Ottawa Rideau River walking tour

This scavenger hunt has a difficulty level of EASY.

The ideal group size is between 2 and 6 – but is not restricted to this. Children are welcome and will enjoy most of the challenges.

After purchase, to begin your Ottawa Rideau River scavenger hunt, you will need to head to the parking of Rideau Falls Park at 50 Sussex Dr, Ottawa, ON K1M 2K1. This is the start location

Once there, to begin your hunt, you will need to click on the link provided and login to this website, or go to My Account on this website and follow the instructions there.

Ancient history

Ottawa was founded in 1826 along the Rideau River for the construction of the Rideau Canal. Then, in 1857, Queen Victoria chose the site to host the new capital of the province of Canada (a province of the British Empire at the time).

It resides on the border of Upper and Lower Canada and resolved the conflict between the cities of Montreal, Toronto, Quebec, and Kingston, all vying for the permanent title.

In 1959, Ottawa became the capital of the Canadian Confederation, under the British Parliament and Monarchy. On July 1st, 1867, it became the capital of the sovereign country of Canada, which only has links to the British Monarchy, but no longer to the British Government. As a matter of fact, all of its principal federal institutions, including Parliament, the residences of the Governor-General (British Crown’s representative), and the Prime Minister of Canada are located here.

Recent history

Then, in 1916, a major fire burned down most of the parliament, except for the library, located at the back. Reconstruction was completed in 1920.

Ottawa, now with over 900,000 inhabitants became the fourth-largest city in Canada. Its metropolitan area spreads across 2 provinces and houses over 1.2 million inhabitants. Indeed, 34% of the population is bilingual (French and English) in Ottawa.