So as already covered in an earlier post we didn’t have the best of times leading up to our arrival in Ottawa and we got there on Thursday very much needing a couple of down days. We had just that.

A campsite outside of the city, which at first glance seemed a bit tired, turned out to be great.

The kids made friends immediately with 2 sets of siblings and spent 2 days biking, swimming and playing ‘soccer’. They were from 2 families travelling together from New Brunswick across Canada for 3 months. Their husbands were Ministers and so they spend their summers travelling from city to city. They were lovely people and reassured us that there are lots of families making their way across Canada homeschooling – so we felt slightly less alien.

We were parked next to a lovely German couple that had shipped their campervan out to Canada through the same logistics company as us and were spending 3 months travelling. Much banter about the football and comparing stories about Europe and North America. The kids shared their marshmallows with them when they said they’d never toasted any on a fire before!

Finally we met a lovely couple Ray and Louise from Nova Scotia with whom we spent a really lovely evening. They invited us to their RV and the kids were charming which is always a relief!

We had a days total ‘down time’ catching up on food shopping and sorting the van a bit.

Then on Saturday we left the campsite and parked at Hogs Back Park (still very pleasing to see names we recognise) and took the bikes off the back. On the great Canadian Bucket List they suggest ice-skating down the Rideau Canal as a must do. With not in the way of ice around we opted instead to cycle down its lovely pathway into Ottawa.

The canal, which was originally built to protect Canada against the Americans, stretches for 200km and includes 47 locks and 24 dams and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. We managed only a few of those miles but really enjoyed it. Herons and cormerands flew alongside us and we were overtaken regularly by roller-skaters, cyclists and joggers!

We arrived into Ottawa with incredible views of both the Parliament Buildings and the famous Fairmont Chateau Laurier hotel. The National Arts Centre sits on the bank of the canal and was so reminiscent of London’s South Bank we felt quite at home.

Queen Victoria chose Ottawa as the capital of Canada in 1857 and her image appears everywhere. The city appears to have museums that would cater for all enthusiasts (Science, Nature, Agriculture, Aviation to name but a few) but we took it easy and just had a wander and then took the free tour around the Parliament Building.

Sadly the only space available for the rest of the afternoon was with a French Speaking guide so although I caught the general gist of it’s history the others made do with admiring the architecture and marveling at the striking resemblance to Westminster on which the Canadian version is modeled!

The lawns in front of Parliament are open to the public so full of kids playing, daily Yoga classes and people picnicking.  Which seemed lovely.

We struck gold and arrived in town on Rib Fest weekend. The smell was truly mouthwatering so we picked up a rack of ribs, some BBQ chicken and a stick or two of Twister Potatoes and sat outside Parliament and had our supper.

A really lovely day and just what we needed to get ‘back on track’.