Ottawa: Still Cold

Returning to Ottawa after 22 years, Keith was quickly reminded of a certain kind of March that we just don't have in Vancouver.

However, it also has buildings like no-where else out west. The blowing snow and the stubborn, dramatic structures, like rock formations crystallizing out of the cold ground, were beautiful in a way that they never had been to a busy student.

Byward Market doesn't really compare to Granville Island, but that's just not being fair.

It did offer up a delicious Atlantic salmon pie for lunch.

Bourgeois' Mother spider at the National Gallery.

Roxy Paine's 100 Foot Line looked like a crack in the flat grey sky.

Just outside the front door, the National Gallery has an unintentional piece of light sculpture on their hands. Perhaps we can get a grant to name it and point it out to them, since it's already installed.

Sushi Go has great interiors and logo design. The ramen was okay.

With one word this became our favourite café. We're suckers for Futura anyway.

Aya grabbing $750,000 at the Canadian Mint.

On a completely unrelated note, we went directly to prison after that.

These are the cells converted to dorm rooms in the Ottawa Jail Youth Hostel. (We had a nicer room upstairs).

Chicken breasts from the market, one stuffed with Camembert and cranberries and the other with mushrooms and shallot butter. We cooked them up in the hostel kitchen.

A cold bottle of the ever-reliable Friexenet Cava, with its fine bubbles and citrus-mineral flavour was the perfect match. Prison food is not what it used to be.

The evening train to Montreal, another city full of beautiful buildings and amazing food.

We really did not expect to have quite so many posts about trains.

Kyoto Trains

Further on the Japanese railway theme, we saw these two posters in Kyoto in October, celebrating the 30th anniversary of the Kyoto City Subway.

Embroidering the trains onto "gama-kuchi" (frog-mouth) purses cleverly ties the subway system to Kyoto's history.

These are just adorable:

Yōkan (羊羹) is a thick jellied dessert made of red bean paste, agar, and sugar. It is usually sold in a block form, and eaten in slices. Kyoto is famous for it.

From the low number of views, it seems that not many people were interested in the train videos in our post a week ago. To show that we don't cave to popular opinion (or lack of it) here are two more.

A view of Kyoto rooftops on the way to Arashiyama (25 seconds)

Going from Osaka station to Shin-Osaka, the first leg of the trip from Osaka to Kyoto. We cross the huge Yodo-gawa river at 55 seconds (2:32):

For anyone who made it this far, click the map below to see the distance and route covered (blue line):

View Osaka to Shin-Osaka in a larger map

Okay, no more trains. Back to food and wine for a while.

Hankai Tramway from Abeno to Myokokuji-mae, Osaka

One of Japan's three remaining tramways (light rail, street car, etc) is the Hankai. Its Uemachi Line runs south from Tennoji in Osaka and passes within a few blocks of Aya's house in Sakai.


Traveling at street-level gives such a different view of the city and we often go into Osaka this way instead of on the much faster subway line.


These three videos were all shot on an October evening. They are slow and rhythmic and not exactly action-packed, but they offer glimpses of life that seem to float in pools of light, and can be fascinating if you're in the right mood.


We know it's crazy to expect anyone to watch these videos in their entirety, but we love this trip and we wanted to share it.

Part 1 (10 min):

Notes:
0:01 pedestrian proximity
0:30 departure 
2:10 big turn away from road, into residential area
3:09 two platforms float in the darkness 
3:31 level crossing 
4:25 pass opposite train (one of many) 
7:17 cars on the tracks due to narrow road


A search on Youtube turns up many more videos by people who really take this kind of thing seriously.


We have outlined the three parts of the route we captured on this Google Map:

View Hankai Tramway, Uemachi Line, Osaka in a larger map

Here is a link to the real one on Google Maps , where you can activate the amazing Street View.

Part 2 (10 min):

   

Notes:
0:07 depart

1:40 big turn
6:50 crossing the Yamato River
9:00 big turn

Part 3 (3 min):

Notes:
0:20 depart
0:27 Pachinko Enjoy!
0:30 big turn