Ottawa with Sylvia (8/4/2015)

Today was Ottawa day for our tour group, and Sylvia volunteered (?) for the thankless task of showing us around their beautiful capital city. And it is a beautiful city.  Even the drive in was very pretty.  We got into more of the farming area, with cornfields on one side and bean fields on the other.  As we got into the city, we drove along the Rideau Waterway, and Sylvia told us that when it freezes over in the winter, people ice-skate to work on it.  That road took us into the downtown area where their government buildings are, and Sylvia parked in an underground parking lot right next to the market (which didn't happen to be fully open today), then we began our "walking tour" of Ottawa.

We walked along the set of locks here, I think there are a series of 8, coming off the Ottawa River and starting the Rideau Waterway system.

Across the Ottawa River lies the province of Quebec. We could see the bridge that crosses the river, but we did not cross it today.



I no longer remember which building is which, for the most part, but they were all very beautiful.



And there were lots of steps.

This pretty building is Canada's version of the IRS.


And the landscaping was georgeous, as it has been everywhere.

What government building would be complete without a fair amount of statutes?  There were several here.

This tower is called the Peace Tower and is part of their Parliament building, which we later toured.  However, the Peace Tower had already closed for the day so we did not get to see the inside of it.

We also had some sidewalk performers.  Sylvia had a name for them, but I have forgotten it.

We stopped in at the beautiful Chateau Laurier Hotel, to use their restrooms and rest a bit.  This is a lovely old building, lots of marble.

The building across the street used to be a train station.

We finally arrived at the Parliament Building, which was quite a little walk from where we parked, and quite a few steps. 

Collins and Sylvia walked across the street to get tickets for the free tour, but the only tickets left for the day were for the 4:40 p.m. French Tour.  So they took them, but our French isn't exactly top notch!  On the grounds here is an Eternal Flame, I think this was created in honor of their centennial, in 1967.  They are preparing for their bicentennial ? celebration in 2017, and we saw signs around the city announcing this.

Our very excellent tour guide stopped one of the duty officers to get some information.

Among the many statutes here is one of Queen Elizabath on horseback.

There was also a little circle of statutes commemorating women getting to vote.

Since we had to come back here later, we decided to cross the street and find some lunch.  We ate at Darcy McGees Irish Pub, and right outside their entrance was this cool bear with a salmon.

Right next door was their Post Office, which was quite a substantial building.

And more statutes here.  This one is a war memorial, which I believe was built to honor the veterans of the War of 1812, but later more was added to include all the other wars, e.g., WWI, WWI, Korea, Afganastan.  Interestingly, Viet Nam was not included because Canada did not get involved in that war, although some of their people crossed into the states to join the U.S. Forces.

Part of this is in memory of the Unknown Soldiers, and there were two guards posted here.  While we watched, they began marching back and forth in front of the statute, which we were told they do whenever they feel the need to walk.

Again our tour guide stepped up to the plate and got more information for us foreigners.

We resumed our walking tour, back past the locks (we always have to stop and watch some boats go through locks anytime we get the chance).

We did a bit of a hike then, down to their Art Centre (I don't know the actual name of this building).  Across the street, we could see this cathedral with silver spires just shining in the sunlight.  Sylvia said we could go inside, so we did that later.

Outside the art building was this interesting sculpture of a spider.  Wonder how much they paid for this artwork?

Across the street were some embassies, including this one for Kuwait.

We walked into the art center gift shop but we did not buy tickets to tour any of it.  We didn't think we had enough time before our 4:40 tour back at the Parliament Building.  We did walk on to the Royal Canadian Mint, which had a cute moose guarding the gift shop.

They allowed us to take a picture of the gold brick, weighing 28 pounds.  Imagine 2 14-pound bowling balls -- it was quite heavy.

Outside Mazie and I took advantage of picture poses.

We crossed over and finally made it to the church, the Notre Dame Cathedral Basilica, built in 1841.  This is probably the most beautiful church I have ever been inside. It had a beautiful altar, lovely stained glass windows, everything was just breath-takingly beautiful.

We left there and headed back toward Parliament, stopping again at the Hotel for a 20-minute rest.  Collins and Dave had stopped touring with us at the Art Centre, and at this point, they headed back to Market Street to await our return.  We got back to the flag where we were to meet our French-speaking tour guide, and rested until it was our turn.

The only thing we understood were part of the instructions telling us what NOT to do.  Otherwise, it was all Greek, or rather French.  Thankfully, Sylvia was there to explain some of it.  I believe this first room is the House of Commons.

Note the speaker's chair

This was another room but we didn't see a name on it, and obviously we didn't understand a thing she said about it.

The library was self-explanatory, and lovely.  She told us, in English, that we had to be quiet because people would be in here working, but it was 5:00 and we didn't see a soul in here working!

The next building was the Senate; Senators here are appointed, not elected.

Again, the speaker's chair

As we left the grounds, I saw this animal which I thought was a groundhog (or woodchuck, they call them in Canada), but a fellow-photographer told me it was a marmot.

We met up with the guys and headed to the CASINO!@#$ for their buffet.  It is the Rideau Carleton Raceway, where they also have horseracing several nights a week, but not tonight.  The buffet was good, and when we finished eating, one car (Collins, Marilyn, Joe, and Dave) left for home, which the second car (Sylvia, Mazie and me) stayed behind to make our donation to the Canadian Casino Association, i.e., play the slots for an hour.  Sylvia was the only winner, but it was well deserved because she devoted her whole day to touring us around.  We left about 9:30 and had a little over an hour to get back to her house, then another 20 minutes or so to where we are camped.  Although we dodged the rain while we were touring, we did get some on our way home.  But between raindrops, I spotted a raccoon (we almost hit it) and a fox.  Always happy to see some wildlife.

It was a long day, but we were all really impressed with Ottawa.  It will be a highlight of this trip.

Driving Around the Countryside (8/3/2015)

After a rainstorm during the night, sometimes pretty heavy, we woke up to clouds and cool temperatures.  It's been in the 60s every morning since we've been here, warming up into the 70s during the day.  Collins ran down to a friend/neighbor and got something to put vehicle oil in, and then changed the oil in the Johnson's motorhome.  Joe had changed ours yesterday, so there was quite a bit of old oil to get rid of.  After all that, Dave and Mazie decided to drive into Smith Falls to take care of their laundry and do a little shopping.  Collins and Marilyn took Joe and me on a drive around the countryside, through all the little villages they had grown up around.  We are never very far from water here, rivers and lakes inundate the area, many of the rivers have locks on them, and they all are very pretty.  We stopped off at Sylvia's first to drop off a dish of potato salad that Marilyn had forgotten to take to yesterday's potluck get-together, then drove into Smith Falls for Joe's soda.  We then headed out of town.  We didn't get a very early start, so the next town we hit was Perth and it was time for lunch.  There was an antique store on the street where we parked, so we browsed it after we ate, and Marilyn found another glass butter dish.  I think she has started collecting them.

I can't begin to remember all the little villages we saw, but one of our stops was at the Foley Mountain Conservation Area, which is part of the Rideau Watershed.  The locks in Smith Falls that we saw the other day are part of the Rideau System.


 We also drove back around behind Westport, where you can see the village below.  We drove back to an "interpretive center" but it was locked up, but we did see the lake and the town from there.  I took a path through the folage to get a better view, but it was a jungle out there!


  Down another road was an overlook called Spy Rock Ramp, which afforded a beautiful view of the lake and the town, and picture ops for us.

 

On the way back to the car, I found WILDLIFE!!!  (I'm getting a little desperate for wildlife, as you can tell).  I thought it was a worm we could save for fishing, but Collins called it a hardshell snail, then decided maybe it was from the centipede family.

I did see a few wild turkeys today, but nothing any larger.  Our driver proceeded on down the road.

Our next point of interest was Jones Falls, which I thought was the prettiest stop of the day.  It is a series of 3 joined locks, and another lock separated by a little pond area, for a total drop of 60 feet.  We walked up to the top of the 3 joined locks, and just missed a boat going through.  We could actually see it in the last lock, but we didn't walk up there, it was a bit of a trail.

Jones Falls is world-famous for its beauty.  "Among the many wonderful guests to Jones Falls, there have been those from the White House, Hollywood, Buckingham Palace; guests from as far away as Great Britain, Australia, China, New Zealand, British Columbia, Herzegovina, Italy, Germany, and many more.  National Goeographic has endorsed this United Nations World Heritage Site as the second most important place to visit in the world." The difference in lake levels at Jones Falls is nearly eighty feet and was overcome by the construction of four locks . . ."  "It was also necessary to build a solid stone dam to hold back the waters of Sand Lake. . . The dam is 400 feet in length, 90 feet high and 300 feet thick at the base."



 There were 2 boys jumping in the water here, having a good old time.

 

I could spend a day here with a book, waiting for boats to come through the locks.  For some reason, this fascinates me, and I feel very fortunate that not only have we got to see this a few times, but we even took a boat ride through the locks last month on the old Erie Canal in Pennsylvania.

There was a little open building visitor center here with a video about the history of the building of the lock system here.  Very interesting.


"The Rideau Waterway between Kingston and Ottawa ... was developed following the War of 1812-14 so that the British would have an independent means of conveying war material other than through the international waters of the St. Lawrence Seaway.  The building of the canal, which actually entailed building only about six miles of artificial waterway and several locks to compensate for the difference in the levels of the fifteen lakes involved, was completed in 1832.  The Rideau Lakes waterway traverses over 125 miles of beautiful Ontario ... "  "The locks themselves are 120 feet long, 24 feet wide, and 6 to 8 feet deep."

We had to walk across a wooden bridge to get over here, and Marilyn said they used to be able to drive across this bridge.  The water was laying picture perfect here, although when we parked we took our umbrellas because it looked like a storm was on its way.


There was also an old hotel here, Hotel Kenney, that was pretty grand in its day.  Marilyn said she used to spend a lot of time across the road at the snack bar, waiting for her dad to come out of the bar in the hotel.  Inside the hotel are several photos on the wall, including two with her grandfather in them.  He was a hunting/fishing guide back in the day.  When Marilyn told the desk clerk that her grandfather was in the pictures, she asked Marilyn her name, and when Marilyn told her her maiden name, the clerk went to the back and got another girl, who said Marilyn's grandfather was her grandfather's brother.  So another cousin, a few times removed.  Marilyn has lots of relatives around here.


This is a very popular area in the fall when the leaves are turning.  I would love to see that!

Throughout the day, we drove past several cemeteries where Marilyn has family buried, and when we left Jones Falls, we stopped at another lake, Charleston Lake.  Marilyn and Collins had stayed in a cottage here several years ago with Collins' cousin Judy and her first husband Darrell.  An older lady happened to be walking outside and Collins recognized her, so he pulled over and they talked for a few minutes.  We might get to go fishing in this lake later in the week.

Our last area to cover was Lyndhurst, where Marilyn was born and raised.  In this little village is the "oldest bridge in existence in Ontario," over Furnace Falls.  This is another significant drop in water level, but it's nothing like the 60 foot drop back at Jones Falls.




Marilyn pointed out the church where she and Collins got married,

and the last house her father lived in before he went into a nursing home.


She also pointed out several homes of family and friends she grew up with (some of whom we have met over the years).Many of these old homes are brick and well preserved.

We finally ended our road trip and got back to the RVs.  Marilyn had leftovers from yesterday's potlock (enchalidas and the other bowl of potato salad she forgot to take), so she fed us.  And Collins had bought a blueberry pie at a farmer's market we stopped at, run by Marilyn's cousin's granddaughter, or her bridesmaid's brother's granddaughter, or something like that. Dave and Mazie joined us for the pie, and we caught up on the day's doings with them.  But we were tired, so no cards tonight.  We have a busy day planned for tomorrow.