Ottawa Flooding

Margot, Glosette Girl and I were in the Aylmer, Quebec area this past weekend and snatched a glimpse of the Ottawa river. It's incredibly swollen and has spilled its banks everywhere along both sides of the border.

Bike path...gone

Actually there are reports that some parts of Ottawa and Aylmer/Gatineau are experiencing the worst flooding ever. It's so sad to listen to the stories in the news about people whose homes have been flooded.  There is a lot of talk of requiring people in these flood prone areas to move or buying them out. The problem is that in many cases some of the poorest areas have been hit and the residents who live there couldn't afford to move even if they wanted to.

One way or another, something has got to change. The Ottawa river is just too powerful to hold back forever and with climate change causing regular "floods of the century" every two years ago what used to be high and dry land is now a flood plain.

Imagine trying to stop that with sandbags...

Earth Day Cleanup: Chapman Mills conservation area

Today the temperature hit a heavenly 23 degrees (which is right about right for Ottawa, which pretty much always skips over spring and heads straight to summer). We originally didn't have any plans for the day, but not wanting to waste the glorious weather, Glosette Girl and I reached out to our network of friends with kids to see if anyone would be interested in a last minute Earth Day cleanup as an excuse to enjoy the sun.

As some of you may know, "Last minute" and "parents" is like oil and water. Most of our friends had to take a pass. Fortunately, Margot's friend A and her family were onboard!

So at 11 am this morning we met them at Chapman mills conservation area, in the south end of Ottawa, equipped with garbage bags and gloves and ready to pickup trash.

"Little hear you squirts, everyone picks up 25 lbs of garbage, or else!"

I knew, from last year's mini cleanup, that Margot would be an enthusiastic garbage picker. Margot's friend A and her little brother were just as good.

"OK, the best place for the 6 year old is next to the highway. Off you go!"

It turned out to be a really fun experience. The kids made clean up song and kept on yelling how much they liked the environment. We also got quite a few "thank yous" from other users of the trail.

What does it mean when picking up trash bring as much happiness as Shopkins and Pokemon?

To be honest, I think more people would have been interested in joining an organized cleanup put on by the city of Ottawa if one had been arranged. I looked for such an event, but only found one in another, less scenic, park so decided to create my own event. Note to self: write letter to city and promote more Earth Day cleanups next year. at least we made our little corner of the world a little greener!

My local river!

Fortune Farms

I packed up the fam' this past weekend and drove into the Ottawa Valley for some good ol' fashioned sugar shack fun. It was a pretty fun time.

A modern operation: boiling sap away into maple syrup

The sugar shack we visited, Fortune Farms, doesn't have too many bells and whistles, like some other sugar shacks in the area, but they do a great job of explaining and showing you how maple syrup is made. They also dole out spoonfuls of free samples, which Margot and her cousin A appreciated.

Sampling the more traditional way to gather sap

The kids also appreciated the quasi-comedy routine a group of locals at the site, known as the "Kettle Boys", put on. Mostly it involves some cheesy jokes and the display some woodworking skills. Although I've heard the jokes before (Glosette Girl, Margot and I visited Fortune Farms last year ) there is a kindheartedness to them that makes it hard not to smile when you hear them.

Sigh! Every time I visit the countryside around Ottawa a part of me wants to stay a bit longer. Life just seems more peaceful there and parts that run up against the Canadian Shield are very pretty. My image of life in the country is probably an illusion and I know I made the right decision for my family to move to downtown Ottawa but still, visits like this make cause me to daydream...

Margot and A walking the trails on the property - note the sap lines in the trees!

Tough Cookies: Country Livin' Style? Haha, maybe not.

Hidden Art of Hintonburg

We went for an evening stroll in the rain on Sunday. It was a perfectly marvelous aimless ramble with no particular destination in mind.

We managed to meander our way over to the Mechanicsville side of Wellington Street (the main street through this neighbourhod) where we stumbled across some cool hidden street art.

Actually the dog mural got some press recently.  It was a local resident's attempt to cover up some graffiti. I think she did a pretty cool job...but the city was less amused. Apparently this violated some local ordnance and the city told her to cover it up. 7-months later the mural is still here. I say good! When you live in a downtown neighbourhood you should expect some funkiness here and there. Plus, there are thousands of beige cookie-cutter row houses in this city and only one 20-foot tall French bulldog. Let's cut the home owner some slack for her creative solution to beautifying the area. Vive le grand chien libre!

Dowd Supply: A Rarity

I was walking Margot to school the other day without a care in the world while singing "Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah" when disaster struck and I slipped on some black ice and fell to the ground. Unfortunately for me, I bruised more than my ego; I just so happened to land in exactly the wrong way and the wrist band on my watch broke.

Not a great start to the day.

Luckily for me, there is a jewellery repair shop just around the corner from my house: "Dowd Supply".  I don't know how things are in your corner of the world, but shops that repair...well anything... are quite rare around here. Seriously, try and think of the last thing you got repaired. Shoes? Clothes? In our disposable society it's often easier and cheaper to just get something new.

But Hintonburg still has a few hidden gems like this, which is another of the neighbourhood's charms.  Dowd Supply is tucked away on Rosemount street near the local library.

Now, I'll admit, my watch isn't the best watch in the world (its probably a knock-off of a knock-off) but I was just not in the mood to go shopping for a replacement. So I decided to throw caution to the wind and see what kind of magic Dowd Supply could do.

It's going to take a few days before I get my watch back, which may seem like an eternity for some but I'm a patient man (the fact that I have a smartphone which tells time thus rendering a watch a pointless luxury doesn't hurt).  If all goes well I'll be back to singing "Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah" before you know it!*

If all goes poorly I'll sing more like these guys.