Around the World - Canada

What better way to start off a tour of Canada than with pancakes and maple syrup?  P and I told the girls all about the time we visited a maple syrup plantation near Toronto many years ago; how we watched the trees being tapped for their lovely golden sap, then saw the sap boiling away in huge cauldrons.  It was a lovely place and the whole process of turning sap to syrup was done in the original, old fashioned way.  While we ate we listened to some fantastic Cape Breton fiddling by the very talented Natalie McMaster.
We also baked a maple syrup upside down cake which was, surprisingly, pronounced "too sweet" by the girls. Poor Grandma, P and I had to eat the whole thing...

We read some books about Canada in the winter and learnt that if nothing is done to stop global warming, by 2080 there will be no more ice in Hudson Bay. Very bad news for polar bears!

We travelled with Billy Connolly on his Journey to the Edge of the World - a series about his adventures along the legendary North West Passage deep within the Arctic Circle.

On our last day the girls filled in their scrapbooks with many pictures from travel brochures (thanks to our lovely travel agent Claire for those), notes on the history and cultures of Canada, made some sweet snowy owls, and learned about some of their favourite Canadian animals.

snowy owls