Ottawa trip ☆
Sep. 24th, 2018 08:56 pmI just realized that I haven't posted a single thing about my vacation to Ottawa. Whoops! Then again, I was rather busy. ;p Let's see....
+ The flight there was an overnight, which is unpleasant because I hate trying to sleep on planes, but... gotta' say, it's a pretty good way to maximize one's time.
+ As a refresher, the reason I decided to go to Ottawa in the first place is because the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau had a special exhibition about the Franklin expedition. WELL... the Franklin exhibit was a bit underwhelming, probably because most of the information was familiar to me, even if I hadn't seen any of the artifacts in person. But I'm still glad that I went, because otherwise, I would have always wondered. However! There was also a special exhibit on medieval Europe. Tons of neat things, including some really cool tapestries, and one of the Lewis chessmen. That was really neat to see. So, I don't mind at all that it was a bit of a long walk to Gatineau from downtown Ottawa. ;)
+ Speaking of the history museum though, holy shit, is it ever huge. I only saw half of it. Would have gone back again to see the rest, but never got around to it. It's just - seriously enormous. (If you are going to walk down there from Ottawa... make sure you eat. Um. Not that I made the decision of walking there and back on a warm day and with an empty stomach or anything. I'm not terribly smart. ;p )
+ The National Gallery was also very impressive. They had a nice variety in there - tons of Canadian works, of course, but lots of European stuff too, which I didn't expect. Unfortunately, I missed the impressionists exhibit by a couple of weeks (how disappointing) but I did manage to catch the exhibit on Venetian portraiture. Very glad I was able to see Alessandro Vittoria's sculpture in person - the bust of Giulio Contarini was quite an amazing sight.
+ I met up with my dear friend![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
icelilly! We've known each other for years, and it was so nice to finally talk face to face. Spent hours chatting about literally everything, and it was very, very nice. :) And now that I've told her some of my pending fic ideas, it means I'll have to write them! (Yay, accountability! ;p )
+ Also met up with my aunt and uncle. The last time I saw them, it was about 10 years ago. They were still living in Halifax at the time. It was nice to see them again. We ended up going out for supper, and it was really nice. (Mm, delicious Mexican food. Can't get that in Fort Mac.) Now, on account of this and my meeting with Lilly, I think I have fulfilled my sociability quota for the next two years. ;p
+ Did a little bit of Christmas shopping. Not as much success as I might have had in other locations, but I did find something really good for my mom, and she's the hardest one to buy for. So. I'm satisfied.
+ I went to a NAC orchestra performance! Beethoven's 7th and 8th symphonies. Absolutely lovely. It's been a while since I was last able to go to something like that, so I'm really glad that they had this concert series going on. Would have liked to attend more than one performance, but ah, well. I was in the city on the day they were doing the Pastoral Symphony, but by the time I knew about it, the only seats left for that particular performance were seventy bucks. I like Beethoven, but I don't like him that much. ;p
+ I also got a lot of writing done! Not as much as I had hoped, but still, a good amount. I finished the handwritten draft for one of the FTH fics, completed the revs for a longish SSSS thing I was working on, finished drafting a longish aRTD x SSSS crossover, cleaned up an old VME draft and posted it for shipping month, and slapped together a short Hetalia draft too. (It's Sve/Nor, so I think I'll sit on it until the prompts for their shipping week are posted.)
In all... a pretty good time. Oh, and people have been asking me about this, but - yes, I was there when the tornado hit; but it didn't touch down in the part of the city where I was staying, so I was fine.
I still have a bit of vacation time left, so I'll probably be going to Victoria in a couple of months. There is a ballet performance in November that I would love to see, but I'm unsure about the scheduling - I'll have to check a few things before I can commit to it. (But oh, if I could commit to it...!)
(And then in February, La Traviata - it's been ages since I've seen any opera in person, I would love to go - but it's a bit early to be planning for next year. But if I made that one a short trip, it would probably be easy to schedule it? I hope? HMM.)
+ The flight there was an overnight, which is unpleasant because I hate trying to sleep on planes, but... gotta' say, it's a pretty good way to maximize one's time.
+ As a refresher, the reason I decided to go to Ottawa in the first place is because the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau had a special exhibition about the Franklin expedition. WELL... the Franklin exhibit was a bit underwhelming, probably because most of the information was familiar to me, even if I hadn't seen any of the artifacts in person. But I'm still glad that I went, because otherwise, I would have always wondered. However! There was also a special exhibit on medieval Europe. Tons of neat things, including some really cool tapestries, and one of the Lewis chessmen. That was really neat to see. So, I don't mind at all that it was a bit of a long walk to Gatineau from downtown Ottawa. ;)
+ Speaking of the history museum though, holy shit, is it ever huge. I only saw half of it. Would have gone back again to see the rest, but never got around to it. It's just - seriously enormous. (If you are going to walk down there from Ottawa... make sure you eat. Um. Not that I made the decision of walking there and back on a warm day and with an empty stomach or anything. I'm not terribly smart. ;p )
+ The National Gallery was also very impressive. They had a nice variety in there - tons of Canadian works, of course, but lots of European stuff too, which I didn't expect. Unfortunately, I missed the impressionists exhibit by a couple of weeks (how disappointing) but I did manage to catch the exhibit on Venetian portraiture. Very glad I was able to see Alessandro Vittoria's sculpture in person - the bust of Giulio Contarini was quite an amazing sight.
+ I met up with my dear friend
icelilly! We've known each other for years, and it was so nice to finally talk face to face. Spent hours chatting about literally everything, and it was very, very nice. :) And now that I've told her some of my pending fic ideas, it means I'll have to write them! (Yay, accountability! ;p )+ Also met up with my aunt and uncle. The last time I saw them, it was about 10 years ago. They were still living in Halifax at the time. It was nice to see them again. We ended up going out for supper, and it was really nice. (Mm, delicious Mexican food. Can't get that in Fort Mac.) Now, on account of this and my meeting with Lilly, I think I have fulfilled my sociability quota for the next two years. ;p
+ Did a little bit of Christmas shopping. Not as much success as I might have had in other locations, but I did find something really good for my mom, and she's the hardest one to buy for. So. I'm satisfied.
+ I went to a NAC orchestra performance! Beethoven's 7th and 8th symphonies. Absolutely lovely. It's been a while since I was last able to go to something like that, so I'm really glad that they had this concert series going on. Would have liked to attend more than one performance, but ah, well. I was in the city on the day they were doing the Pastoral Symphony, but by the time I knew about it, the only seats left for that particular performance were seventy bucks. I like Beethoven, but I don't like him that much. ;p
+ I also got a lot of writing done! Not as much as I had hoped, but still, a good amount. I finished the handwritten draft for one of the FTH fics, completed the revs for a longish SSSS thing I was working on, finished drafting a longish aRTD x SSSS crossover, cleaned up an old VME draft and posted it for shipping month, and slapped together a short Hetalia draft too. (It's Sve/Nor, so I think I'll sit on it until the prompts for their shipping week are posted.)
In all... a pretty good time. Oh, and people have been asking me about this, but - yes, I was there when the tornado hit; but it didn't touch down in the part of the city where I was staying, so I was fine.
I still have a bit of vacation time left, so I'll probably be going to Victoria in a couple of months. There is a ballet performance in November that I would love to see, but I'm unsure about the scheduling - I'll have to check a few things before I can commit to it. (But oh, if I could commit to it...!)
(And then in February, La Traviata - it's been ages since I've seen any opera in person, I would love to go - but it's a bit early to be planning for next year. But if I made that one a short trip, it would probably be easy to schedule it? I hope? HMM.)
Yuu. Fic writer & book lover. M/Canada.