A misty autumn morning in Brantome.

Had a little business to do in Brantome this morning.  I lived in and ran a business in this little town for over 20 years until I retired in 2008 and moved away. Great to visit again, such a beautiful town, known in France as The Venice of the Perigord.

Part of the original walls that at one time surrounded the town, with some pre-history cave dwellings behind, the tower around 700 years old, the caves 3 to 4,000+ years old.

 Brantome's famous Abbey on the left, the tower was started by Charlemagne over 1200 years ago. Quite a bit of history here. 

Water, water everywhere.

Another view of the Abbey, founded by Charlemagne in 769AD.

Looking towards the Monks Garden from one of the bridges.

The Moulin de Abbey, Brantome.

Another part of the town walls, on one of the forks of the River Dronne.

The main part of the town is built on an island on the River Dronne, very picturesque!

From Ottawa Canada to The Perigord France

10am. taxi to the bus station in Ottawa, Greyhound Airport Shuttle to Pierre Elliot Trudeau Airport Montreal

                                                                                   

 Plane to Bordeaux France

 Over the St. Lawrence river after leaving Montreal.

Sunset over Newfoundland.

No pics of landing at Bordeaux - it was still dark.

Stopped in Montpon, an hour or so up the road from Bordeaux on our way to Perigeaux.

Breakfast - deux café grand crème avec pain au chocolat.  Eat your heart out Timmy!

A warm sunny morning in the Perigord and onwards to Perigeaux.

Pink Lake & The MacKenzie-King Domaine.

Friday was a lovely sunny day, a chance to re-visit Gateneau Park without the crowds. Our first stop was Pink Lake, the last time we were here it was so busy we could only look at the lake from afar.  

Going down the stairs to the lake shore.

Couple of shots of the lake, called Pink Lake after the family that lived here.

Back along the boardwalk to the parking.

Our next stop was the MacKenzie- King Estate, the first part of the walk went long side the Chute, a famous waterfall walk, as you can see there's not much water falling, why I don't know, after all the rain we have had over the last week you would have thought it would have been a raging torrent.

Our first sight of Moorside, Mackenzie-Kings summer residence. William Lyon MacKenzie-King was Canada's 10th. Prime Minister and served for 22 years in 3 spells from 1921 to 1948.

His hobby was rescuing bits of old buildings that were being demolished in Ottawa and rebuilding them in his garden.  This is parts of some windows from The British North America Bank Note Company, called the garden window.

Looking through the window at an English Rock Garden.

He called this the Arc de Triomphe, I think this was the main door into The British North America building.

Another view of Moorside.

This collection of ruins he called the Abbey.

I wonder if Mackenzie-King was the original building material recycler.

Mer Bleue & The Experimental Farm's Ornamental Gardens.

We set off today on what we thought was going to be a nice stroll along a boardwalk through some wetlands, the stroll turned out to be an 8km. hike, and the wetlands turned out to be a very special place indeed.  My knowledge of botany is not up to describing this place properly. I will leave that up to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/mer_bleue_conservation_area   or just google Mer Bleue Ottawa.

The boardwalk meandering through reeds and water.

A Black Capped Chickadee enjoying some grains left on the fence post

This is a fine looking fella. 

We are getting some super colours, I think its going to be a really good autumn for the leaf peepers.

This silver birch had some interesting fungi growing on its trunk

Ruth got back to the truck before me, telling me  here to get a move on, or I'l drive off without you.

Last Friday we had a walk around the Ornamental Gardens at the Experimental Farm in Ottawa.  I suppose when this farm was started by the government to find the right kinds of crops to grow in Canada it was out in the countryside, now of course its in the middle of the city.  How lucky are the people of Ottawa to have this on their doorstep!

Interesting flowers and vegetables together.

Lots of Monarch's around at the moment, soon be leaving for Mexico.

One of the few roses left, they have quite an extensive rose garden here, but a bit late in the season for them now.

Parliament Hill.

We have had some pretty miserable weather here in Ottawa for the last couple of days, this afternoon around 3pm, the clouds lifted and the sun came out, and we were off like a shot to Parliament Hill to take some pics. before the weather changed its mind.

We parked up in Bytown Market and walked across to the Alexander Bridge.  The first three pics. were taken on the bridge looking back towards Ottawa.

My camera has this wide angle/panorama thingy something on it.  having owned it for over a year I thought it was time to try it out, pic. above is with the thingy turned on, the one to the left in normal, quite impressive. The Parliament buildings on the right, the final locks on the Rideau Canal centre and the Chateau Laurier on the left. 

Statue of Samuel de Champlain on Nepean Point looking west along the Ottawa River. The chap below is an Anishinabe Scout, originally he was kneeling beside Champlain looking in the same direction, but he should have been in a canoe, only they ran out of money (government cuts I wonder!) this was back in 1918. The First Nations people didn't like that and rightly so, In 1990 they moved him here to Major's Hill Park, he still hasn't got his canoe!

This is Colonel John By, a pace of honour standing in Major's Hill Park overlooking the last locks on the canal and the Parliament Buildings above.

Chateau Laurier taked from Colonel By's statue.

A view of some of the flower beds in the Park. The Connaught Building in the background.

A couple of pics. of The National Gallery.

A different type of statue called Twist.

Just after 5pm. and the lights all wrong but we have to show Parliament Hill from this direction.

Above is the East Block. No pic. of the West Block-its covered in scaffolding. Below is the Confederation Building 

The Parliament Building housing the House of Commons and the Senate, with the Peace Tower in the centre.  The Centennial Flame was lit in 1967 to celebrate 100 years of independance.