Canada - Toronto - City Hall, a Castle and Lots of Shoes

Day 3 - Thursday 29 August

We had a big list of things to see today and started our trek at Nathan Phillips Square.  However, before we'd reached it, we'd already spotted some of the quirky and interesting architecture Toronto has to offer.

The old and new city halls sit on adjacent sides of the pond.  Time for a photo shoot.

Smiley, happy people.

In an O.

We wandered up through a local park.  I love the way that Toronto's open spaces have dog parks.  Gated areas are set up where dogs can be unleashed and snuffle around to their canine content.

Even the water fountain has dog bowls.

Toronto has a real selection of eclectic buildings.  This is the Sharp Centre for Design.  

And next up was the AGO, the Art Gallery of Toronto.  The back of it looks half finished, covered in blue plastic - the sort workmen put over scaffolding mid-build.  But, on Googling, I have discovered it's meant to look like that.  The front is a mishmash of windows and angles.  It's apparently an 'understated' Frank Gehry architectural design.

As we walked east we came across a 3D Van Gogh portrait.

And if you popped around the back you could see it better.  Van Gogh's nose and a Riona.

I'm a fan of botanical gardens and Toronto's offering is the Allan Gardens Conservatory.  Built in 1858 it is a classic Victorian set of hot houses. 

I really love pottering around these.

Look - plant!

Not quite Medusa.

These terrapins were really cute.

Stacked up higgeldy piddeldy.

We headed towards the Government Buildings, found a super spot to buy lunch, passed the Women's College Hospital (which Riona was eyeing up...) and plonked ourselves in Queens Park to munch.  Wow, it was good to sit down.

I don't think I've ever seen squirrels this dark.

We could have stuck our heads in the Government Buildings apparently but unfortunately only realised this after the event.  I've no doubt it was quite impressive inside.

Our next architectural treat was the ROM, Royal Ontario Museum.

Arty farty pavement.

And the modern extension.  Again, not sure it quite works for me...

As if we hadn't already put enough mileage under our feet we headed out, away from Downtown Toronto, to a castle we'd spotted from the CN Tower the night before.  This is Casa Loma.  

Casa Loma was built in 1914 by a rich financier with his accumulated £17M fortune.  It's up on the ridge away from the lake side where the wealthy settlers lived.  He filled it with priceless art and his family hosted lavish parties.  Unfortunately, the First World War hit his income stream in many ways and 10 years later he was forced to auction off his dream to pay his debts.

In a spur of the moment decision, I purchased my annual (if that) lolly which turned my lips red.   It was one, big, sugary, drippy thing but perfect for the hot day.

We headed back down to the 'common' side of Toronto keeping the CN Tower in view as we strolled.

The final item on our itenary was the Bata Shoe Museum.  We timed our visit with the free entry session - it's a Thursday evening thing.  It was the first museum we'd entered that day being too conscious of our time and money to loiter in any other.

We both had a lot of fun discovering the weird and wonderful history of shoes.  These are Hindu shoes for a wealthy woman.

And these are testament to the Chinese practise of foot binding.  I can't think how terrible that must have been: to have been bound and, effectively, handicapped from an early age.  No running, walking, climbing - a life of small dainty steps was all you were henceforth capable of.

Moon boots!  These never made it up, but it's always good practice to have a spare pair.

And these were my favourite.  Mainly because I could see me wearing these.  And if I ever see them in Exeter...

All in we walked over 15 km today.  Despite flat sensible shoes it was a welcome break to stop and head home although I wouldn't have shortened one step of our exploration today.  Wonderful.

Canada - Toronto - Parks, Lake and the Big Tower

Day 1 - Tuesday 27 August

Well, technically, the Riona and Ruth big adventure started on Day 0 as we headed to London and stayed overnight with Caitlin. It was a good start to the trip and nice to see her, albeit briefly.  I think I lost ungraciously at cards (OK, I know I did...).

As Caitlin pedalled off to work on the Tuesday, Riona and I headed to the lovely Jewish bakery near Caitlin's and enjoyed breakfast.

Our flight was early afternoon so we ambled off to Heathrow, checked in and eventually we were airborne.

The flight was uneventful (all the best are) and we landed in JFK airport, New York, to suffer over an hour's worth of queues entering the US.  Once entered we promptly exited the country for our flight to Canada.

It was now 1900 local time which was 0000 BST and I was fading.  A make-up lady caught Riona's attention as she was taking polaroid photos.   Riona is too young to remember these.  I recall the excitement of standing in my Grandma's garden watching an image come out of the camera like magic.  Anyway, the lady took a shot of us in our weary smiles.  Riona does sleeplessness better than me.

It was a disorganised bundle onto the plane to Toronto.  I admit to forgoing any British "after you please" stuff and shoved my way on along with everyone else. There was a large family gathering that were somehow taking over twice the hand luggage limit each on board so there was a lot of to'ing and fro'ing as everything was shoe-horned in.

Anyway, we left the US and were soon landing in sleepy Toronto, midnight local time.

Public transport was asleep so we hopped in a taxi and easily found our way to our BnB.  And sleeeeeeeeep.

Day 2  - Wednesday 28 August

We had a plan, mainly organised by Riona, and once we'd roused ourselves we were off.  Our bike hire failed at the first hurdle as it required internet connection to pick up the code.  Ah well, a long walk then it was.

Definitely in the right country.

We spotted free sunscreen attached to a play park.   So Riona made us (re) sun block up.  

The harbourside.

Yay!

Along the harbour is the Toronto Music Garden.    It is designed around Bach's 'Suite No. 1 in G Major for unaccompanied cello' and hosts different plantings/pathways based on the various movements.  It was a pleasant wander and also gave us our first view of the CN Tower.

We stopped for our first iced coffee and then continued into downtown Toronto.

Riona and the duck share a dip.

We headed to St Lawrence Market for a late lunch. 

Then we headed east towards the Distillery District.  We couldn't resist this photo opportunity on the way...

Flat iron building.

The Distillery District hails from 1832.  Obviously once a hive of activity it fell into disuse.  It was refurbished and re-opened in  2003 as a hip, arty, cultural quarter of Toronto.

And here I am being hip, arty and cultural.

Lots of Victorian architecture remains.

You just have to try the beer/cider when in the zone...

Next up was the CN Tower.  This is the thing to do in Toronto and I was keen to do it early on our trip so we could orientate ourselves to the city.  

It opened in 1976 and at 553 m high it became the tallest free standing structure in the world, holding this title for an incredible 34 years.  

We only rose to 350 m but the views were outstanding as you'd expect.  

Looking towards the harbour and Lake Ontario.

In 1994 the glass floor was built/opened so we just had to go stand.

 
We stayed up for quite a while taking in the views and watching the sun go down.

Awesome.

Whilst the sun set we spied on the Blue Jays baseball game in the Rogers Centre, 350 m beneath us.  

And that was our first day in Toronto.  Exhausted already.