We hit two museums today, despite the long 2 mile or so walk in the rain to the Museum of War (reminder: you can't cross Wellington near the museum; you must walk down the river walk steps and then go under the road--there are no signs about this). Rakesh loved the museum. It's shaped like a fighter plane (at least that's what it looks like to me), and it's huge. There's a large cafe where we had a cup of coffee to recoup after our rainy walk and we dropped off our wet coats with the coat check. The nicest thing was how empty the museum was. We stayed about 2 hours and it never got busy in the slightest (our mistake was thinking civilization museum would be the same NOT. The place was packed).
the military museum traces the history of war in Canada, starting with the aboriginal people's (or first nation--at the civilization museum a sign said aboriginal people was more accurate, but who am I to say). The history of human beings is truly a history of war. We followed the Canadians through their early wars between the french united with the aboriginals against the British, then the reoccurring conflicts between these people. I never saw any exhibits about Canadian vs. American's, so I am assuming there has never been war between these two countries?
The WWI exhibits were especially horrifying. The number of people that died on the Somme and in the trenches is simply incomprehensible. To even try to understand how these countries rebuilt after losing such a huge percentage of their young men . . .The exhibits include a replica "trench" for visitors to walk through, a battle field itself with a dead man mired in the mud. Lots of rifles and weapons and tanks and other transportation also interested Kesh. He wanted to see every exhibit (and I think we did). The exhibits on the holocaust were brief but also horrifying (well, I guess all exhibits on war are horrifying). there wasn't much gratuitous violence though.
We left there thinking we'd have lunch in the cafe at the Civilization museum which we thought would be as nice and empty as the one at the war museum. totally not the case. The Civlization museum was overflowing. A word to the wise: if you are going to hit both museums, start with the war museum and buy the tickets to both (you get a good discount for two, for a family the cost of one museum is $30, the cost of both is $45). When you get to the civilization museum, you get to walk straight to the exhibits rather than waiting in the long line.
We weren’t too fond of the museum (although I would have liked to spend a bit more time in the Canadian history exhibit). The exhibits included Aboriginal Canadian history, Northwestern Canada history, an exhibit on Dragons (which was really a gateway to a gift store) and a Canadian people exhibit. The best exhibits were the Canadian history that included replicas of Canadian historic buildings that represent buildings across the country and individuals are acting in character for the time and place. But, overall this museum was a disappointment (it has an IMAX theater, but we didn’t visit). There are three eating options: one super expensive with a limited menu which did not appeal to Rakesh, one cafeteria with enormous lines for sandwiches (meat looked horrible) a grill with hot dogs, burgers, onions rings (with an enormous line), and a Chinese noodle dish with thai sauce which was tasteless (that’s what we ordered). They also had already made salads which we ordered. The salad was okay. The third restaurant was like hot dogs and popcorn.
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