O schadenfreude

For the third time since we returned from Hades, we accompanied Demeter to the Butchart Gardens for Christmas tea. The first two excursions featured heavy downpours; Butchart's has its own micro-climate:
it's either hotter, colder, or wetter than what you'd expect in the Victoria area.

But this time, we were blessed with a semi-sunny day, although a thick cloud of mist had been trapped in Brentwood Bay, like a bowl of meringue.

After the ritual ride on the carousel - I rode the zebra this time, while younger daughter rode a deer with a nose reddened for the season, and the Resident Fan Boy sat astride a medieval charger - we feasted on tea, scones, sausage rolls, trifles, and real gingerbread.

Demeter, who has reached the age where every experience might be the last opportunity, wanted to stay and perambulate, because the Christmas lights come on at 3 pm, an hour before sundown. The Resident Fan Boy escorted our daughters to the bus home. Demeter accompanied me with her walker to the Five Gold Rings in the Sunken Garden, then made her way back by the wheelchair route. She's in this picture, dressed in gold. (You may have to click on the photo to enlarge it.)

Excited little boys pelted by me, pursued by their parents, past flowerbeds planted with electric lights, and I climbed the stairs out of the sunken garden, to meet Demeter by lanterns hanging from the bare branches.

We caught the bus, which took us past a kilometre or so of headlights, hundreds of cars headed in for a rare rainless Christmas season night. And there we were, headed swiftly and unimpeded in the opposite direction.