Back to winter

On our return, late on November 30th, we found the Rideau River already frozen over in our neighbourhood, with snow on the ice. It's an early winter in Ottawa this year. We missed a very cold week last week, apparently. The Ottawa River is still mainly clear of ice. The ducks and geese seem to have gone now.

The WaterStreet condo development has begun, with the old houses knocked down and the ground cleared for the new building work on Bruyère Street.

Here, for the sake of contrast, are some houses on the bank of the Parramatta River in Sydney, Australia (photo taken last week):

The westernmost of our Minto Bridges is under cover again, and a security guard sits there in his or her car day and night to keep guard over whatever is under the tarpaulins, which makes me wonder. Are we still in Phase 2 of the "rehabilitation" or is this the start of Phase 3? Possibly they're just doing more work on the new road surface. Anyhow, the road over the bridges is blocked again but at least pedestrians can get by on the boardwalk, unlike last year. We now have a small roundabout at the King Edward / Union street intersection, near the foreign affairs (Lester Pearson) building which will make for an easier flow once the Minto Bridges are open to traffic again.