Kayaking on Stillwater Creek

Last Saturday, May 23, we went kayaking from our back yard.  We back onto Stillwater Creek, which flows through Crystal Beach in Nepean, and meets up with the Ottawa River between Dick Bell and Andrew Haydon Parks, on the wide bend of the river called Lac Deschenes.

We had to carry the kayak down the stone steps in our back yard and through a bit of brush to reach the water.  Here is Ed, on the banks of the creek before we put the kayak in the water.  The bank was pretty muddy and slippery:

On the water, looking at our house at the end of the creek bend:

Condos as we approach the parks.  They did some shoreline stabilization work last fall on the creek banks here:

Through the tunnel under Carling Ave., approaching the bridge that connects Dick Bell park on the left with Andrew Haydon Park on the right:

Heading through the marsh, and around the corner into the open Ottawa River:

Andrew Haydon Park on the right:

Around another corner, and we enter the mouth of Graham Creek:

There is a little sand beach here:

Heading towards the Graham creek bridge:

Into the big culvert under Carling Avenue:

We couldn't get any further once we were through the culvert, as the creek got too shallow there to be navigable.  We turned around, and this is coming out the park end of the Culvert:

The Ottawa river is in the distance as we come out of the creek:

We headed a little further east.  This is a condo building at Bayshore drive, where the eastern corner of the park meets the bike path:

Then back to Stillwater creek.  Here's the inside of the tunnel:

The home stretch of the creek:

We turned the corner, and used that log on the right side of the creek to steady ourselves to get out.

The weather was perfect!  Low 20's, not too windy, not humid, full sun.  I hope we get out again this year, last year we kayaked only once as I travelled so much last summer.  In this year of Covid-19 I should be around more, so if the weather cooperates we hope to do it again, either here, or driving off to another wet destination.

Snowshoeing in Andrew Haydon Park and Stillwater creek

OK, just a quick trip back to the present to show you some photos from today.  I went out snowshoeing in the late afternoon today along the creek behind our house, into Andrew Haydon Park and along the Ottawa River.  It was cold out (-18) but snowshoeing is such good exercise that I was warm the whole time.

Shoreline of the Ottawa river:

Andrew Haydon Park:

Stillwater creek behind our house:

A swampy area along the creek that is now nicely frozen for exploring:

Our house from down at creek level.   I snowshoe right out our back gate.

La Machine

These photos are from July 28.  As part of the Canada 150 celebrations in Ottawa this summer, some street performance art called "La Machine" came to town from France.  Long Ma, a Dragon-Horse, and Kumo, a giant spider, are huge mechanized creatures that wandered and duelled in downtown Ottawa over the course of 4 days.  The backstory is that Kumo has stolen Long Ma's wings, and they both roam the streets of downtown, with Long Ma battling Kumo at intervals to try to get them back.  We went down on the Friday to see them encounter each other for the first time.

Ed took these first two of Kumo at rest:

Here is Long Ma at rest over lunch, the battle was scheduled for 2 pm:

This shows the machinery that operates Long Ma:

The crowd was really big, but well behaved.  This is as close as we got for the battle part, there is a spider way off in the distance waving its giant legs:

Ed took these next few with his zoom lens.  You can see Kumo's orchestra that follows behind her on raised platforms:

The dragon is not happy, and exhales some smoke to prove it:

Kumo takes off after Long Ma to start roaming the streets again:

We hate crowds and were at our quota of standing around, so we took off in the other direction.  It was cool to see it though, and then to watch the videos on Youtube from people who had had closer encounters with them.

MosaiCanada 150

I kind of got derailed about posting about Hawaii, but I will get back to it!  In the meantime, here are some photos of the MosaiCanada topiary displays that are in Parc Jacques-Cartier this summer.

Ed got to learn about a lot of sterotypical Canadian iconography on this outing.  Here he is with the Mountie, representing Saskatchewan:

The lobster fisherman, Nova Scotia:

The muskoxen (my favourites!) represent the Northwest Territories, and the inukshuk is for the northern lights (which are pictured on the other side so you can't see them from this angle):

The drum dancer is for Nunavut, and the polar bear behind him is for Manitoba:

The dragons are for Beijing, I guess they get an honourable mention on Canada's 150th, so we can't be accused of being too parochial.

The voyageur:

Bison grazing:

And a couple of Mother Earth:

I really liked this event, it was my favourite of the Canada's 150th birthday celebrations.