Barkerville, B.C. – What better way to celebrate Victoria Day than hanging out with the Queen herself?

That opportunity is available at Barkerville Historic Town today at the Wake-Up Jake restaurant for their annual Victoria Day Royal Tea.

“There will be two seating’s – one at 1 o’clock and one at 3,” says James Douglass, manager of visitor experience and public relations. “You can have private audiences with her majesty and talk about Canadian Confederation if you are so inclined.”

He adds the tea – now in its 19^th year – has proved incredibly popular over the years (Queen Victoria of course never visited Canada but he says it’s still fun to play along).

“They do sell out very quickly on the day. Especially if you want the one o’clock seating. I would even recommend people calling the Wake-Up Jake ahead of time and making reservations,” says Douglass.

“The 3 p.m. is usually pretty good. As soon as you’re on site you can make a reservation for that.”

He says the tea is especially popular with visitors with “royalist leanings.”

“And I’m not saying you need to be a royalist to enjoy this experience but one of the things that we’ve really found with the Queen Victoria Tea is people initially expected it to be a send up but it’s not done like satire – it’s literally done very straight as Queen Victoria.”

He says it’s proved an even bigger hit with Barkerville’s older visitors.

“The generation for whom King or Queen and country was very important. It’s an opportunity for those people to express some of the feelings that they’ve had about Canada and about how we become part of Confederation through being a British colony,” says Douglass.

“It’s been in many ways a touching thing to see. Many laughing and poignant moments can be had.”