After finding a pharmacy to sell me some cream for my poorly arm, we had another wander around the parliamentary buildings and chased some squirrels (like our british greys only black) and chipmunks :)
Ottawa's a beautiful city and seems to have really benefitted from being a purpose-built capital. It was a pretty small town before it was designated the new capital, so it seems really well planned, not like the jumble of buildings you get in London! It's lovely and clean, the buildings are fabulous, and it's so quiet! The whole greater Ottawa area has a population of only 900k.
Next we went to Canada's National Gallery/Musee des Beaux Arts, a great gallery with loads of really cool stuff. Highlights included a huge sculpture of a whale skeleton made entirely out of plastic patio chairs, a film of an elephant and two big circles of magnetic tape dancing in mid-air between 2 large fans (very cool - quite hypnotic like a lava lamp). We also saw some great examples from Bacon, Picasso, Pissaro, Monet, Cezanne, Brach, Magritte, Turner, Constable, Epstein, Worhol, Dali, Klimt, Degas, Rothco, Pollock, Rembrandt, van Gogh, Matisse, and Rodin. There was a huge collection of excellent Canadian and Canadian-inspired art, including pieces by the Group of Seven who we'd seen a lot of in Algonquin.
Unfortunately, we were in Ottawa between temporary exhibitions and they were setting up the next ones, which looked like they'd have been really good if we'd come a week or two later - typical! We'd also planned to visit the Museum of Contemporary Photography, but it seems it has recently moved and is in the process of being merged with the National Gallery so we missed that too. Bother. Still, there isn't time to do everything we'd like anyway so no matter. As it was, we only had a couple of hours before the gallery closed, and Stu does art galleries at a snail's pace (I'm much more able to tailor my pace to the time available!) so it's a wonder we managed to see as much as we did!
After the gallery we did some more wandering around the park and parliament hill, followed by a well-earned drink and a tasty pudding in Brasserie Metropolitan, another Lonely Planet recommendation. We went back to our hotel for a bit of a chillout before heading back to the Brasserie again for dinner. No sooner had we sat down, ordered drinks and starterd to consult the menu, than the waitress brought over our beers and somehow dropped Stu's entire pint all over me and our table! Oh how we laughed. She was very apologetic of course and I wasn't too bothered, we just moved to a drier table and carried on. If it had gone all over one of our cameras though, it would have been a different story!
The food was good and we had a free round of drinks by way of an apology. We then went for another wander round the city to take some night shots, with mixed results, and then wandered back to our hotel. All this walking and driving is ensuring we fall asleep the moment our heads hit the pillow, and the hotels all have REALLY comfy beds - bliss! :)
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