THE MORGAN VISIT!!!

Bree arrived late on Thursday night, ready for her own "Ottawa adventure". After a quick catch up to find out what she'd been up to, we got ready for the coming weekend.

Saturday came quickly, with the Grade 6's playing at half time of the Ottawa Swans and Toronto Eagles match. The kids played very well, with the stacked red team sure to win!!!! Unfortunately things don't always go to plan, with the Black team taking the game by the scruff of the neck, winning 1.4.10 to 0.0.0 (the ball didn't cross the centre circle!!!

On Sunday we got ready to go to Parc O Mega - to show Bree some wonderful wildlife. We were fortunate to experience the "Birds of prey" live show - their first for the year. Getting up close and personal with these magnificent creatures was unbelievable (along with the other 15 people in the crowd!!!)

The time we had with Bree was short, yet fun - and we wish her all the best on the rest of her trip!!!

CLEE Weekend - 1000+ islands

Another weekend filled with Aussies, Kiwis and a handful of Poms. We headed down to Gananoque (near Kingston), which is 2 hours from Ottawa. Arriving late evening, we headed to the local - for a few brews - then out for dinner. Catching up with mates - John, Tracy (Rowville) we enjoyed a few beers by the pool with the rest of the crew!

Saturday morning we were up early, readying ourselves for the 3-hour boat cruise through the 1000+ islands - some huge, some - well no more than a solitary tree - quite good viewing!

After the cruise we headed out to the local arts theatre for a comedic performance. The play was well performed, but a little confusing, as it had a lot of Canadian jokes / humour, which caused a few to head to bed early - some during the performance!

Sunday we left Gananoque, heading to the Medi-eval festival, held at Upper Canada Village. Seeing men smash one another for 10-15 seconds at a time in full armour was awesome, as well as some "hard hitting" jousting, from some of the top ranked men in "jousting" worldwide - see the clip! The blokes would be sore tomorrow!

Luckily for us, we got chauffer driven by Kiwi - in her new wheels - very spiff!!!

Take me out to the ball game

441 km's from Ottawa lies the beautiful city of Toronto - pronounced "Tronto" by the locals. With Mum and Dad here for their final weekend, we decided that we'd see one of America's greatest past times, baseball. Coercing Dad into going was relatively easy, especially since

a) it was sport
b) Orioles were playing
c) it was sport!

Leaving early Sat morning, we arrived after a 4 and a half hour drive - staying in Carlton street (YUK). Great location, right in the heart of the gay and lesbian district - which suited both Dad and I to a tee ;)

We made our way to Rogers Stadium (the old sky dome) - there were people all around the park. Entering the 50,000 seated stadium, we found it to be rather empty (and with the mercury hitting 30 degrees - and a lot of humidity) we were glad to be seated under cover.
The game was relatively slow - with the Blue Jays (Toronto) only scoring in the 1st and 9th inning, the crowd was rather sleepy! But woke when the Jays rallied late in the game.

After the completion of the game, we got to watch an interesting sight, seeing the roof close - 16 minutes, a rather interesting way too!
Leaving the stadium, we wandered around downtown Toronto to find a large number of tents, playing host to a dog show zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Heading out to dinner - we enjoyed a fantastic meal & desserts - drinking Steam whistle beer (it's easy to play the bottles - making plenty of noise!!) We then found another festival on in town, listening to the finale - a fiddler - quite good!

Sunday came quickly - so we decided to head up the tallest tower in the world (on a technicality, whilst the towers in K.L are being built!). A great view of Toronto was found, as well as the opportunity to stand on a see through plate of glass - looking at the Skydome below! Very cool.
Before leaving we noticed a brewery nearby - needing a quick drink, we found out it was the STEAM WHISTLE brewery, where we had a few "freebies", as well as buying a case for Dad to take a few back out of home....

A fantastic weekend!!!