Marina Restaurant, Oak Bay

For years I have been hearing about Oak Bay Marina Restaurant's Brunch Buffet. I have heard that this is the best brunch in the city. So, naturally I had to check it out for myself and what better time than for Mother's Day.

For your information, this is not a place you call up a week before for reservations (I made that mistake last year), in fact, I made my reservations about 3 months prior. I couldn't bear the thought of missing this much hyped buffet for a second year in a row.

Well, the time finally came, Mother's Day was upon us. I treated my fiance and my stepson to the renowned brunch buffet. The scenery around the marina is gorgeous and the restaurant is strategically designed to capture the beautiful views from every seat.

Now, I can't realistically write a review on all of the food that was available at the buffet, but I can give a general overview of the food as a whole. I enjoyed most everything I tried. The food ranged from Vanilla Scented French Toast, Waffles, Bacon, Sausages, Pasta, Barron n Beef, Seafood and a plethora of desserts. A couple of standouts for me were the french toast and smoked salmon and mussels. However, they also had eggs Benedict and made to order omelets.

As I stated earlier, all the food was good; however, I was a little disappointed that there wasn't more seafood options...we were at a marina restaurant...weren't we?

As for the service, I was not as impressed as I was with the food. Our server seemed to have somewhat of a chip off his shoulder, who knows, maybe he was just run off his feet. He was quick to provide new plates and cutlery; however, he was a little abrupt and quite slow to bring beverages and even at one point removed my fiance's coffee altogether.

As it was mother's day, the restaurant had plenty of fresh flowers available at the front door for outgoing mother's to create their own bouquets (nice touch).

Overall I would say the food was good, but like any buffet, you can get better food on it's own at other restaurants. As for the price, a little high, around $42 per person (including tip). In summary I think it was a nice treat for a special occasion, but it is definitely not somewhere I would go on a regular basis.

Food: 4 out of 5 Stars

Service: 3 out of 5 Stars

View: 4.5 out of 5 Stars

OVERALL: 3.8 out of 5 Stars

P.S. If you haven't been to the marina before, you can feed fish to the harbor seals. The seals have made the marina home and usually hang out by the docks.