It’s that time of year folks. The gardening gloves come out. The flowers start to bloom. The flip flops and salmon shorts start to creep their way back into people’s outfits. The warm weather is finally here to stay!

Last Thursday I got to spend one of the first few balmy days at an adorable pop-up flower shop that Tourism Victoria set up by the Vancouver Public Library.

If you’ve never been to Victoria, it’s a beautiful city on Vancouver Island full of the friendliest people, beautiful monuments, and fantastic food. Of course, in springtime, the main attraction are the flowers at Butchart Gardens, but this is all stuff you can find with a quick Google search. Tourism Victoria was there that day to let people know of all the other beautiful things Victoria had to offer, especially with Canada 150 just around the corner. (With a cold glass of local beverages and finger foods of course.)

If you don’t feel like driving all the way out to the ferry terminals in Richmond, the new V2V luxury ferry takes you from downtown Vancouver straight to Victoria. And man, you go in style. Everyone at the pop-up was buzzing about this ferry, not even the Tourism Victoria folks had gotten a chance to ride it yet! It’s set to start sailing this spring though, so if you want to pamper yourself on a quick vacation to the Island, this is definitely the way to go.

They also told us about whale watching, micro-farms where you could see farm to table in action, and the new Terry Fox memorial. There were dozens of more suggestions from the Tourism Victoria folks, definitely enough to pack an exciting weekend on the Island.

So if you want a splash of something different in your springtime madness, get in touch with Tourism Victoria. Or browse through their Instagram and Twitter to get a feel for what your next vacay could be.