So much history of hockey in Ottawa. Arguably the sport started here and not Toronto but they went…read moredecades without a team and came back about two decades ago and then had an arena built for them far outside the city in Kanata. The arena, Canada Tire Centre, is quite dated but they do their best with a good fan experience. My wife and I went here for our first hockey game in Canada to see our Kraken play the Senators. It was Oktoberfest night and they had a Bavarian dance troupe that was fun to see from crowds up in the club level. Their star player Brady Tkachuk is amazing and grew up near me where his father Keith was on the Blues. Hence I got a Brady Tkachuk jersey from Fanatics to wear while my wife wore a Kraken jersey.

Ottawa Senators The original Ottawa Senators were founded…read morein 1883. They won the Stanley Cup 11 times playing in the NHL from 1917 until 1934. For complicated reasons I don't understand the team moved, changed names, and possibly went bankrupt. You can research the details if you're interested. On December 6, 1990, after a two-year public campaign by Firestone, the NHL awarded a new franchise, which began play in the 1992-93 season. The Senators have made 16 playoff appearances, won four division titles, and won the 2003 Presidents' Trophy. They made an appearance in the 2007 Stanley Cup Finals but lost to the Anaheim Ducks in five games. So there you have the history that is important to me. I support all the teams because of my love for the sport. This one has a place in my heart because of the history. I'm not sure I'll ever get to see them play live. I hope their local fans support them so they won't lose their place in the NHL. NHL wants to expand the league not lose teams.

The Arts Court is great because you can go to see many different galleries without leaving the…read morebuilding. Within the Arts Court "complex" there is Saw Gallery, video and Club, The Ottawa Art Gallery, the Firestone Collection of Canadian Art, Le Groupe Dance Lab. Entrance is pay what you can, though I did not see where to put my donation! I really enjoyed browsing around, as the gallery was literally empty except for my friend and I, so we could see things at our own pace. It's great to have works by such different artists all in one place. It would have been nice to have some help finding the different galleries though, there were not many staff people around to give directions or answer questions about the exhibits.

I might be a bit biast as I work in the building, but it is truly a hub of local artists and arts…read moreorganizations (over 25!). There is so much going on inside these heritage building walls! From the Ottawa Art Gallery, to the Theatre, Club Saw/Saw Gallery/SAW video to Ottawa Dance Directive - there is always something happening here. Most of the activities in Arts Court are free, fundraising or at very low cost and the programming benefits a wide audience. The down side is that the listings aren't grouped anywhere together, outside of the Artlist (Artengine's e-blasts). In addition, the old Courthouse's layout is a real maze to navigate and unfortunately, some people get lost, give up and get out before they've discovered something exciting or found what they've come to see in the first place.

FINNNAALLLLYYY.... I'M BACK!!!!!! YEAAAHHHH!!!…read more I waited three years to finnnnnaaallllyyyy be able to do Ottawa Race Weekend. My husband and I signed up for our races the week they launched back in September 2022 in anticipation for the event in May 2023. That's right, we were SERIOUS about doing this!! Four years ago (2019), I signed up for the Voyageur Challenge that later became virtual and I felt it was only fitting to do the same races in-person--5km and 10km on Saturday and 1/2 marathon on Sunday. My hubby wanted to do the same with me, but I told him it's best to do the 17km challenge--2km, 5km, and 10km on Saturday--because he wouldn't have as much time as I would to train for the 1/2 marathon. Believe it or not, this is not my first ORW. I did my first 10km in Ottawa 10 years ago, back in 2013!!! It was super nostalgic to be doing the race 10 years later and the 10km route was pretty much the same, as I vaguely remember. ORW is Canada's largest race weekend. People come from all around the world to compete and to participate in it. ORW also hosts the Canadian National Championship for the 10km run; this was pretty cool for me to see some of the top runners in Canada at the starting line. The weather was HOT. And, honestly, I've been told before that the weekend of ORW is usually hot and humid, so I wasn't surprised. What was hard was running in the heat. For the 5km at 4pm, I was hoping for a water station at 2.5km in, but it wasn't until the 4km mark was there a water station--this is my only complaint about the race. For the 10km at 6:30pm, the heat started cooling quite a bit with the sun setting and shade. The run along the Rideau Canal was very scenic. My husband and I stopped by a tulip flower bed to take a quick shot during the race. For the 1/2 marathon at 9am, I was expecting it to be miserable as the race would just get hotter and hotter, but the temperature wasn't too bad. There were more water station evenly spread throughout the course and water sprinkling station to help cool you off. I also loved the water towel, which was nice, but given a bit too early near the first quarter of the race. I loved how I got to run by famous monuments and buildings in Ottawa AND Quebec--yeah, the 1/2 marathon course is spread between downtown Ottawa and Gatineau and Hull. The entire race was very beautiful and I loved the breeze from the river. My favourite was the Xtra Mile Crew near the end of the race who were volunteers that came by you to run part of the course and to cheer you on. By the 18km mark, I started to hit a wall and was struggling to finish. I was losing momentum and steam, but three Xtra Mile Crew joined me on different segments to help get me through to the finish line. THANK YOUUUU!! Another thing I love about ORW is how involved locals are at coming out to cheer for runners. There were some neighbours that turned on their sprinklers for runners to cool off, and there were kids with water guns shooting at runners, hahaha!! People held signs such as "Pain is for French Bread", "Longest run for a free banana", or my personal favourite, "Is Strava the new Bumble? Add me!"--I laughed so hard when I saw the latter one. More than all the pretty bling that I got at the end of my races, I had an overwhelming feeling of gratitude in the end. I am just so grateful for completing something I had wanted to do it for so long, and I am super grateful that my hubby was able to join me for the journey. Next time I'm back in Ottawa, I gotta catch up with Jennifer P.!! =P

I came to Ottawa Canada to partake in the 2016 edition of the Tamarack Ottawa marathon. It had all…read morethe hallmarks of being a great race, but heat advisories this year made me think something eventful / bad would go down that morning. It did. After completing my 50 states marathons in America, I needed a new goal and found out that there are 42.2 km races all over Canada. I've already done 3 provinces in 2015, let's add 2 more in 2016, the other being Rock n Roll Montreal in late September. So here I was traveling to Ottawa Canada to participate in the marathon to pick up Ontario as the latest province. I arrived in Ottawa a few days earlier to get acclimated. Once race weekend approached, I was excited to finally go to the expo to pick up my race kit and explore the expo with the vendors and races out there. I didn't know Toronto had a marathon in early May. In hindsight, I will be thinking about that one in the future, among a short list of ones to re-do for Ontario. The entire race experience ended up to be what I had thought was going to happen, wished that it didn't happen, but it happened anyway. I'm so mad and very flagrantly disappointed at what did happen, but I can't dwell on it for too long, as I have to plan the next one - and the next one. The heat advisories were evidently there at least 10 days before race morning. At 5 days out, they issued out alerts to participants. During race weekend, more issued alerts for a better race experience, even adding more aid stations and misting stations along the course, to help cool down racers and participants. The Ottawa marathon race officials even asked residents along the course to use their hoses to help cool down the race participants. All these precautions didn't really help, as I was told at 11:30am, 4 1/2 hours into the marathon that parts of the marathon course was closed due to hot weather conditions and I was redirected from 27 km to the quickest way to the finish line. It was very disappointing and angry again when I was told the news by a race course volunteer. Regardless of what happened, I just arrived to get to the finish line and salvaged what was not 42.2 km, but was about 30km for me. I received the finisher medal for the marathon, but vowed to do 12.2km or more that afternoon to make up for it while sightseeing around downtown Ottawa. The race route that I did travel on was nice and quite scenic. A mixture of both green urban parks along with city and urban flavor made it a pretty good urban marathon for the capital city of Canada. Unfortunately for this American who visited from Honolulu, USA, I found that canceling the race and detouring the race was quite disappointing. While race morning of May 29, 2016 was as close to June and summer temperatures, I certainly did not agree with what reaction went down, knowing full well of the weather reporting 10 days before the events. Race weekend started on the Friday before with the marathon expo and packet pick up, with the 5 km and 10 km race distances on Saturday. They actually had to move the start times for the shorter distances to acclimate to the heat, but didn't touch the marathon. I would have been way better off starting at 6am versus 7am to beat the heat. Needless to say that I will not be back to redo Ontario for my Canadian province quest. I'm hoping that they either would consider an earlier start time or moving the race day to earlier in the month to prevent heat related weather. The expo itself was larger than I expected. It was held at the Shaw Centre in downtown Ottawa. Packet pickup was in 2 parts, with the bib pick up on the first floor, the race shirt pick up on the 3rd floor, and the third party vendor expo nearby. I did like the race t-shirt though. Very Canadian for sure with the maple leaf and everything. For what it's worth, I would like to say that this marathon is one of the largest in Canada, with a cap of 5,000 runners in the marathon and is open to all. 7 hour time limit. 1 star for what happened on race day, but 3 stars for the organization, aid stations, crowd and community support, and scenery. Support local! C

There is a lot going on at Maker Space North. There are all sorts of different small businesses…read moreworking out of the main building and event within the Maker Space as well. Also, the main large space can be rented for different events such as craft fairs and other trade show events. I attended and participated (with Yelp) in one such craft show, and was really impressed by the turn-out at this location, even though the main doors have an unusual entrance situation. They do well to make the most of the space, but warning, it gets HOT in this space in the summer. It's also conveniently located in the same space as the Art-Is-In bakery, so certainly worth checking out next time you are grabbing some yummy baked goodies.

The Inventors Association (Ottawa) is a great organisation for new Ottawa area Independent…read moreInventors to learn about the invention process from experienced inventors. Each month a presenter is invited to speak on a topic of interest to inventors. This is a good place to network with other inventors, who are friendly and quite supportive of new inventors.

Probably a 3.5 stars is about right,…read more What a lovely way to use open space in a mall! This outlet brings charm, character and culture to the Hazeldean Mall! The Art Gallery's full time permanent home is on Campeau, but from April of 2014 until October, they are also occupying a space in the Hazeldean Mall where the card and gift shop used to be. This big bright open space will change their display every month. They are showing a variety of local artists' works, from photography to painting, sculpture, and mixed media. Very intriguing! I might add that the pieces on display are in fact for sale.

One hidden gem of a Gallery in the same building as the Beaverbrook Public Library. This is an…read moreartist run gallery so chances are you will meet one of the artists.

Another Winterlude event...which I don't know how to rate. 18 days worth of creative happenings…read moreand cool events but I didn't attend any that I loved. The winter happenings are scattered between the Byward Market and Sandy Hill and there are some meh events to some that look amazing. I haven't had a chance to go to any of the festival events but some of the other events I went to, I didn't love or didn't even realize it was happening until much later. Some of art is a must see though. Here are the events for this year. http://downtownrideau.com/docs/Chill_Factor_Program_2013-1.pdf

I have to give it up to the Ottawa Fashion Week (OFC) crew that runs this event every few months…read more It can't be an easy thing getting designers to come out of their way to Ottawa let alone come up during our winter season. The event is made up of multiple daily fashion shows and after parties for people to mingle with. It hasn't got to the size of the Milan Fashion Week but I bet the OFC crew is trying to grow it there!!! I reviewed Milan here ;) http://www.yelp.ca/biz/settimana-della-moda-milano This event has happened all over the city, from the National Gallery, to Little Italy and now the Convention Center. Previous events started off with a lot of Canadian talent but over the years they've brought in more International designers. It's actually pretty cool! You might be asking what I know about female fashion? Let me be the first to share a secret with you. Absolutely nothing! I just like kicking back, watching the show, listening to the music and hoping my jaw doesn't hit the ground. Come check it out and support the Ottawa fashion scene or come out to an after party to mingle! Part of your ticket sale goes to a charity, this current one to UNICEF.