Verdun #4-6

 Near Crawford Street in George O'Reilly Park there is a historical house built in 1710 called  Maison Nivard-De Saint-Dizier, it is now a museum and archeological site with tourism visits available. It was closed when I was there today though, maybe due to COVID 19 restrictions. The stones are all different shades of brown, grey and even pink, while the doors, windows, and roof are earth colours. I was going to pass on this today because I only had 5 x 7" (post card sized) paper with me due to being almost out of paper, but I found a good angle to get a sliver of the building, and some of the park land around it including the bixi bike stand and some of Lasalle Street. The only things that were here in the old days were the house and Lasalle street. The park, tree, and bixi stands were added a lot later. My Dad was saying how he would put his Kayak into the water from right here, around where I was sitting! They filled in the river side with landfill and turned it into a park. 5 x 7" cold press, watercolour, August 2020

The big attraction around here is the Lachine rapids, many people were relaxing and taking in the view. I found a spot to sit away from people and in the shade. There were hundreds of seagulls standing on the rocks in the river, which I barely manged to depict in the painting. The water was broken with froth and foam all over the place, with a smooth flow of lilac/blue water reflecting the sky and showing some of the green brown from underneath. In fact, the water was even darker and richer than shown in the painting. I would like to come back and do the historical house and the rapids a few more times. 5 x 7" cold press, watercolour, August 2020

 

Going all the way down the bike path brought me to the end of Verdun... or did it? Verdun merged with Nun's Island awhile ago, and it remains part of the same borough. Sure enough, after crossing the Nun's Island bridge on the bike path to the island, I ran into yet another Verdun sign the same style as the other two, minus the landscaped flower garden. Maybe they ran out of money or something, it was just a mound of grass and pebbles strewn about. The whole bridge and bike path was under renovation so it may just be a limitation this year, that they didn't do the flowers due to construction. The sun was going down, and it was partly cloudy, which made the lighting conditions unpredictable. It was all in shade when suddenly I got hit with full blast sunlight. The ugly apartment building in the background seemed part of the welcome sign. Welcome to Nun's island and sky scraper apartments. Since I ran out of cold press, I had to use my last piece which happened to be hot press. Time for a visit to the art store!  5 x 7" hot press, watercolour, August 2020