Sixteen Taps at Driftwood Brewery

A moody Bastion Square wine bar with oysters, blankets in the back courtyard, and wines that reward asking questions.

The Chateau Victoria's hotel bar, Canada-nominated, with rare vintage spirits and leather banquettes built for slow, low-lit evenings.

A working single-malt distillery and craft brewery under one roof, where a 45-minute tour ends in a tasting flight.

Down Trounce Alley in Victoria, a snug tapas bar where the sherry list is one of the biggest in Canada.

The Toptable group's Victoria showpiece: Japanese-style raw bar, West Coast plates, and the atrium is where the intimate seats live.

Climb above a Victoria bar to find Spanish tapas since 2014 and a happy hour with 50% off the wine list.

A tiny face-to-face bouchon in Oak Bay where the wine list has won awards and the elbow room has been intentionally omitted.

A neighbourhood pub on the Saanichton corner that has been an inn since 1859, and the only room out here that runs to midnight.

The 130-year-old tea house where choosing between a hundred loose-leaf options and the pastry case somehow becomes the whole, happy date.

An Uptown cocktail bar with an award-nodded drink list and Indian small plates built for lingering over a second round.

Two blocks from the Inner Harbour, the Magnolia's Canada-nominated bar where craft cocktails and Pacific Northwest bites quietly become the whole evening.

The quieter, candlelit alternative to the Empress: Victorian afternoon tea in an 1890s mansion, five minutes from the Inner Harbour.

A 30-seat art-filled room in Sidney for French-inspired Peninsula cooking and a smoke-and-rum cocktail worth making the drive for.

A tiny, nature-obsessed cocktail bar ranked Top 100 in North America, where the drinks menu reads like a naturalist's field guide.