First snowstorm of the season

It has been a quiet time for us in Blogland. We've both been toiling at our decidedly un-intellectual jobs, so there has not been terribly much to report. Mel's still getting up before 5am the poor chook.
Canada has a constantly changing landscape. It's starting to average -4*C here (dropping to minus 15 at times). Brutal, but according to locals we've 'not seen anything yet'. 'Just wait until it gets really cold you wimps' they subtext. 'We're only here for one winter, hahaha', we think back.









We'd had a couple of light dustings of snow in recent weeks, but on Wednesday there was a full on snowstorm in Ontario. It never reached whiteout conditions, but there was a steady fall for the entire day - 30 centimetres worth. It was awesome! And in a 24 hour period the city looks completely different. Naturally we got out in it and engaged in a little bit of horseplay. People stopped in the street to watch us having snowball fights, riding woolly mammoths, etc.









The snow looks quite beautiful when it falls under the street lamps. It is also quite the muffling / insulating substance when it builds up. The city gets much quieter as the veil of snow descends. Then it gets much noisier as all the snowplows come out to clear the roads and sidewalks.

The view from Castille Dave and Mel during the storm

Dave has decided to assist Tourism Ottawa with some of their slogans.

Come to Ottawa: Experience an arctic adventure every time you step outside the door!
Ontario; Land of Sunshine (Tourism Ottawa can't guarantee more than 5 hours a day)










Experience Ottawa's excellent biking conditions!

Canadian travel warning: wear 3 layers if you want to stand on the balcony.









Relax in comfort and take a load off as you explore the city!

Needless to say we're enjoying the novelty of this winter wonderland.

The Campervan - a tribute

We finally sold our campervan the other day. We had a lot of fun over the summer traveling right across the continent in our little home. Here is a tribute in pictorial form.

Getting Chilly

The temperature has been dropping here in Ottawa over the past few weeks. Although today was a lovely day of around 12 degrees, it has often hovered around the freezing mark. It snowed here for the first time a few days ago, although as soon as it hit the ground it turned to water. An exciting precursor of things to come though. Walking to the market yesterday was a very cold experience, but Dave had a lot of fun breaking up the icy shields formed on top of puddles overnight.Last night we went out to the ice hockey to watch the local team - The Senators. It was a great game, very fast and almost excessively violent. A fistfight is an obligatory part of every match, and it is actually part of the game to try and crunch your opponent up against the plexi-glass walls of the rink. It was a lot of fun, although they ended up losing 3-2.
The noise of the skates slicing along the ice is great, as well as the sound of the puck being belted around. They have 6 players on the field at once including the goalie, but each team consists of about 25 guys. So they are constantly swapping on and off! Our friend Sandra got us the tickets to this match - so thanks Sandra!

Halloween - A Fun Night Out

Our group before heading out.

Canadians really get into their Halloween, and Ottawans are no exception. We had loads of fun dressing up and wandering around from house party to bar to other bar. The night is probably best told in pictures.

Sarah as 'Marie Antoinette' with the Black Spy from 'Spy vs Spy'. Sarah ended up winning best costume for her efforts.
Who's that hot flamenco dancer?
Face paint - sticky on the lips and eyeballs.

Zap Branagan from 'Futurama'











Ric the zombie king makes one Japanese girl's night.











Not sure what this guy is meant to be - half Mickey Mouse, half cow?

It must get hot in that thing.

Even closer to Halloween

In further preparation for Halloween, or perhaps just because they are strange, last Sunday drew many Ottawans to the Ottawa Zombie Walk 2009.

There were lots of cool costumes, plenty of fake blood and many calls for 'braaaiiiins'. The children in the crowd took it all way too calmly.

'A zombie took my baby koala'

A tribute to Michael Jackson

Halloween preparation

One of the fun things that Canadians celebrate is Halloween. It is just over a week away, and so we have been getting ready to participate in this for the first time. The stores are filled with lots of decorations and there seem to be costumes for sale everywhere you go. One of the coolest traditions is carving pumpkins and making jack-o-lanterns. Dave tried his hand at it with a little pumpkin he bought, and the result is in the pictures above and below. A pretty good effort for a first go! We burned a candle in him until the wax started to ooze out of his mouth. Icky, but somehow appropriate.

Dave-o-lantern.

Our landlords were kind enough to take us to a costume store that specialises in Halloween. The store was amazing - rows and rows of costumes, make up and accessories. You can buy almost anything in there to make you look scary. One of Mel's favourites was a latex stick-on patch for your arm, that made it look as though a pencil had gone through it. Would have been great for a "dead school teacher"costume!

A mask display at Audrey's Costume Store.

Ric, our landlord, loves to dress up, and will do so for almost any occasion. So you can imagine how excited he is at Halloween. He doesn't celebrate it just one day - he has a week's worth of costumes! In honour of our first Halloween and the trip to the costume store, he decided to dress up in one of his outfits and freak out the customers. At 6"7', he is a sight to be seen!

Mel and Ric (he's the one in the costume...)

We are still putting the final touches on our costumes, but you'll have to wait until after Halloween to see the results...

One of the displays from the costume store.

Fall

6 degrees C, rainy and a great day for a bicycle ride

The seasons change fast here in Canada. In just two weeks the temperature has dropped drastically and many of the trees have started losing their leaves and changing colour, revealing vibrant oranges and reds.
We trek up to the farmers market each weekend for bags-worth of fresh vegetables. We even found a purple cauliflower and decided to give it a go.




Nice haircut on that freaky cauli.









Dave got a few days work delivering new recycling bins around Ottawa. These are large compost/ food waste bins and a really neat idea for reducing the residential waste stream by 45%.