More Ottawa and the Parliament

One of the surprises we found was the colour of the squirrels. We are well used to the grey interlopers that have taken over the UK.  Also the red ones that survive on the Isle of Wight. Black was a whole new thing:

and rather unusual for us. That picture was "borrowed" from Wikipedia and look them up there if you want to know more about squirrel genetics, the advantage of being black and their distribution. Alternatively just enjoy their colouration from the picture and pour yourself some wine. You are not likely to get a black squirrel question in any pub quiz.

Ottawa has some great "ad-hoc" decorations that work very well, like the painting on the risers of this flight of outdoor steps:

We had a good wander around the city centre, some great coffee and snacks in a bike café, watched the army guys play the bagpipes at the war memorial

and generally had a great time. It was topped off by a visit to the Houses of Parliament.  Like the UK version in London, their House of Commons needed serious refurbishment. Unlike the UK the Canadians decided to get on with it. A ten year long renovation is underway as you can see:

The surrounding buildings are equally impressive:

So the members had somewhere to meet, they undertook a 7 year building project to prepare a new meeting chamber that looks like this

If you are thinking that the walls look like exterior stonework then you are most observant. Basically they built a roof over the quadrangle between some existing buildings, installed the seating and technology for the meeting chamber and it is now in use until the original building is ready again. An excellent tour around explained the history and how it closely follows the UK parliament in processes. We just hope it is better at taking grown-up decisions and making them stick than ours....

Of course, all the Prime Ministers have to be remembered by a portrait that hangs in the parliament building. By convention they can choose where they are portrayed and their attire but they are not allowed to add in another person. Brian Mulroney wanted his family included and it was refused of course, so he placed a picture of them on the furniture behind him for the artist to capture:

Proper sneaky / clever politician thing to do. 

We really liked Ottawa and packed plenty into our brief 3 day stay there. Being at an airport hotel we arrived back to the airport itself early each evening to catch the hotel shuttle bus. We realised just how small the airport is when the only place to get  a drink was a tiny Tim Hortons concession. For the UK folks, that is a bit like a small Greggs store. The following night we arrived after 7pm and that was shut - no coffee whilst waiting for the shuttle bus. Not quite like Heathrow.

Sometime it would be fun to travel along the Rideau canal in a hire boat. However the hire charges for a week or so there are wildly high. If you have an idle few minutes have a look at the Le Boat website but make sure you are sitting down before you see the prices for even pretty basic hire boats.

Ottawa is simply a great place to visit.