Winterlude in Ottawa

This weekend my family went on a trip to Ottawa to visit my brother at university and to finally see what Winterlude is all about! It had been a two years since we’ve all been together away, even just for a weekend. Our trip may have been short, but we still managed to have lots of fun together. After a quick lunch, we headed out to see the festivities.

 The ice carvings in Crystal Garden at Confederation Park were amazing.

 The even had one for the upcoming Pan Am Games in Toronto this summer.

 We were able to catch some ice sculptors in action while walking through the park.

They used a variety of power tools (sanders, grinders, chainsaws, etc), but also some handheld tools for the more fine details.

You can see the outline in marker of where this carver still needed to work on his design. 

In one area there were buckets of these colourful ice cubes for kids to use to make their own sculptures.

The kids held up the ice cubes onto the sculpture and then volunteers poured water over top of the cubes to set them in place. It was so cold that it only took a second for it to stick.

Throughout the park there were other displays including how to make maple syrup and ice fishing safety.

We even caught a few bands playing and some tap dancing on stage. I’m sure all that movement was keeping them warm!

You could also go skating up and down the famous Rideau Canal.

 We didn’t bring our skates, but we were happy to hang out on the ice with all the crowds.

How could you go to Winterlude and not try a Beavertail? I couldn’t eat them because of my allergy, but they smelled like those little tiny doughnuts you can get at the CNE. So yummy!

On our way back to the car, we popped into Northwest Territories Pavilion. They had real huskies walking around, Northern lights displays, stuffed animal exhibits, merchants and student ambassadors. The exhibit is on right now to promote travel to the Northwest Territories.

After a quick trip to the hotel to warm up, we headed out to dinner at the Sir John A pub. We split a pitcher of Kichesippi (a local Ottawa craft beer) and got some amazing food for dinner. I tried this Philly cheese steak wrap and it was so good, especially with a mountain of sweet potato fries on the side.

 Even the restaurant had an appropriate ice sculpture out front!

We headed back to our hotel and went to the hot tub to warm up before staying up late into the night talking.

On Sunday morning we went to Parliament Hill for a tour, which I’ll be sharing in another post this week. There was just too many photos to pack this into one post!

If you’re looking for something to do in the next few weeks, I’d say that the festivities at Winterlude are worth checking out – just be sure to dress really warm!