy eventually passed, it had put Victoria on the map and made it the main city and commercial centre of the region, a role that would prepare it for its future as capital.
After the gold rush, the political organization of the region gradually took shape. In 1866, the two British colonies in the area — Vancouver Island (with its capital at Victoria) and mainland British Columbia — were united into a single colony, British Columbia. After some debate over which city would be the capital, Victoria was confirmed as the capital of the united colony, thanks to its greater development and its weight as a commercial centre.
The next great step came in 1871, when British Columbia joined the Canadian Confederation, becoming a province of the young Dominion of Canada. One of the conditions the province set for joining was the construction of a transcontinental railway to connect it with the rest of the country, a promise that would take more than a decade to fulfil. Victoria was confirmed as the capital of the new province, a rank it still holds today.
However, the transcontinental railway, when it was finally completed in the 1880s, did not end in Victoria (on the island) but on the mainland, at Burrard Inlet, where Vancouver was born and grew at breakneck speed. That meant Vancouver quickly overtook Victoria in size and economic power, becoming the province's great metropolis. Victoria, on the other hand, kept its political role as capital and reinvented itself as a quieter, administrative and elegant city, cultivating a refined British character that would set it apart forever from its thriving neighbour on the mainland.
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Victoria forged the elegant, British image that defines it to this day. Having lost economic prominence to Vancouver, the city leaned into its character as a refined capital, with a strong attachment to British traditions, customs and aesthetics: well-kept gardens, afternoon tea, English-inspired architecture. It earned a reputation for being 'more English than England', an appeal it would also cultivate for tourism.
Two monumental buildings, both by the same architect, sealed that image. The young architect Francis Rattenbury, newly arrived from England, won the competition for the new provincial Parliament Buildings while almost unknown; they opened in 1898: an imposing neo-baroque mass facing the harbour, a symbol of the capital. A few years later, the same Rattenbury designed the Fairmont Empress, the great château hotel of the Canadian Pacific railway company, opened in 1908 beside the harbour, which became the city's other great icon and a byword for its elegance (Rattenbury's own fate, incidentally, was tragic: he was murdered years later, in a famous case).
These buildings, along with the gardens (Victoria earned the nickname 'the City of Gardens', crowned by Butchart Gardens, created from 1904 onwards), the mild climate and the easy-going atmosphere, defined Victoria as a charming, distinguished destination. Through the 20th century, the city grew moderately, attracting retirees (for its benign climate) and visitors, and establishing itself as a tourist destination and an administrative centre, without ever losing its human scale or its quiet character.
The Victoria of the 21st century is still true to its essence: a small, elegant, easy-going capital, known for its charm, its gardens, its exceptionally mild climate and its high quality of life. As the capital of British Columbia, it houses the provincial government, but it is also a university city (with the University of Victoria), a first-rate tourist destination and a much-chosen place to live, especially for retirees looking for its benign climate (the warmest and driest in Canada).
Its economy revolves around public administration, tourism, education and technology. Tourism is a fundamental pillar: every year, travellers from all over the world arrive drawn by the Inner Harbour with the lit-up Parliament Buildings and the Empress hotel, the spectacular Butchart Gardens, the Royal BC Museum, whale watching, afternoon tea and the relaxed, British feel of the city. Many come as a day trip from Vancouver, by ferry or floatplane, or as a cruise stop.
Victoria keeps its human scale and its garden-city character, with a walkable centre, coastal promenades, flower-filled parks and a calm pace of life that contrasts with the energy of neighbouring Vancouver. It is also still a starting point for exploring the spectacular nature of Vancouver Island and the Pacific coast. For the traveller, Victoria offers a different experience within Canada: that of a small, refined and serene city, where the British legacy, the gardens and the sea combine in a unique and charming atmosphere. It is, without doubt, one of the cities with the most personality in western Canada.