Monday, May 09, 2005
Canadian Tulip Festival
This past weekend, the Canadian Tulip Festival began here in Ottawa! This event spans three weekends, offers concerts, art, flowers, food and other activities for families. It is always interesting living in the capital city of a country as there are tons of tourists around. When I was walking my dog yesterday, I was approached by tulip seekers... and they wanted to know where Tulip Lake was. I explained that the tulips by the "lake" were at Dows Lake (which isn't really a lake, but is a man made docking area off of our huge canal)... but anyway... and they had to drive to another area to get there.
Ottawa has an interesting historical partnership with a connection to tulips. During World War II, the Dutch Royal family took safe haven in Ottawa while the Germans were occupying their country. Queen Juliana gave birth to her daughter Princess Margriet, here. Ever since, the Dutch government has 100,000 tulip bulbs to Ottawa each year as a gift to Canada. They have even given our city a real wind mill! And every summer, after the city workers dig up the bulbs, we citizens can go and get bags of bulbs to put into our own gardens. We are tulip crazy here!!
