Photography
The pandemic and health issues have kept us from travelling, but with travel restrictions lifted and the ok from the health professionals we booked a trip to see our family in Orkney, Scotland.
Here are a few photos of our journey over and our first day. The blurrier photos were taken with my mobile phone.
The weather turned cold again and the birds came back looking for seeds. We have been hearing Robins early in the morning, but had yet to see any. They finally made an appearance. Cardinals are so stunning in their red coats. Has Spring truly arrived?
We took a short trip down to the Byward Market to get some Maple Syrup and Maple Candies. We haven’t been downtown in months and it was nice to see people out and about. I was a little nervous in one store as it was full of people and tight quarters. But it was still nice to be out.
The weather cooperated to shoot a few more visitors to our backyard bathtub feeder. I am hoping to entice some Bluejays with some peanuts in shells that I bought. The weather is supposed to me amazing this week so I know they will be hungry.
Been watching the Heathrow Airport like activity in my neighbours yard and so I decided to try and get in on the action. Disappointingly, only 1 squirrel visited today. Not A single bird. It was supper cold out, so maybe try again later in the week.
Be sure to click on the picture to see the whole image.
So it has been very cold here this week. One day it got down as low as -26c with a -36c windchill. This has kept me indoors as the roads and sidewalks are so icy. To satisfy my itch to do some photography, I trained the camera on the trees and bushes in our backyard. There is lots of wildlife back there. It surprised me how many different kids of birds that are still here with this cold weather. I know nothing about birds but they are great to photograph. One of my photos even caught the eye of our local news station and will be used in one of their shows this weekend. If I can figure out how to add a video I will include it below after it airs.
Ottawa’s LRT has been in the news since September, well really since it was launched due to all the issues and a couple of derailments it has had. This month the LRT is free as a thank you/make up for all the issues. We thought it would be a good opportunity to take a ride and spoil ourselves to some Beavertails in the Byward Market. So we took the train downtown and walked to the Beavertails Hut and it was closed due to a staff member having caught Covid. Very Sad. Took these photos while we waited for our train to go downtown.
There was a freezing rainstorm the other day and since I am still finding my legs, pulled out my 500mm and 300mm telephoto lenses and shot some wildlife in the trees in our backyard. I was nice and safe in the living room and the wildlife did it’s best to cooperate.
Stuck inside as it is a snow day in Ottawa. Tried heading out for a little walk with my walker but it is to slippery. The walker appears to have summer rubber and no way to change it over to winter mode. Thankfully I am getting confident enough to start walking with cane and it has a spike for ice and snow.
So since I was stuck in the day, I played around with my 50mm lens. Did a bit of time and motion and a bit of portrait photography.
In March of 2020 we booked two hotel rooms in Toronto for a night in May. My daughter and her best friend were coming from Scotland and they wanted to do all the Touristy things as my daughters best friend had never been to Canada. Covid happened and no travel was allowed. Unfortunately, this hotel would not refund our money but said we could come and stay another time, so long as it was before December of 2021. Fair enough.
Feeling strong enough to make a quick weekend away, off we went to Toronto. We were able to use the stay as 1 room for two nights. We took the bus down and the train back. The hotel was located just a couple of blocks from Union Station (Bus and Train Stops) so I was able to walk to the hotel.
We booked a visit to an amazing new attraction located in Dundas Square called Little Canada. Several very well made dioramas of cities in Ontario and Quebec. They are working on more and as a result of this visit, I will go back and see the new cities they are working on.
Just another couple of blocks away was the icon Flat Iron Building. Since I knew we were going to be so close, I just had to go and photograph it. We then walked another couple of blocks over to Brookfield Place. The atrium is often used in advertising. After this is was a long walk up to Nathan Phillips Square to the TORONTO sign.
We then walked back to the Hotel, for a very well deserved nap! Really enjoyed our unexpected trip and I was so glad I was able to have the leg strength for photography. It has taken days to recover from the trip, but it was worth it.