Old Country Market

Our favourite place to visit when on the island! Everything from the billy goats donuts, to the inside of the market is super delicious and fun. It's a unique experience as during the warmer months, there will be literal goats hanging out on the roof of the building. We love coming here to look for cute, unique wooden toys. They also have a full on super market with lots of international goods, a cafeteria and a baked goods section that sells small coffee and lattes. Definitely a must come when you're in the area!

This was a fun place in a very unusual way.  There was such an odd assortment of items.  There are bakery items, cheeses, canned food and lots of snacks, etc.  But there are also small items for doll houses, stuffed animals, clothing, and many great gift items for someone back home.  We ate lunch here and I wasn't terribly impressed with the food served, but the rest of the experience was absolutely worth the stop.  Goats on the grass roof were just a plus.

THE BEST NANAIMO BARS!
Unfortunately everything is fairly expensive. It was about $10.99 for 100g of smoked salmon. The Nanaimo bar was $2.99 and a slice of cake was $7.99. I got the carrot cake (gluten free) and the strawberry champagne cheesecake. Both were rock hard-I'm assuming they were sitting there for a while. But, overall, a really cute market with lots of options for everyone - just a little pricey.

This summer, a friend invited my husband and I to spend a few days at her family's vacation home in Qualicum Beach.  One of the places we visited was the "Old Country Market", also known as "Goats on the roof," as a big draw to the market is that there are goats grazing on the roof.

The market is pretty cool, and sells all sorts of neat things -- specialty foods from around the world, toys, kitchenware, and various household knick-knacks.  There's something for everyone, and it's fun to look around.  In addition to the market, the grounds of the Old Country Market also has various shops and restaurants/eateries.  It's such a touristy place, but it's fun!

[Yelp collections: Qualicum Beach]

This is a must visit destination when visiting the area and although it is a great tourist attraction, it is extremely busy and the number of eateries for lunch are quite minimal. On the day we came, their biggest restaurant was closed which left us to getting lunch at the deli being their three sandwiches including the muffuletta with many meats and cheese on focaccia, turkey on rye and ham on sourdough. Surprisingly, all of these sandwiches were VERY good. Nice and soft bread even after being in the fridge and packed with meats and cheese. The fillings were very simple but more than enough to provide a satisfying lunch for 4 hungry people.

We couldn't leave without trying the donuts from Billy G's and the constant line proved how popular they were! We tried their ukee magic, nanaimo bar donut and the double dunker donut. The ukee magic was a bit sweet for me but my mom who is a caramel fan enjoyed it! We all liked the nanaimo bar donut as their yeast donuts were light and fluffy. Strangely, our double dunker donut was supposed to be a chocolate base dipped in chocolate icing but the donut itself was actually just a plain vanilla cake donut which was disappointing. Nonetheless, donuts were too expensive for a tourist attraction but tasted great!

I honestly came here for the goats on the roof, but I was glad to actually check out the market inside. I loved how it has character and the item selection was quite unique and of quality. The bakery section offered plenty of options and each piece/serving was quite generous. I wish I allotted more time to visit this place because there's plenty of interesting items to look at while in the store. There's a doughnut shop beside the grocery market too that's worth trying out! The staff were friendly and were very helpful to a local tourist like me

I expected this place to be lame, but it was awesome. We stopped in looking for the famed Nainamo Bars and wound up getting one of those, as well as a chicken pot pie, steak and mushroom pie, and a giant sourdough pretzel. Surprisingly, the pretzel was the star of the show, but it was all good. Went back a few days later and got the marshmallow bar. That was AWESOME!

There were also so many fun things to buy, and surprisingly, nothing was marked up to tourist prices. Fun for kids, fun for adults, a great way to spend a couple of hours.

Cake by the Ocean and DNCE aren't here, and neither is Joe Jonas.  The Old Country Market is, and they have some ungulates, more specifcally artiodactyls on the roof.  Need I state the obvious?

What else is obvious?  It's a tourist destination.  When you see person upon person taking pics of the goats, it's obvious.  This area is a little tourist trap.  It's a market and they have quite a bit of merchandise that you wouldn't find in a "normal" grocery store.  A lot of specialty items.  I guess that's what you must do to maintain uniqueness in your target market's eyes.

I did buy a loaf of the in-house garlic cheese bread to try.  Quite good.

Restaurant inside if you want to eat in, but I didn't get to try anything.

Worth a visit if you're on your way to the west side of the island.

This place is so funny! Why and how did they decide to have goats on their roof??

We stopped here on our way to Tofino for some coffee. This small market has everything: coffee, pastries, hot food, butcher, cheese/dairy, packaged food/snacks, stuffed animals, and randomly a few Japanese items (sushi sets etc).

I also purchased a fish roe onigiri! It was great.

A Covid nightmare!  A weekday afternoon and parking lot wasn't even half full. Signs everywhere to social distance and that's about it!  Except for maybe a few signs on the floor arrows that pointed one way and then another so confusing!  

Worst  part was there were way too many people in there! People smashing into you and grabbing and reaching in front of you it was a gong show! I can't imagine a weekend. Suffering from ptsd I bolted!

And by the way it's illegal to put up a big sign that says Vanilla in front of fake vanilla flavour.  There's lots of that there beware!