Fairmont Empress tea in Victoria

[GORDONCHICK]

I'm interested in doing the tea excursion in Victoria.  It's in the evening so I'm wondering if it's different than the afternoon teas they do everyday but not for cruise passengers?  Does anyone know?  I don't mind paying $100 for tea if it's the full experience.

[Heidi13]

2 hours ago, GORDONCHICK said:

I'm interested in doing the tea excursion in Victoria.  It's in the evening so I'm wondering if it's different than the afternoon teas they do everyday but not for cruise passengers?  Does anyone know?  I don't mind paying $100 for tea if it's the full experience.

 

You'll find a number of superior and cheaper afternoon teas in Victoria, rather than the Empress. However, not aware of any that serve afternoon tea in the evening. Our last visit to the Empress was last year and only because nowhere else was open and had space.

 

At $100 pp it is grossly overpriced for a very average Afternoon Tea.

[martincath]

To the best of my knowledge it's the same experience regardless of the time of day - and cruise seasons for the prior 5+ years have seen OpenTable bookings available until 9pm, at least until Canadian Summer ends on Labour Day! This is very likely going to save you some money, as the cruiselines jack up the laready outrageous CAD$90pp to cover a shuttle bus into town which you could either walk in about 20min or pay $10 for a cab full of people to do instead.

 

Honestly less money does buy better elsewhere - but if you only have a PVSA compliance evening stop none of the better value tearooms have followed the Fairmont down the path of evil that is Afternoon Tea In The Evening! At least book it directly yourself though and cab or walk it, US$100 = $130ish Canadian, so you could hire a cab both ways yourself, tip the cabbie 100% of the fare, and still break even!

[GORDONCHICK]

2 hours ago, martincath said:

To the best of my knowledge it's the same experience regardless of the time of day - and cruise seasons for the prior 5+ years have seen OpenTable bookings available until 9pm, at least until Canadian Summer ends on Labour Day! This is very likely going to save you some money, as the cruiselines jack up the laready outrageous CAD$90pp to cover a shuttle bus into town which you could either walk in about 20min or pay $10 for a cab full of people to do instead.

 

Honestly less money does buy better elsewhere - but if you only have a PVSA compliance evening stop none of the better value tearooms have followed the Fairmont down the path of evil that is Afternoon Tea In The Evening! At least book it directly yourself though and cab or walk it, US$100 = $130ish Canadian, so you could hire a cab both ways yourself, tip the cabbie 100% of the fare, and still break even!

The excursion price is only $99pp (USD) so it's actually a little less with a few other things thrown in.  I've never had afternoon tea, though I was hoping for high tea since it is in the evening.  And they said they would be serving iced tea, which I found odd but wondering if catering to Americans is why?  My stop would be med-September so I think hot tea would be more welcomed - at least by me!  I was wanting to make sure that the experience being given was the whole tea thing instead of a skimpy version for the cruise line excursion.

[martincath]

8 minutes ago, GORDONCHICK said:

The excursion price is only $99pp (USD) so it's actually a little less with a few other things thrown in.  I've never had afternoon tea, though I was hoping for high tea since it is in the evening.  And they said they would be serving iced tea, which I found odd but wondering if catering to Americans is why?  My stop would be med-September so I think hot tea would be more welcomed - at least by me!  I was wanting to make sure that the experience being given was the whole tea thing instead of a skimpy version for the cruise line excursion.

A whole buck less! 😉 My concern with a mid-September date is that this might actually be a 'just for the cruiseline' excursion, with who knows what compromises made to the menu to drive down the value even further... I just checked, because it's been a while, and they have jacked the price up yet again (now CAD$95!) and changed reservation system to SevenRooms from OpenTable - right now, resos only go until 4pm on the September dates I checked so you might want to enquire as to precisely what's included on this excursion and compare it with the detailed list of the included nibbles, types of tea etc. for the regular 'good but pricey' version... which not that long ago had a blatant Summer Tourist Tax added (prices in June-Sep were 50% higher than rest of the year when I first moved out to the west coast ~13 years ago - now they just keep the tourist tax on year round, while other Fairmonts have near identical menus for about two-thirds the price).

 

Note that High Tea is one of those ironic names - it's a real meal, far more casual than Afternoon Tea though slightly-swanked-up compared to the regular 'meat and two veg' Tea (which just means dinner/supper to many folks in Scotland, Ireland, & North of England) by adding some scones & jam, maybe a pastry - an upgrade to us working plebs as a treat but hardly comparable to the froo-froo Afternoon all-luxury version!

 

Coffee (and iced tea) isn't inherently a warning about a bad experience though - that's been offered alongside the classic pot of hot tea for at least my lifetime, very helpful to long-suffering family members dragged along grudgingly to at least be able to drink a familiar beverage (and even Britain was far more of a coffee drinking nation until the Victorian era anyway, when coffee rust decimated the original Indian coffee plantations while not impacting tea production).

 

Even if you're still keen to go I'd check out the options around OK City first - this website does a great job at listing locations offering teas, even just seasonal/special occasion ones rather than regular menu offerings, although I've found that the prices can often be well out of date. Even if there's nothing as fancy as the Empress, you'll at least have some baseline expecations set so you'll be able to assess how good the surroundings/service/baking was without also trying to process the whole concept for the first time.

[GORDONCHICK]

37 minutes ago, martincath said:

A whole buck less! 😉 My concern with a mid-September date is that this might actually be a 'just for the cruiseline' excursion, with who knows what compromises made to the menu to drive down the value even further... I just checked, because it's been a while, and they have jacked the price up yet again (now CAD$95!) and changed reservation system to SevenRooms from OpenTable - right now, resos only go until 4pm on the September dates I checked so you might want to enquire as to precisely what's included on this excursion and compare it with the detailed list of the included nibbles, types of tea etc. for the regular 'good but pricey' version... which not that long ago had a blatant Summer Tourist Tax added (prices in June-Sep were 50% higher than rest of the year when I first moved out to the west coast ~13 years ago - now they just keep the tourist tax on year round, while other Fairmonts have near identical menus for about two-thirds the price).

Yes, that's why the question - this isn't the standard tea that they do.  But I do know people who came into the Empress on their own and had tea there while in town on their cruise (also in the evening) so I don't think it's ONLY for cruise passengers, but primarily.  And if they can make some extra bucks off some walk ins, I'm sure they're all for it.

 

And the irony to me for the name of high tea is that it's for the working class who don't have the opportunity to have afternoon tea except on days they aren't working.  High tea = working class.  But I wouldn't mind the beefed upvariety myself.

 

Edited April 4 by GORDONCHICK