On our previous videos we visited Toronto, Canada; enjoyed the Niagara Falls, and passed
by the 1000 Islands of the Saint Lawrence River.
Today the road takes us north, towards Ottawa, Canada's capital, where we will explore Parliament
Hill and the Peace Tower, see the Rideau Canal locks in action, eat some local delicacies
at the Byward Market, and much more, so stay tuned, Road Nomad is next.
Hello everybody and welcome to another great adventure.
After a little over two hours we arrive at Ottawa.
Our hotel the Capitol Hill on Albert Street.
We wake up to this rainy morning.
My parents got the balcony, and we got this great view of the office next door and this
guy who we have aptly named Captain Picard.
It is an old hotel but boy is it well located, a mere two blocks away from Parliament Hill.
First thing in the morning we've bought umbrellas because it looks like the weather is not going
to cooperate.
We pass by this Spark Street, which is pedestrian only, and right there is the Parliament Hill.
There's a bit of construction going on.
Here's the centennial flame, which commemorates the 100th anniversary of the Canadian confederation.
The building is the Centre Block, the main building of the Canadian Parliament, and the
Peace Tower.
We go inside the building and take the elevator to the top.
The view is spectacular even on this rainy day.
We see the Notre Dame Cathedral, the American Embassy and the Chateau Laurier, and the Museum
of Civilization on the other side of the Ottawa River.
Going back down we see the bells carillon, which is used to play melodies on special
occasions.
We also visit the memorial chamber.
There are several Books of Remembrance, which list the names of the Canadian soldiers who
died in the many world wars.
Time to go down.
We go back out under a pretty heavy downpour.
The tourists don't seem to mind much, though; umbrellas everywhere.
We pass once again by the centennial flame.
We are going back to the hotel to pick up my parents and Bryan so we can get them some
umbrellas and continue exploring.
We walk a little bit on Spark Street under the rain.
We see a statue of Terry Fox, a famous Canadian amputee athlete.
And we are back by Parliament Hill.
This statue belongs to Henry Albert Harper, a notorious Canadian journalist and public
servant.
On the side of the Centre Hall there is a statue of Queen Elizabeth II on horseback.
I guess the Canadian birds don't really care much for her majesty.
We walk along all these statues, which are behind the Parliament Building, by the river.
The Ottawa River divides the city into Ottawa, in the province of Ontario, and Gatineau in
the Quebec province.
Quebec is also known as French Canada.
We are on the Ottawa side, on the Ontario side.
This round structure is the library, which luckily was the only surviving building from
the fire of 1916, which by the way consumed the entire Centre Block.
The rain is too much for my parents so they are going to stay at the hotel and we continue,
we continue on our own.
We walk to the Canadian Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
It holds the remains of an unidentified Canadian soldier who died in France during World War
I. One cool thing about Ottawa is that they have guides waiting around all these monuments
to give you information.
I think it's a great idea.
And I guess that's their solution to unemployment.
Le Boulevard de la Confederation.
Next we pass by the Rideau Canal, which has this system of locks to compensate for the
difference in water levels.
There's a small boat coming up so we get to see how it works.
First they close the locks behind the boat.
Then they fill up this water compartment with water from the next compartment coming up
until the water levels are equalized.
Then the open the next lock and off we go, to do it all over again.
Pretty cool.
This ancient canal isthe oldest one in North America, dating back to 1832 and it is a UNESCO
World Heritage Site.
All this mechanism is still operated by hand.
It was our original intention to take this boat tour of the canal, but there was no one
else, probably because of the bad weather, so they canceled the tour.
It is disappointing but what can you do.
Here's the famous Chateau Laurier, which we'll visit later, but we are getting kind of hungry
so we pass by the Byward Market, which is this area around the original market building
with a farmer's markets, café's, boutiques, restaurants, pubs... they have these stalls
selling all kinds of goods, this one specialized on stuff made with Maple syrup.
This is a famous maple syrup candy, in Ottawa.
Cheers.
It's time to try a beaver tail.
It's a beaver tail.
Yeah, I did burn my tongue back there but it was good.
The beaver tail is a fried pastry topped with different condiments, which originated right
here in Ottawa.
Next we go inside the market to see what they have.
The highlight apparently is the Obama cookies.
This people love Obama.
Apparently he caused a sensation here when he visited Ottawa, ate a beaver tail, and
the rest is history.
They have all kind of pastries and tasty looking food, but it looks like we are passed the
lunch hour rush so decide to continue exploring, beside we are already kind of full from the
maple syrup treat and the beaver tail.
We end up having some wine and Quebec cheeses at this place called Vineyards.
Very nice.
We see the Notre Dame Cathedral as we continue walking around this pretty neighborhood.
We encounter the famous sculpture Maman, by Louise Bourgeois, which belongs to the National
Gallery of Canada.
Behind it we see the Notre Dame Cathedral Basilica.
The steeples are covered in tin, which I hear is typical of French-Canadian churches.
As I said before, the sculpture belongs to the National Gallery, which we can see in
the background.
National Gallery of Canada This ugly building is the United States Embassy;
located on McKenzie Avenue.
Maybe we should hire better architects, just saying.
We pass, once again, by the famous Chateau Laurier, which is a hotel built in the early
20th century.
The interior while pretty and very tasteful and classy is nothing to write home about.
We head back to our hotel.
We've been walking all day under the rain and we are tired so we're going to call it
a night.
In the morning we take out the car and decide to drive around Ottawa little bit before leaving.
It is such a beautiful day, we wish we had this kind of weather yesterday, but ces't
la vie.
We drive on Albert Street, make a right on Kent, and then another right on Wellington
Street so we can take one last look at the Parliament Hill.
There are some people on strike, don't know why.
And there it is, the Centre Hall with the Peace Tower.
In front of us the Chateau Laurier.
We make a left in order to take the bridge across the river.
To our left the back of the American Embassy, to our right the Notre Dame Cathedral.
We see the National Gallery again as we turn left one more time.
We cross the Ottawa River and we are now in the province of Quebec or Quebec in French.
The Museum of Civilization to our left.
Let's have a look, shall we?
First we are treated to this great view of Parliament Hill and downtown Ottawa on the
other side of the river.
The museum was designed by Canadian aboriginal architect Douglas Cardinal.
The curvilinear design reflects the landscape around it, and everything in the building
symbolizes a feature of the land before civilization took over.
There have also this Japanese Zen garden.
Very nice, very peaceful.
The cascading fountain perhaps evokes the Rideau Canal, but I don't know.
Well it is almost time to go.
Let's go inside for a second to take care of business and see the Grand Hall.
And off we go towards Montreal.
On our next video we visit the city of Montreal and you are in for a treat because Montreal
is awesome.
So much to see and so little time.
We are going to cross into the province of Quebec, which is in reality another country
within Canada.
The official language is French, and although many people are bilingual all the sings, by
law, must be in French.
But that will be our next video, so stay tuned.
Do subscribe to the channel so you don't miss any of it.
As always, thank you for watching and see you on the road.