Only in Canada?

We hopped off the bus at Rideau Hall, residence of the Governor General. The beautiful grounds are open to the public, people sitting under the trees relaxing, kids playing, a few cricket games going on and others walking around enjoying nature and the good weather.

Bus tour of Ottawa

Monday was a civic holiday and the downtown businesses were closed so was easy to get around, just us tourists.

Red Green was here

hahaha

I swear this is duct tape. Don't have the best zoom on my camera but spied this on one of the upper windows on the back of the centre block on Parliament Hill. Click on the picture to zoom in.

Impressed

I like the fact that the public is allowed to play frisbee on the grounds of the Parliament buildings.

Centennial Flame on Parliament Hil

Ottawa

We arrived Sunday between 6p, and 7pm and checked into our hotel, which was just a couple of blocks from the Parliament buildings.  Great location. We went for a stroll, warm and sunny and few people around. Smaller city and felt easier, like home I guess. Not crowded but some people walking about.  There was a Buskers festival on Sparks Street (one block from Parliament Hill)  and some people milling about watching. We are going to stay a couple of nights here but already we like Ottawa.  Lots of museums and galleries and history and lots of sites to see. Lots of french, of course but thankfully lots of English too.  My high school french isn't going to get me very far.

Where we are now

Rita remembered but I forgot

It's my BIRTHDAY today !

testing

Trying a new thing. Have too many pictures I like so here is a link to extra photos.

Click on MORE PHOTOS above.

Basketball in Almonte

AND! Wouldn't you know it is the boyhood home of the man who invented basketball, Dr. James Naismith.

How we roll

There is a TV show called Canadian Pickers about two guys who travel around Canada looking for collectables. In Last night's episode they were in Almonte, Ontario. After some research on the net, we decided to make a detour. It's about 50 km before Ottawa, off the main road and is mainly a commuter town. Was once an old mill town from the early 1800's, quaint and picturesque with falls running running through town and old brick buildings.

It was after 5pm and most things were closed so we just drove around a bit, had a short stroll and then carried on. The weather was beautiful, nice light for photos, quiet and peaceful.

Rita, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore

Leisurely Sunday drive through Toronto

On our way to Niagara we hit Toronto at rush hour. Yowzers, welcome to the big city.  I was expecting it to be similar to driving through Seattle. Not. The population of Toronto is around 2.6 million and Seattle is about 600,000, so no wonder there were 12 lanes of traffic. Okay, GPS not the big evil thing, did resort to using it on the phone to get us through. Somehow, on Sunday, we just drove and one thing led to another and oops, there it was, oops, missed it. Oh well. The only thing wanted to see was the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) anyway. Oh well. Just didn't appeal to either of us. On to Ottawa.

Contest update

We are closing the bag count contest on Aug 20th.  Mainly because it is getting harder for us to remember which are the newly acquired bags since the last post. Send me an email if unable to via the blog.

St Jacobs to London

Had a long day in St Jacobs and had no place to stay anymore so drove to London passing through Stratford.  What a pretty town, all the old brick buildings and outdoor patios and the happy people milling about. Would have liked to spent the night but the only room we found available was $190 above a bar so we are off to London to see the queen. About an hour and a bit away and hope to get an early start to Toronto. hahaha

A last look at St Jacobs

Horse of course

Horse drawn carriage ride to a working Mennonite farm leaving from the market. Our guide talked about the Mennonite life, religion and history.  The farm produced maple syrup and we had a look at how they did that.  The maple trees are different than the ones we have in BC, much smaller leaf and tall. We had the opportunity to see a bit of their home where they had a little shop set up to purchase syrup, quilts etc.  Sorry about the lack of captions, proving to be a challenge and this seems to be lesson on not being so picky.  Taking me a long time to learn that...grrr

Farm we visited

Our guide

Our horses

Maple syrup talk

More market pictures

Mennonite baking

yum, lasted us a few days...Not sure what it was, but about the size of a pie.  Kind of like a baked cobbler?  Lots of cherries.

St Jacob's Market

whoa boy, that is what you call a market, massive and busy! Definitely the place to be Saturday morning. Over 400 venders of flea market, made in China stuff. Six or more outside rows, packed with people, two double story buildings with food and wares of all sorts, packed with people.  All jammed and nowhere to move. Some local Mennonite farmer selling veggies, baking and canning but  no local handmade crafts.  Plenty of food venders to choose from if willing to wait.  I expect the Tuesday and Thursday market days would be different, but the Saturday summer market was a zoo and both of us wanted out.  Definitely worth a see, however. 

Indonesia in Waterloo

For those in the know, imagine my surprise.