Ottawa – (Miles to Date: 2775)
The weather has not been so kind to us in Ottawa but fortunately there are plenty of good museums to see. Yesterday was a really horrible wet day so we dragged ourselves out to the Canadian Museum of Science. Compared to the Museum of Civilisation this place was very under-funded but did have some fantastic exhibits – Jack and Emily just love this type of museum particularly the hands-on displays. They also have presentations on the hour and we managed to fit in two, one on Electricity and the other on Physics. The former one was particularly fun as the presenter got the children up and charged them up on a Van De Graff generator and then discharged it through them, giving them all an electric shock. Just love to watch children being tortured … heh, heh!!!
Today we had not quite had our complete fill of Museums so we went out to the Museum of Nature. Unfortunately half the building is under construction but we did manage to see the other exhibits – the most notable of which were the Dinosaur exhibits and the one on Genetics. The Dinosaur exhibit was great combing full size models, skeletons and multimedia to give one of the best exhibits we have seen on dinosaurs. I don’t know about you but rows and rows of dinosaur bones is not exactly interesting but mixed in with informative displays and multimedia it comes to life. The Genetic exhibition was fantastic – it tackled head on controversial subjects like cloning, stem cell research and genetically modified crops – in such a way it was fascinating for the adults and the children. No mean feat with this subject matter.
As some light relief from all the museums we had been to in the last week we decided to rush and fit in the Museum of Agriculture, which is a working farm in the centre of Ottawa. It was a great way to end the day. We were able to see the new born calves being fed (and we were able to stroke them), the cattle herd being milked and had a chance to stroke the sheep and goats. To finish the day we went to the area called Parliament Hill which has an impressive array of official buildings which were constructed to impress the word outside as Canada developed into a republic of significant standing. The parliament building even has a clock tower not too dissimilar to Big Ben. We were amazed how close you could approach the Parliament building itself – virtually no security at all. They even off tours around the parliament building.
The weather has not been so kind to us in Ottawa but fortunately there are plenty of good museums to see. Yesterday was a really horrible wet day so we dragged ourselves out to the Canadian Museum of Science. Compared to the Museum of Civilisation this place was very under-funded but did have some fantastic exhibits – Jack and Emily just love this type of museum particularly the hands-on displays. They also have presentations on the hour and we managed to fit in two, one on Electricity and the other on Physics. The former one was particularly fun as the presenter got the children up and charged them up on a Van De Graff generator and then discharged it through them, giving them all an electric shock. Just love to watch children being tortured … heh, heh!!!
Today we had not quite had our complete fill of Museums so we went out to the Museum of Nature. Unfortunately half the building is under construction but we did manage to see the other exhibits – the most notable of which were the Dinosaur exhibits and the one on Genetics. The Dinosaur exhibit was great combing full size models, skeletons and multimedia to give one of the best exhibits we have seen on dinosaurs. I don’t know about you but rows and rows of dinosaur bones is not exactly interesting but mixed in with informative displays and multimedia it comes to life. The Genetic exhibition was fantastic – it tackled head on controversial subjects like cloning, stem cell research and genetically modified crops – in such a way it was fascinating for the adults and the children. No mean feat with this subject matter.
As some light relief from all the museums we had been to in the last week we decided to rush and fit in the Museum of Agriculture, which is a working farm in the centre of Ottawa. It was a great way to end the day. We were able to see the new born calves being fed (and we were able to stroke them), the cattle herd being milked and had a chance to stroke the sheep and goats. To finish the day we went to the area called Parliament Hill which has an impressive array of official buildings which were constructed to impress the word outside as Canada developed into a republic of significant standing. The parliament building even has a clock tower not too dissimilar to Big Ben. We were amazed how close you could approach the Parliament building itself – virtually no security at all. They even off tours around the parliament building.
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