ottawa museum reviews.com

Canadian War museum

warmuseum.ca

The architecture of this museum has a suitably somber presence with its bunker-like appearance, the morse code "Lest we forget" along the front of the building and the profound solitude of the Memorial Hall.  It is in Memorial Hall where the headstone of the Unknown Soldier is mounted, where every November 11 at 11am the sun shines through a high narrow window and lights up the entire headstone.

My kids tend to make a beeline for the Memorial Hall.  The headstone of the Unknown Soldier usually has some poppies about it.  There is a pool there and they like to throw coins into it with a quiet prayer for peace...or just to skip the coins.  Another stop is LeBreton Gallery where the military vehicles are housed.  One memorable visit there included strategy games such as Othello and Battleship with all the tanks lending a bizarre and competitive ambiance.  They also enjoy observing the model plaster casts from the Vimy Ridge Memorial in the Regeneration Hall.  There is even a dark and claustrophobic trench in the World War I section.