North America 2022 : Sunday September 11 Day 13 Ottawa by Foot, Bus and Boat
Wherever possible Rob likes to jump on a city’s Hop-On-Hop-Off bus to get an idea of how the place’s attractions are related to each other. It provides us with some idea of what we might like to look at – beyond any research we might have done prior to arriving – and helps to set the priorities. Robyn likes to to do a full round of the bus circuit while deciding where to get off on the next loop. I’m generally too impatient for that.
We had already booked and paid for the Ottawa bus before leaving home so just needed to drop off at a bakery by the market, which we had discovered the night before, and then head over to the nearest bus stop. Ten minutes later we were sitting on the top deck, a few seats from the front. For the next 90 minutes or so we floated around the city seeing the outsides of buildings we would have liked to visit and listening to an informative commentary in both French and English.
The bus took us past a lot of interesting places but the first one we really wanted to get to was the National Gallery of Canada, located only a few blocks from the start/finish of the bus route.
We wandered around there for a few hours before catching the bus again for another circuit. We had wanted to visit Parliament House but it was shut as they observed some days of mourning for the death of Queen Elizabeth II.
After the cruise we wandered back through the centre of the city, looking at the government buildings under lights – purple for the queen – and then headed back to the hotel.
We picked up a serving of poutine from Smoke’s Poutinerie across the road from the hotel. Robyn especially wanted to sample this “delicacy” a few times in Canada, though our first serving a few days before hadn’t been that good. This was better without being something that I would want to eat very often.
There is no driving map for this day as we didn’t drive anywhere.
No comments:
Post a Comment