After the perfect voyage from Seattle to Victoria, British Columbia, during which we were surrounded by two super pods of Orca whales who danced around our boat for several magical minutes, we had worked up quite an appetite.

So, after checking into our hotel, The Magnolia Hotel & Spa, we made a beeline for Pescatores Seafood & Grill, located in the Inner Harbour right across from the venerable Fairmont Empress hotel.

We’d eaten there on our last trip to Victoria and had fond memories of the place with its 20-foot ceilings, dark wood paneling, attractive bar, and five-blade, eight-foot-in-diameter chain-and-pulley ceiling fans turning lazily.

This visit, all three dishes we tried were good, from Pescatores Manhattan Clam Chowder (full of toothsome chunks of clam) to Pescatores Famous Seafood Salad (the salad and seafood–marinated scallops, mussels, clams, prawns, shrimp, and Dungeness crab–corralled by a long strip of cucumber so it looked like a frilly hat) to the Fish + Chips.

But it was the Fish + Chips that really shone, the freshest of fresh halibut cooked in the lightest of light tempura-style batter made with one of the three beers on draft–Sea Dog Amber Ale. The thin-sliced French fries were fluffy and not at all greasy; the tartar sauce delicious and whimsically served in a huge Pacific oyster shell, which we’d not seen done anywhere else before.

A couple of glasses of Mission Hill Family Estate 2008 Chardonnay from the Okanagan Valley, and we were well-stoked for some afternoon sightseeing and shopping in the cool autumn air.