Category: Outdoor activities

Canadian Tulip Festival 2014

by barbstruestories, posted in Outdoor activities

Although warmish spring weather has been reluctant to show itself around Ottawa, the delay has made the timing of the Canadian Tulip Festival and the tulip display a perfect match.  The festival runs May 9-19th.  My friend and I went for a stroll through the tulips yesterday. The sun was shining making the display particularly pretty.   The beds of flowers and perennials at Dows Lake are beautiful and things are at the early end of their glory.  This year there are some outdoor sculptures/art interest features to add to the interest on your stroll through along the paths.  It is lovely to live close enough to the tulip festival to enjoy its beauty every year.

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Adventures on a bike ride

by barbstruestories, posted in Outdoor activities

I took the two-wheeler out for a spin a couple of days ago.  Here’s the outline of a couple of hours away from the house:

  • Method of transport-20 year old Specialized Crossroads bike with two saddlebags.  I am very fond of my bike.  It has taken me on many a journey over the years.
  • First stop-local dry-cleaners.  Make the drop-off and spy eye-catching purses, each made from one very long zipper.  The manager is from Vietnam and his niece, who is going to university in Vietnam makes the purses.  I buy one.  Feel good about it.  It’s for her education fund, I presume.

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  • Stop a mailbox to mail completed form to receive more accidental death insurance.  Think I should call my husband to let him know I put the envelope in the Canada Post box if someone nails me when I am on the ride.  Decide to take my chances and don’t call.  
  • Ride along the Rideau Canal.  Things are just getting started for the year. They were preparing this boat for adventures somewhere along the waterway.

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  • Take the route that goes by some of the displays of the Ottawa Tulip Festival.  Some beds are in their prime, some are getting past their prime.  It looks as if there is a pink/purple theme with the tulips this year (first photo below is an exception).

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  • Pass one bed where workers are digging up bulbs in preparation for annuals that they will plant there for the summer.  I stop and ask what they do with the bulbs (hoping they say they give them to people riding by on their bikes).  Instead I receive this courteous response “We donate them.”
  • Continue on to the Canadian Museum of Civilization, crossing locks, huffing and puffing up some hills and keeping upright.  Conduct a bit of business there after the 3 busloads of school children have finished buying their souvenirs.  Here’s a view of the backside of Parliament Hill from the Quebec side.

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  • Meander home via a different route, trying to figure out which streets downtown in Ottawa have bike lanes.  I don’t want my estate to collect the accidental death benefit I mailed in earlier in the day.
  • Elapsed time: 2 hours, 15 minutes.  Distance 31kms.  Reward: a cold beer in a frosted glass