Our trip to Ottawa was a blast.  Rosey has posted a bunch of our photos online. It was nice to get away for a while. The drive up took 7 hours, but that’s because we stopped a lot (all the rest stops along the 401.) Once we got past Toronto, the drive actually wasn’t too bad. The scenery was absolutely beautiful, and it was great seeing the names of places I had only ever seen on a map.

Our hotel was right beside Byword Market, so we were able to walk everywhere we wanted to go. I really appreciated that as I did not want to drive.

Our first day of walking was to the National Art Galley. We walked past the American Embassy, which was very odd.  It looks like a prison with all the barred windows and gates. The funniest part was seeing the protesters on the other side of the road.

The art gallery was great.  Very big.  It took us a nearly three hours to go through the entire building. The rest of the week was spent exploring Byword Market and the shops around it.

On our last day we walked up to Parliament Hill and took a bunch of pictures. We have some great shots of the various statues, and the cat sanctuary.

Our drive back was less eventful.  Only took six hours. We made it back in time to get the cat from the vet before they closed, so our whole family is now back home.

Definitely was well worth the money, and it was a great way to escape what had been a rather trying series of months.