Ottawa

Ottawa, Canada's capital, is only two hours from Montreal on the train. That makes it a perfect day trip, and this Sunday that's what we did. We were blessed with brilliant weather - it was 2 degrees in the early afternoon - positive digits, unheard of! Apologies though, as there's so much snow around all my photos outside are super bright . . . get your sunglasses ready!

Most of what we had to tick off our list was situated on Parliament Hill, which is reached by crossing the (frozen) Rideau Canal:

This is one of the parliament buildings. This pictured below is the centre of things, containing the House of Commons and the Senate. In front of it stands the Centennial Flame which burns perpetually.

We took a tour of Parliament, seeing the Senate (based on the House of Lords in function and design) and the stunning library. The library is the only original part of the building, saved by its iron doors in a fire at the turn of the twentieth century. 

The Parliament Building is one of few to have a portrait of Edward VIII, given that he abdicated so promptly after he came to throne. It also has an original portrait of Queen Victoria, the first monarch of Canada - although its edges are missing as the canvas had to be cut to save the picture in a fire. The frame was too cumbersome and wouldn't fit through the doors!

You are able to go to the top of the Peace Tower in the building. The lift goes past the bells on the way up, and you can see the clock face through the roof of the look-out point. The view over Ottawa River is very beautiful.

There are statues throughout the grounds of the building, our favourite was definitely this which commemorates the roots of the Women's Rights movement. We had fun joining in their tea party.

The National War Memorial. A particularly pertinent location to visit given the Ottawa shootings last year - a moment to pause for thought.

We walked past the art gallery on the way to the Royal Canadian Mint. We couldn't take photos in the mint, but the tour (for the bargain price of $4.50) was fascinating. The mint for example has approximately 70 contracts every year, making coinage for countries such as Barbados. We also got to find out about the medals they made for the Olympics and we all got to lift a 24 carat, 29 pound bar of gold . . . unfortunately it was chained down!