Hold a Tarantula at the Bug Zoo

More than 85 hand-built dioramas inside the Empress, featuring one of the world's largest model railways and zero self-consciousness.

Victoria's 1913 grand hall still fits 1,400 seats under an ornate ceiling and a wildly varied bill worth dressing for.

A coal baron built a 39-room sandstone castle, died before moving in, and accidentally created Victoria's best self-guided date.

A genuine 1908 castle with free Italian, Japanese and rose gardens, peacocks, and a film resume that includes Professor X's mansion.

A woolly mammoth, a walkable old BC town you can actually wander through, and a First Peoples gallery that'll stop you cold.

A 1890s Fernwood church turned theatre so intimate the actors skip the mics, and the pubs are right outside.

Quirky black-box shows tucked through Victoria's brick-lined Old Town, cheap enough to gamble on two and compare over late drinks.

Emily Carr's 1864 yellow Italianate childhood home in James Bay, tours by donation, and Dallas Road is right down the street.

Seven galleries, an 1889 mansion, twenty thousand works, and a Japanese garden with a real Shinto shrine waiting out back.

A candlelit, scented journey through the afterlife with 250 real ancient artifacts, at Victoria's Royal BC Museum.

Canada's narrowest street, three feet wide at points, once a gambling den, now vintage records and ice cream.

Stand a foot away from an actual Emily Carr for free, then quietly reconsider your salary when you see the price tags.

Eighty-plus years of volunteer theatre in a 175-seat Rockland coach house, plus a gallery, a bar, and absolutely no parking.

One of Canada's largest university art collections, free to walk through, in a calm room on Yates Street.