I WANT TO EAT A NUT OF LAERMA!

A FEW PHOTOS FROM DOWNTOWN OTTAWA, FOR A CHANGE...

I didn't get to the anime club on Saturday because, as usual, I left rather late after having blogged and videogamed, and Cars started at 7 p.m.

Instead, enjoy some scenes from my late afternoon and evening stroll around downtown Ottawa. There are a few actual landmarks besides chain stores and fast food franchises in this set if you're patient.



Some guy getting on the 111 OC Transpo bus on Meadowlands. This is the only bus photo this time, and the only Nepean photo.



The Blockbuster Video on Ottawa's Bank Street Promenade.

I love how bold and upfront the signage on this one is, with the letters being almost as tall as the video store below.



The small-ish McDonald's franchise on Elgin Street in the southern part of downtown Ottawa, with some interesting alien graffiti on the building it's housed in.

I think they recycled the frame of the Elgin Street McDonald's sign from something else that used to be there (probably a laundromat or something).

ANIMATED GIF BONUS FUN: Watch the Elgin Street McDonald's sign dance! (EPILEPSY WARNING!)



The Elgin Street Wendy's... ooh, how exciting!



Place Bell Canada, which is about the closest thing that Ottawa has to a real skyscraper.

Not too impressive, I'm afraid. It makes the IBM-Marathon building in Montreal seem like Taipei 101 in comparison.

Though, from this angle, it looks kind of like the RCA Building/GE Building/NBC Building at Rockefeller Center.



Some church, the Lord Elgin hotel, and a Starbucks.

(Here's a close up on the Starbucks... or, rather, RBUCKS thanks to that tree.)



Looking up Elgin Street towards the War Memorial Cenotaph. The taxi is a Chevy Impala.



Ottawa City Hall on Laurier. It's modern... don't really have anything else to say about it.



The view from the Mackenzie-King Bridge looking north along the Rideau Canal towards Parliament Hill and the Chateau Laurier hotel.



The Sears department store side of the Rideau Centre and the Mackenzie-King Bridge OC Transpo Transitway stop.



The OC Transpo ticket/information booth inside the Rideau Centre with the distinctive bus facade-turned-map window.

Two hours later, after seeing Cars.

The Rideau Centre HMV, one of two HMV's in downtown Ottawa, neither of which comes close to the size of the downtown Montreal HMV superstore.

A shot of the side of the HMV from a stairwell.



A somewhat blurry night shot of the Rideau Street McDonald's. Those bus shelters are scheduled to be removed as they are havens for drug dealers.



And the Rideau Street Chapters bookstore and Starbucks Coffee, also blurry since I don't have a tripod.



An overhead shot of Rideau Street looking west towards the Chateau Laurier, taken from the walkway between Rideau Centre and the Bay department store. I actually got one of those time lapse headlight streaks!



The Rideau Canal, Parliament, the Chateau Laurier Hotel, and the Ottawa Convention Centre at night. I was actually able to compensate for not having a tripod by using the Mackenzie King bridge as a giant tripod, but a drop of water in the middle of the lens ruined that shot somewhat.


No, I didn't take a single self-pic this time. I bet you're all devastated.

posted by Steve Brandon @ 7:04 AM