Buses from Sidney- Victoria,Butchart Gdns?
 

Aussies staying in Seattle, thinking of a day trip early April to Vancouver Island.No possibility to stay overnight.-
Would drive to Anacortes and catch ferry to Sidney, may take car. Just read on WSF site that a double decker bus does a tourist trip from Sidney. Would like info on this trip please. Name so I can look it up? Where does it go? Prices to compare with taking car over etc. Many thanks.

www.victoriabcguide.com/rblbutchart.htm

This is only one of the links I found using Google.

Bob Gardner

I don't know of any buses going from Sidney to Butchart's but have never had occasion to use one. Where did you read this?

Hello Carrabella,

I don't think the Anacortes ferry makes sense for a day trip. It takes about 1.5 hours to drive from Seattle to Anacortes, then the ferry ride takes 2 - 3 hours. And that's not counting the time it takes to embark and disembark, and go through immigration and customs. Then you'd have to do the same thing in the other direction. There wouldn't be very much time left in which to see Victoria.

Something you could consider is the Victoria Clipper. It's a passenger-only ferry that goes from Seattle to Victoria.

If you wanted to start really early, you could catch the 7.30 am ferry from Seattle and land in Victoria at 10.30 am. Alternatively you could leave at the slightly more sensible time of 8.30 am and get to Victoria at 11.15 am.

Then you could leave Victoria at 5.30 pm and get back to Seattle at 8.15 pm. Or else you could leave Victoria at 7.00 pm and arrive in Seattle at 9.45 pm.

A more expensive option, but one that would reduce the crossing time, would be to fly from Seattle to Victoria in one of Kenmore Air's floatplanes. Kenmore Air takes an hour to get from Seattle to Victoria's Inner Harbour.

Something that may turn out to be a suitable compromise is to use the Victoria Clipper ferry in one direction and the Kenmore Air floatplane in the other direction.

Except for Butchart Gardens, the landmarks that a day visitor to Victoria would want to see are all within walking distance of the Inner Harbour. There are numerous buses (both private buses and scheduled city buses) that go from downtown Victoria to the Butchart Gardens and back again.

As usual, Judy cuts to the core and makes an excellent point. I wouldn't want to do that trip in a day. Just be aware that April is often windy and a Clipper trip could easily be cancelled, or be a ride you'd rather not take anyway. Weather permitting, the float plane makes the most sense. It's just a short walk from where they dock in Victoria to the tour buses.

Another option is the Coho Ferry (www.cohoferry.com). You could drive up the Olympic Peninsula to Port Angeles and come across to Victoria. The drive to Butchart's is about 20 minutes or you could leave the car and take a bus from downtown Victoria out. More buses than from Sidney.

the local transit buses go from downtown victoria to butchart gardens and then to sydney. google bctransit.com and go to the greater victoria site. My son takes these buses from uvic all the time. some are double-decker