Tourists in Toronto

After vis­it­ing the Nia­gara Region, we stopped in Toronto. I know the city very well now but it’s always fun to revisit a few favourite places down­town: Chi­na­town (where you can get excel­lent jiaozi and baozi), Kens­ing­ton Mar­ket (for the funky artsy feel) and Yonge Street (for the shops and the crowd).

Niagara-on-the-Lake

Niagara-on-the-Lake is much qui­eter than Nia­gara Falls and most tourists are here to enjoy his­toric build­ings and good wine, not haunted houses and fam­ily enter­tain­ment. Antique shops, art gal­leries and golf courses replace fast food joints and touristy attractions.

Niagara Falls, Ontario

The Sun­day was gor­geous and drove to Nia­gara Falls. It was my fourth visit there (last time was in the mid­dle of the win­ter) and def­i­nitely a busy time of the year for the region.
The con­trast between the tacky main strip and the beauty of the falls always amazes me.

Night Show On Parliament Hill

After wan­der­ing around between Par­lia­ment Hill and Major Hill’s Park on Canada Day, we went home to rest a bit and even­tu­ally headed back down­town for the night show. We some­how man­aged to secure a spot by the Par­lia­ment where we were sur­rounded by a sea of peo­ple clad in red and white.

Canada Day 2011

Happy Canada Day everyone!

It was (and still is) a crazy day here in Ottawa, the nation’s cap­i­tal. With the visit of Kate and William and the usual fes­tiv­i­ties around Par­lia­ment Hill, thou­sands of peo­ple are wan­der­ing down­town in the streets of Ottawa.

RibFest and Visitors

On our way to pick them up at Mon­treal Air­port , we stopped by the Rib Fest on Sparks Street. I’m not a huge fan of meat but I can def­i­nitely have a pulled pork sand­wich once a year—and boy, this one was good! The street was packed and smoky but I loved the atmos­phere. The city is alive after all!

Pow Wow in Ottawa

A cou­ple of years ago, I attended the National Abo­rig­i­nal Day cel­e­bra­tions on Vic­to­ria Island, by Par­lia­ment Hill. I was intro­duced to Aboriginal’s cul­ture and had a great day among the per­form­ers. This year, I spent most of the time watch­ing the pow wow com­pe­ti­tion where dozens of kids, men, women and elders took turn per­form­ing tra­di­tional dances. The cos­tumes were sim­ply amaz­ing! The atmos­phere was great too, peo­ple were relaxed and wel­com­ing… a photographer’s dream.

Doors Open Ottawa

Last year, I vis­ited the Supreme Court and the Para­medics Head­quar­ter. This year, I opted for a build­ing I always walk by but never truly paid atten­tion to: the Gov­ern­ment Con­fer­ence Cen­tre, which was also Ottawa’s cen­tral rail­way sta­tion until the 1960s. It’s located right in front of the Château Lau­rier, nearby the Rideau Cen­tre and now serves as the place of many polit­i­cal and cul­tural dis­cus­sions and nego­ti­a­tions, includ­ing the repa­tri­a­tion of Canada’s Con­sti­tu­tion, G20 Con­fer­ence in 2001.