Ottawa is Canada's capital, and one of the most underrated cities in North America. It is smaller and quieter than Toronto or Montreal, but it punches well above its weight: the seat of government, the country's best collection of national museums, and a setting of rivers, canals and parkland that makes the city itself a pleasure to walk through.
The heart of it is Parliament Hill, the Gothic Revival cluster of copper-roofed buildings perched above the Ottawa River. From there it is a short walk to the ByWard Market, a cobbled grid of cafes, bars, fromageries and food stalls that has been Ottawa's living room since 1826. South of downtown the Rideau Canal threads through the city — a UNESCO World Heritage site that turns into the world's largest skating rink every winter, packed with locals commuting to work on blades and eating BeaverTail pastries on the ice.
The museums are world-class and almost all national: the National Gallery of Canada with its glass-and-granite Moshe Safdie building, the Canadian Museum of History across the river in Gatineau (designed to look like the geology of the continent), the Canadian War Museum, the Canadian Museum of Nature, and the aviation and science museums on the city's edges. You could easily fill four days without repeating a building. Further out, the Diefenbunker — Canada's Cold War nuclear shelter — is one of the most unusual museum visits in the country.
Ottawa is bilingual in a way no other Canadian city is — cross the bridge to Gatineau in Quebec and the language, the food and even the architecture shift. The city has neighbourhoods worth wandering: the leafy Glebe with its independent shops, Wellington West and Hintonburg for restaurants, Westboro along the river. Be honest about the winters: from December to February the temperature regularly drops below minus twenty, and you will need proper boots and a serious coat. The reward is a city that embraces the cold rather than hiding from it — skating, snowshoeing, the Winterlude festival, and the smell of woodsmoke along the canal.