Commonwealth Games.

It is a testament to the beauty and elegance of this seaport city of 250,000 people that Bermudians who make the long trek to Canada's west coast will find themselves right at home in Victoria.

Casually elegant and boasting a picturesque harbour that ranks with any on North America's Pacific coast, there is much that Victoria and Bermuda have in common. Perhaps it's the horse drawn carriages and their tourist cargo. Maybe it's the compact downtown core, filled with shops peddling Irish linens and English sweaters. Or the turn-of-the century buildings that line Victoria's narrow streets. Perhaps it's the genteel nature of downtown, saved from the garishness of many cities by restrictions on building height and the use of neon signs.

More likely, though, it's the understated charm of Victoria that is its enduring asset. Rated one of the top ten urban destinations in the world recently by Conde Nast magazine, Victoria is a city to be enjoyed on foot.

From the fabulous Inner Harbour, so beautifully framed by the BC Legislature Building and the ivy-covered Empress Hotel, to its cobbled shopping areas at Bastion Square and Market Square, to the block-long Chinatown - one of the continent's oldest - Victoria is best discovered slowly.

Historically, most tours have begun at the Inner Harbour, identified by James Douglas, boss of the Hudson Bay Company and the Island's first governor as the "perfect Eden'' when he was looking for a new trading post site in 1842.

Victoria's strategic location as a Pacific port of entry for British North America became evident after the Oregon Treaty of 1846 settled the boundary dispute between the United States and Britain. A look at a map today shows that the tip of Vancouver Island drops some 50 miles below the mainland border that separates Canada and the US.

Victoria soon became an important trading centre. It was the home of the west coast sealing fleet, as well as a prime pori for the islands growing logging industry. It was also the jumping off point for the 1858 Gold Rush, as boatloads of gold seekers heading for the Thompson and Fraser Rivers on the mainland began their trek in Victoria. It was a boom time for the city - by the 1860s, Victoria had some 85 licensed saloons. Fifty years later, the city had 300 real estate companies with land prices skyrocketing as speculators moved in.

Today, the Inner Harbour is the city's heart and soul. It is the meeting place for Victorians of all ages, a magnet for the thousands of tourists who visit annually to enjoy its mild, Mediterranean like climate - and on summer nights the Harbour Causeway is the stage for the street musicians who make Victoria their home between April and September. It is also the starting point for the annual Victoria-Maui Ocean Race, one of the top offshore races on the international sailing calendar.

Next August, the Commonwealth Games come to Victoria - and the Inner Harbour will play a big part in the spectacle. Some 50,000 people are expected to gather on August 17, the eve of the 10-day competition, to launch the Games' Harbour Festival, a music and arts exhibition that will feature artists from the 66 Commonwealth nations. Every evening during the Cameo, nightly coromonioc at the Inner Harbour will recognise the top performers in that day's events.

Three of Victoria's top attractions frame the Inner Harbour. The BC Legislature, built in 1898, is an impressive architectural sight with its green dome - and is brilliant at night when it is illuminated by 3,000 tiny bulbs. Constructed on a mud flat in 1908, the venerable 487-room Empress Hotel underwent a $45 million facelift in 1989. Unfortunately, tea at the Empress is one of the grand tourist rip-offs that Victoria has to offer. For $17 (Canadian), there's a pot of tea and various sandwiches and sweets.

Still, the hotel itself is worth a visit. With its fabulously ornate lobby, its Bengal room and more, it reminds us that the British Empire is being led kicking and screaming into the 21st century. The Royal British Columbia Museum, between the Legislature and Empress, makes clear to us that the colonising of BC was not without pain - particularly for the native peoples.

Considered one of the finest museums in North America, the RBCM is a must-see for visitors to Victoria. The FirstPeoples Festival, held every August at the museum, features a totem pole carving demonstration as well as other glimpses into native culture.

North of the Inner Harbour lies Victoria's shopping district. Government Street, lined on both sides by shops selling native-made sweaters and jewellery and imported British goods, is a delight. Follow it to Bastion Square, where the Maritime Museum chronicles the early exploration of the island by British and Spanish explorers. Stroll west along Johnson Street to Market Square, where open-air concerts are held every weekend during the summer amid an eclectic collection of businesses that mixes a Mexican restaurant, an avant garde theatre company, a shop selling Guatemalan goods - and a condom store, among others. They represent the "new Victoria'', a sophisticated cosmopolitan centre featuring fine restaurants, modern theatre, a thriving arts scene and shops peddling Central American imports.

The "old Victoria'' is decidedly British (some 50 percent of BC's 3.2 million people claim English ancestry), with high teas, country gardens, double decker bus tours and shops whose names carry the prefix "olde English'' for the sake of North American tourists. Away from downtown, "old Victoria'' is best displayed in Oak Bay, an area 10 minutes drive from the harbour. So British is Oak Bay that Victorians jokingly refer to a visit there as going behind the Tweed Curtain. If you're driving, take the lone way along Dallas Road, at the very southern tip of Victoria. With Beacon Hill Park on your left, and the imposing Olympic Mountains in the state of Washington looming over Juan De Fuca Strait to your right, the coast road is Victoria's most scenic drive.

In Oak Bay, the Blethering Place Tea Room is a favourite of traditionalists - but the real find is Oak Bay Beach Hotel for Sunday brunch or dinner, a water side hotel with stunning views of the many small islands that dot the Strait of Georgia separating Vancouver Island from the U.S. mainland.

Of the other tourist attractions, Craigdarroch Castle the extravagant home built for Scottish coal baron Robert Dunsmuir - is an impressive sight. So is Government House, the official residence of the lieutenant-governor, the Queen's representative in British Columbia.

But Victoria is best discovered slowly on foot, rather than from a tour bus or rental car. Stroll through Chinatown, whose 10,000 residents in 1870 made it the largest Chinese settlement north of San Francisco. Pay a visit to Fan Tan Alley, Canada's narrowest street, where the opium dens and gambling parlous of the 1800s have given way to artists' studios and boutiques.

The arts have always played a large role in Victorian life. From its beginnings in the 1800s, theatre and music have been important cultural outlets - and today, Victoria attracts thousands of visitors to its three annual jazz festivals, and its Fringe Theatre Festival. Modelled after the Edinburgh Fringe, the Victoria festival runs from late August to early September and draws an international slate of performers. A thriving art community includes renowned wildlife artist Robert Bateman - who lives on nearby Saltspring Island, itself worth a day visit - as well as many top native artists, including island son Roy Henry Vickers. Emily Carr, perhaps Victoria's best-known artist, has a gallery in her name and the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria displays pieces from a wide-ranging collection that includes European, Canadian, Japanese, American and Chinese works.

Don't expect to find much in the way of night life in Victoria. There is a lively theatre and concert scene - recent performers include the Moody Blues, the Temptations and Jimmy Cliff - but little else other than a handful of interesting bars. Victoria is a government city, home of the BC Legislature - and a retirement community, the preferred home of many Canadian seniors eager to flee cold eastern winters.

Outside Victoria, Vancouver Island's attributes are more physical than they are cultural - aside, of course, from the thriving native artist community. A string of pretty seaside towns dot the east coast of the island between Victoria and Port Hardy, 300 miles north. Nanaimo (pop. 65,000), the largest, is the two hours' drive north of Victoria. It was first explored by the Spanish in 1791. A year later, British Captain George Vancouver arrived. The economy is now fuelled by forestry and fishing. Nanaimo is also the perfect port for sailors and boaters keen to explore the Gulf Islands to the south and the Fiord Country and spectacular Desolation Sound to the north.

Another two hours north is Campbell River, considered by many to have the finest salmon fishing in the world. On the island, it is rivalled by only Port Alberni, which also draws fishers from around the world to its waters teeming with sockeye, coho and chinook. Port Alberni, just an houroutside Nanaimo through the ancient trees of Cathedral Grove, is the gateway to the remote west coast of Vancouver Island. Voluelet and Tofino are the real finds there, with fishing, whale watching, nature cruises and diving bringing in visitors from around the world. From mid-April to mid-May, the two towns are taken over by whale watchers during the Pacific Rim Whale Festival, as thousands of Pacific grey whales make their way from Baja, Mexico to the Arctic Ocean.

But Vancouver Island is just a small part of British Columbia, which covers 366,000 square miles - an area 18,000 times the size of Bermuda. Vancouver, Canada's third-largest city, is the launching pad for a tour of the mainland.

The site of the Clinton-Yeltsin Summit, Vancouver is a city of stunning beauty. With the Pacific Ocean to the west and the Coast Mountain range to the north, Vancouverites can easily go sailing in the morning - and skiing in the afternoon. A multi-ethnic city which is the home to North America's third largest Chinese community (behind New York and San Francisco), Vancouver has emerged in the last 20 years as one of the most culturally diverse cities in Canada. With its beaches, mountain backdrop, its proximity to the skiing at Whistler and Blackcomb mountains two hours north of the city and its bustling seaport, Vancouver is also the most livable city in Canada.

Whistler, rated by the US ski magazine Snow as North American's top skiing destination ahead of traditional favourites like Aspen and Snow Valley, is quickly becoming a summer resort, too. The condominium business is booming, as Arnold Palmer and Robert Trent Jones-designed golf courses have made the alpine village a year-round attraction.

Four hours' drive from Vancouver is the Okanagan Valley, home of Canada's finest and best-known vineyards and orchards. The valley, one of the trenches in a rolling highland plateau between the Cascade range of mountains on the west and the Monashee range on the east, has a dry, warm climate with 90 degree summers and winters with three or four months of heavy snow. Plan a visit around the annual wine festival in early October.

The Kootenay region in southeast BC consists of a series of mountain ranges - the famous Rockies, plus the Purcells, Selkirks and Monashees. Nelson, the alpine village made famous by the movie Roxanne, is a frequent tour stop.

The province's size gives visitors a seemingly endless list of options. For outdoors types, untouched wilderness covers nearly half the province (180,000 square miles) north of Prince George in mid province. Guide outfitters take thousands of tenderfoots annually into the many parks which do the northern landscape. Or drive yourself up the Alaska Highway, which begins its 600 mile journey in Dawson Creek.

For urban types, Vancouver's night life and physical beauty and Victoria's stunning coastline and laid-back elegance are the answer. But wherever you go, book well in advance. As Bermuda's Commonwealth Games organisers found out in October, hotels in Victoria are already booked solid for next August. Canadian Duncan Hall is a former reporter and sub-editor with The Royal Gazette. He is now studying law in Victoria but still contributes regularly to The Royal Gazette. This is his first article for RG.

Ferries slip through Active Pass in the Gulf Islands between Victoria and Vancouver inset: The Empress Hotel and doubledecker bus reflect Victoria's British influence. SeaBus rides get the best view from the water. BC is rich in nature culture.

NOVEMBER 1993 RG MAGAZINE