City Daily Photo Theme Day: Favourites

For the last theme day for City Daily Photo, the theme is Favourites, and you can see other interpretations of the theme right here. 

I decided to select several from over the years. This first one was the first shot I featured in the blog back in 2013. The Peace Tower on Parliament Hill is nicely framed from within the entrance of East Block. It's not possible to take this shot right now, what with restoration work being done on Centre Block and in East Block; this entrance is presently fenced off.

Parliament Hill in a different manner: each year during the summer a multimedia show is projected onto Centre Block (not this year, but Covid might have a lot to do with that). This shot is from near the end of one such show.

This shot is from September of 2015. For several years Ottawa featured an all night event on a given Saturday night called Nuit Blanche (which I wish they'd bring back). I was out and about that night taking in arts events at various spots, including Arts Court, where Allison Blakley, a member of a local dance group, was putting on an audience participation performance mixing together the pinata and Beethoven's Sixth Symphony. After the performance, I got this shot of her, with a marvelous expression.

One of the big festivals each year is Winterlude, held both in Ottawa and Gatineau, and this shot features a large snow sculpture in Jacques Cartier Park over in Gatineau.

Another festival is of course the Tulip Festival, and this shot is taken in Major's Hill Park here in Ottawa during a previous year.

2017 was the year of Canada's 150th anniversary of Confederation, and there were multiple events that year. One of the biggest weekends featured La Machine, a street performance company that  held this event over several days with giant machine animals moving through the city streets towards an inevitable confrontation. This was the first time the company performed in North America, and one of the two beasties was a spider.

The other was a dragon horse. This shot was taken as it passed Parliament Hill.

Another event that year was MosaiCanada, a display of giant topiaries over in Jacques Cartier Park. They included my favourite, a First Nations take on Mother Earth, surrounded by animals. She was huge.

Another of the events usually held each year is Doors Open, which brings visitors into over a hundred different buildings and facilities over a weekend in June. This year it wasn't held, but this shot from last year stuck with me. I was in the National Arts Centre on stage, and happened to take this shot of a woman holding up the conductor's baton. Her smile made the shot.

This shot is from 2017 before Christmas, a vintage shop not far from where I live. This cat was sitting in the window at the time. It's the same cat I featured in a post a few days back, dozing in the same window.

Here we have a shot from last year, taken at the University of Guelph while I was visiting southern Ontario. The gryphon in the background is the school symbol. My brother and I are both miscreants, scoundrels, rogues, and rascals. And proud of it.

I finish with two shots taken in the fall of 2018, on the same day in the Gatineau Hills. The Mackenzie King Estate is in the heart of Gatineau Park, gifted by Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King to the country. Along with the homes on the estate are several follies that King had erected, using parts of other buildings. This one is called the Abbey.

Not far away is the Champlain Lookout, where the Hills have a dramatic overlook of the Ottawa River Valley as the river comes from places further west and north. 

Immaculate Conception

Picking up where we left off yesterday, here are more views of the basilica.

I started descending back down to the street, taking a shot of the basilica beside its neighbour. Once a convent, the building now houses the Guelph Civic Museum. I decided on a second filter for the shot.

A half hour or so and some errands later, and things looked brighter. The basilica dominates the skyline of the city, as seen in this view from the downtown.

A couple of nights before my visit, I photographed the basilica from down below. I decided to conclude with this, and used a second filter for it as well. Tomorrow I'll show you for a couple of posts around Toronto.

The Church Of Our Lady

This view looks towards downtown Guelph from the highest ground in the city: Catholic Hill. A local history museum and a basilica stand up here.

This statue stands here. John McCrae was the Canadian soldier, doctor, and poet who wrote In Flanders Fields during the First World War while serving in Europe. Guelph was his family hometown. This statue is by Ruth Abernethy, and is one of a pair of matching statues. The other one is here in Ottawa.

The Church Of Our Lady Of The Immaculate Conception is the most prominent church in Guelph, designated a minor basilica by Pope Francis and a national historic site of the country. Designed in the High Victorian Gothic Revival style, its main construction was between 1876-1888. A parish has been here from the earliest days of the city, a half century earlier. I took this first shot and went with two different filters for it.

I've been in the church before, but as was the case last summer, it was locked up. I started to walk around.

Here we have the back view of the basilica. Again, I decided to go with different filters for this view. Tomorrow I'll have more from here.

Winter Vantages In Guelph

Today I start with three shots taken on three different days in Guelph, at roughly the same spot. There is a wetland area neighbouring the retirement home where my father lives.

Railroads run through the city. This first view looks northwest from a spot near Woolwich and Speedvale.

And this looks southeast along the same track, back to where I was in the above shot. Woodlawn Cemetery is the area at left. A newer portion of the cemetery is actually along the right hand side of the track.

The Speed River, downslope from my father's home, stays open all winter, and so Canada geese remain here through the season, coming up from the river on a regular basis, such as with these four seen from the living room window.

I was awake early enough on a couple of days to get dawn views.

I headed into the nearby Riverside Park for a walk. The bandstand is quiet through the winter.

The river keeps flowing. There are signs that beavers are in the area, with the odd tree that's been gnawed on.

A pedestrian bridge crosses the Speed River in the park. This view looks upstream.

And this looks downstream.

Further downstream in the park, a windmill stands alongside the river.