Captain Cook and The Empress

Well, the challenge here was to see if I could get Captain Cook and the Empress Hotel in the same shot. Captain Cook's statue is directly across the street from the hotel but it is up on quite a high pedestal, making it difficult to get both the captain and the hotel in the same shot. I quite like the sort of minimalist view above and the headless statue, but the shot below is perhaps more representative. Cook never actually stopped in Victoria though he did sail past it a few times.

Signs of Summer

Almost lost in a sea of signposts, lamp posts, traffic, trees and pedestrians, is The Great Navigator, Captain James Cook (he's just about in the center of the above photo). In addition to the lightly clad strollers and the leafy green trees this view of Government Street has one other distinctively Victorian sign of summer, those beautiful hanging baskets of flowers that transform our downtown into one large flower garden every year about this time. Another sign of summer is a kind of patriotism I can get behind, the Canada Cone, if you're feeling snackish.

But let us not forget the Three Basic Food Groups so colorfully depicted below.

Captain George Vancouver

We've looked at Captains Cook and Quadra and here is a third but possibly the most important early sailor to visit these shores, Captain George Vancouver. In addition to this island where I write, the metropolis across the Strait of Juan de Fuca has been named after him, probably because he was the first ever to sail into Burrard Inlet, on which shores the City of Vancouver has grown.

Captain Vancouver had an interesting career as a British naval officer. His first naval experiences were with Captain Cook, who explored this area on two voyages between 1772 and 1779. Next Vancouver served in a 74 gun ship of the line in a war with France. These were the glory days of the British Navy when their naval superiority spread the British Empire over the globe. After stints in the West Indies and South Pacific, Vancouver returned to this area on an expedition that lasted from 1791 to 1795, charting the BC coastline with such accuracy that his charts were still in use in the early 20th century. Wisely he spent his winters during this extended voyage in the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii) but presumably with better diplomacy than Captain Cook, who managed to get himself fatally speared while visiting those generally hospitable islands.

Captain Vancouver was accompanied on this last lengthy voyage by Archibald Menzies, a surgeon and naturalist. Those of you familiar with the works of Patrick O'Brian and his Aubrey/Maturin series of nautical novels will find many interesting parallels with the voyages and work of Vancouver and Menzies and those of O'Brian's main characters. These characters were brought to life on the big screen a few years ago under the title, "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World," with Russell Crowe. Menzies gave his name to one of the West Coast's most beautiful trees, the Arbutus or Pacific Madrone (Arbutus menziesii).

Unlike O'Brian's literary captain and surgeon/naturalist, however, Vancouver and Menzies did not get along and when the voyage was completed Menzies' and others' complaints effectively ended Vancouver's career. He died in obscurity at the age of 40 only a few years after completing his circumnavigation of the globe. His statue, pictured above, is in need of a little maintenance but its location makes that difficult. It is, as can be seen below, on the top of the tallest dome of the British Columbia Legislative Assembly buildings here in Victoria, a fitting, if belated, honour.The magnificent figurehead above, apparently gazing at Vancouver's stature, is that of the Pacific Swift, one of the Tall Ships that is resident here when it is not away on a voyage. Below is an additional shot of this beautiful wood sculpture. Notice the BC floral emblem of the dogwood flowers.

Juan Francisco Bodega y Quadra

On Belleville Street overlooking the Inner Harbour just west of the Legislative Assembly Buildings is a small park called Quadra Park. It commemorates the Spanish-American explorer and administrator whose bust is pictured above, Juan Francicsco Bodega y Quadra. The park and bust are a recognition that this island when first named by Europeans (Vancouver and Quadra, in agreement) was called Quadra's and Vancouver's Island. As British power and presence in the area increased and Spanish influence lessened the name became shortened to Vancouver Island. The Nuu-chah-nulth, long-time inhabitants of the area of greatest concern to Europeans at the time, Nootka Sound, don't appear to have been consulted.

Quadra is pictured above because he explored the western coastline of Vancouver Island in 1775, several years before the voyages of Captains Cook and Vancouver. He is thus one of the earliest captains of a tall-masted sailing ship to visit these shores and brings us one step closer to the Tall Ships Festival, coming to Victoria and this blog during the next week.

UPDATE: Jean Bedard
Yesterday when I was down at Fisherman's Wharf searching for some nautical subjects I met again Jean Bedard, who was featured earlier this year on this blog when he was auditioning for a license to busk in Victoria. He now performs regularly on Fisherman's Wharf. With his sound system set up he is now even more of a pleasure to listen to than when he was auditioning. He tells me that there is a CD in preparation so I may soon be able to share a little more of his song stylings with visitors to this blog.

Captain Cook

Another statue graces the Inner Harbour, as prominently displayed as Queen Victoria's, facing the Empress Hotel, that of Captain James Cook. Victoria must be excused a bit of shameless name-dropping here. The famed explorer did not actually stop at Victoria. However, in 1778 he must have passed nearby on his way to Nootka Sound, further up the island. He was looking for a western exit to the fabled northwest passage. Not finding it, he turned around and went back to the South Seas, where he met his untimely end. Travelling with Cook on this voyage were two other later-to-be-famous sailors. Midshipman George Vancouver, who later returned to these waters as Captain Vancouver, has the honor of having Vancouver Island named after him as well as two neighbouring cities, one in British Columbia and another in Washington State, USA. The other famous seaman on Cook's last voyage was the Master of one of Cook's two ships, the Resolution, one William Bligh, later captain of the HMS Bounty when her crew mutinied.

I am particularly fond of this period of nautical history and am looking forward to the Tall Ships Festival later in the year (June 26-29), when Victoria will host sailing ships from many parts of the world. This year we have been promised a visit from the replica of HMS Bounty that was commissioned especially for the film, "Mutiny on the Bounty" starring the late Marlon Brando. I am looking forward to photographing it from stem to stern.