Eastward Bound - The Car

 On each of our trips to the UK we have rented a car. Perhaps that should read "hired" a car because that's more the way Brits would say it. 

We've settled on using the company called Sixt because not only are they competitively priced, but they have a desk and a heap of cars actually in Terminal 5 at the airport, and that obviates the need to clamber aboard a minibus and be ferried out to a car hire depot, even if it's only just beyond the airport's perimeter fence.

This year I'd booked a "Compact SUV", something like a Skoda, and settled on a fee for the 21 days we needed to rent the car. Pitching up up at the Sixt desk, I presented the agent with the news that I didn't want to pay more than the quoted figure (so no upselling, buster!) and the fellow took it on the chin. He did, however, insist that if we proceeded with the booking and the key collection using their mobile app, then we could have a "free upgrade". We let the agent guide us through the said app, ascertained that the price was right, and mooched off down to the car parking area to collect the key for a Peugeot 3008 "slightly bigger than a compact" SUV.

There was a bit of jiggery pokery as we had a bit of bother locating the correct key, but with help from the good people in the office, we were united with both key and car.

The car is big and black. It's a plug-in hybrid and is almost brand new. It also has a host of features that even a week into driving the car, we still haven't cracked. However, as a means of getting us from the airport to our holiday home, it served its purpose without fuss, so that much we are grateful for. I will say here and now, though, that if Peugeot cars were sold in Canada, this 3008 model wouldn't merit my consideration.

The car is at least an automatic, something that was my base line requirement. I can drive stick-shift cars, I did for 25 years, but to go back to manual after years of driving automatics wasn't something I wanted to do, even given that automatic hire cars cost more to rent. Finding the gear-shift, though, wasn't as easy as it should have been; it turned out to be a switch (and a button) on the dashboard. I get it, more electronics, less mechanical, but it still wasn't obvious. 

The steering wheel isn't round, it's a circle flattened off top and bottom. I suppose it'd help if you wanted to raise your seat up high and not have the bottom of the steering wheel interfering with your legs, but adjustable steering wheels, and this is one, would solve that issue. Other than that I can see no reason for the wheel shape, other than fashion. It doesn't impede driving of course, but it seems a wee bit unneccessary. 

There are a range of switches on the centre console, and on the dash, and there's something called "iToggle", which I haven't yet worked out, but the bulk of the car's controls are handled by a curved touch-screen on the dashboard that stretches the width of the driver's area. It looks very fancy and is, or at least half of it is, the customary speedometer and idiot lights that you'd get on any car. The other half is where you access things like the navigation system, the climate control, the car's settings, and anything else those cunning French automotive people wanted to put there. It's all fine and dandy, except that there's far too much information there for the casual driver to absorb, and many of the control screens are hidden in layers beneath the home screen. At a basic level, to get the seat heater control, you have to go one screen down (by swiping left, or pressing a button on the console), then select from a display, something that would require too much time looking at the screen if you were driving.  It'd be easy to switch on your seat heater while stopped, but switching it back off again would typically be required while moving, so ferreting around in layers of screens to achieve someting that a phyiscal switch could just as easily manage doesn't seem like progress to me. Of course putting switches on a touch-screen is cheaper than having a physical switch, so I guess progress is really about making money.

Finding out how to dim the ambient lighting in the cabin was something else again. Part of the dashboard decoration is lit when the headlights are on. By default, that lighting is far too bright when driving at night and reflected off the side windows and windscreen, and that did interfere with night driving. I'm not kidding when I say it took us two days of Internet searching to find out how to access the ambient lighting settings on the touch-screen. It was two screens down, and three or four steps in a menu. That is hardly intuitive.

But this is a common issue with moden cars. They nearly all come equipped with touch screens in one form or another, and the designers bury controls under layers of screens and menus, all of which will take the driver's attention away from the road should they try to access any switches while moving. Despite instructions to avoid using said screens on the move, I'd say that is nigh on impossible if you're needing to adjust things like heating and cooling.

Anyway, I have my co-pilot who deals with these things, which is the only safe way of doing things.

It took me a couple of days to find out how to work the Cruise Control (called Assist on this car), and there's something called "Limit" that I haven't worked out how to use yet. I'm not all together certain how the navigation system works, whether it's using GPS or cell phone towers for location. I do know that it only guesses at what the speed limit is. For example, the road from our cottage to the A38 may be a narrow country lane, but the national speed limit applies, and that is 60 mph.  For some reason, the navigation system tells me that the limit is 30 mph, which is just plain wrong. Then, on the A38, the National Speed Limit applies, and because it's a dual carriageway that means 70 mph. The navigation system flip-flops between 60 and 70 mph, for reasons I can't fathom, and yet it knows that the temporary limit through the road works is 40 mph. Go figure. It's a good job that I understand how speed limits work in the UK because the car certainly doesn't. Google Maps is far better on speed limits, so if you were confused, you'd best consult Google. 

The Peugeot drives quite nicely, albeit not as economically as I'd like, even with the hybrid help. The Skoda we had a couple of years back was far better, although that was a fair bit smaller than this Peugeot.

I though that the car's luggage space was a bit skimpy, that was until I discovered a seperate compartment under the floor of the rear luggage area. There's a plug-in cable in there at the moment, but as we don't have anywhere to plug the car in, thats where it's staying.

I also discovered yesterday that if you apply the parking brake, say on a steep hill, just moving the car forward will release it automatically, which is a handy feature. In fact, that's the only feature that I've thought worth the effort so far. Hey, I'm just too cynical.

We have two more weeks of the Peugeot, and I'm sure I'll get more used to it. I'm still looking forward to getting back to the old school switches and levers on our 15-year-old Toyota, though.

Eastward Bound - Ashburton

 

14 East Street, Ashburton.

In my family tree research, I discovered a whole branch of the family that lived in Ashburton, the little town just over the hill from our little Devon bolthole. We hadn't visited Ashburton during our last trip, so faced with a few spare hours we made our way to the little town on the River Dart.

Asburton is an historic Stannary town that has links with the mining industry, namely Tin, Umber, and Ball Clay, as well as the more traditional agricultural pursuits of sheep, wool, and weaving. My family links are with men working in the Umber and Clay mines, and some of the women working in wool-related trades.

From census records going back to 1841, I can trace family to Cad Lane, Heavyhead Lane, East Street, and Ladwell. Not all the original dwellings remain, but the streets do, albeit that Heavyhead Lane now goes by the name of Woodland Road*. We were able to spend a happy hour or so walking the same streets that my ancestors lived on. One family group lived in an Inn at 14 East Street, and the building still remains. It's a private dwelling now, but after the Inn closed, it became a tea room, and remained so for many years. It was nice to see the building in the flesh, so to speak, and to touch it, just as my relatives would have.

The streets of Ashburton are narrow, and quite unsuited to modern car traffic, but even with the traffic movement, the place still holds a fair chunk of charm.

As part of our walk, we found the old station, formerly the terminus of the Totnes to Ashburton Great Western Railway branch line. The station closed in the late 1960s, although the buildings remain and are home to some car repair facilities. The branch line still runs, though, terminating now at Buckfastleigh a few miles to the south of Ashburton. It was bought by the then Dart Valley Railway (now the South Devon Railway), and since the early 1970s has operated as a hertitage railway running regular steam services to and from Totnes.

Being in this part of Devon, I can barely walk any street that at least one of my ancestors has walked upon. I have links with the villages of Caton and Staverton close to Ashburton, and many, many more links with places slightly further afield including Teigngrace, Teignbridge, and Newton Abbot. Those other places we will explore in due course, but for now I am more than content to have walked the streets of Ashburton, knowing that my family had walked those same streets 150 years before me.

*Old place names have been garnered from the National Library of Scotland's Georeferenced Historic Maps.

Ashburton on Wikipedia

14 East Street

Eastward Bound - Apples

 

Yesterday I experienced the Apple Store for the first time. No, not a fruitier, but the home of Apple tech products, this one the Plymouth branch.

I'm not a fan of Apple products, you see, and never have been. I think they're overly expensive, and once caught in their net, it's difficult to extracate yourself from it. The products are good, and are easy to integrate with other Apple products, but the whole Apple empire lacks the diversity to keep things competitive. All that said, Grandad John wanted a new iPad, to match Grandma Jill's iPad and their iPhones (see what I mean about getting caught in the net?), so off we went to Drake's Circus Shopping Centre.

Far from being thronged by bright young things, the majority of customers in the Apple Store that morning seemed to be of the more mature variety, although the staff of the store were, of course, just out of school. DW checked in with someone, and we had a browse around while we waited to be served. I had a play with a basic iPad, and all seemed OK, despite the eleven-inch screen model being significantly more expensive than my fifteen-inch Android tablet. But then that's Apple for you.

Anyway, the sales assistant turned up, took our order and tried some gentle upselling, but didn't protest too much when we declined. She logged in Grandad John's iCloud account, had a look at his old iPad (which we'd brought along) and his iPhone and declared all was good to go, even though the old iPad didn't qualify for a trade-in. No surprise there. A new iPad box appeared on the table and we were directed to the "Setup Area", where young Katie took us through the set up on the new machine, and set the transfer of the data from the old iPad in motion. Now this is where Apple really do well, getting ordinary folks in and sending them on their way with a new device that is 100% ready to go, complete with everything that was on the old device. Katie was a star, dealing with a handful of customers at the same time, and making sure that we didn't leave until everything was ready. Well done Katie.

Back at the ranch, we fired up the new iPad and it connected to the home wifi without us having to do anything like find the router or the login details; a real boon where passwords can be a pain in the bum. It looked and felt much like the old iPad, but was faster and less clunky. Surprisingly, Apple seem to have moved some of their interface tools to match those on Android systems, which I thought was a turn up for the books.

Anyway, Grandad John is very happy with his new device, especially after we connected it to his fancy Sony speaker. I was impressed with the Apple Store, and its staff, chiefly because they made it all very easy. I still won't buy Apple products because I think they're overpriced, but for those that are smitten, and can afford it, they're pretty darned good.

Eastward Bound - Devon and its roads

 

I'd arranged to meet an old friend from school in the North Devon village of Lifton. She was in Devon house hunting with her husband and it was too good an opportunity to turn down. Devon is England's second largest county, although in terms of size it obviously pales into insignificance when you compare it to Ontario or Quebec, but sometimes a journey across it can be quite convoluted, especially when you're trying to cross its interior. The big issue is the large chunk of granite that rises up between Plymouth and Exeter called Dartmoor, and it's that which causes straightforward trips to become quite awkward.  Trying to cross Dartmoor's wild and windy eminence can mean some pretty scary roads; not high mountain passes or deep valleys, but narrow and twisty roads that take a special kind of patience to deal with.

I'm no stranger to narrow and twisty roads in Devon; those highways that are only wide enough for one vehicle, and are bordered on both sides by eight-foot high hedges. Those roads where your wing-mirrors touch the hedges on both sides, and there's a strip of grass down the middle of the ashphalt. Those country lanes than can have you backing up for a quarter of mile as you meet a tractor coming your way. They are not fun, and I am not ashamed to admit that I'll avoid them if I can.

Our trip to Lifton, sadly, meant us going from one side of the moor to other. Thankfully, though, we have Google Maps.

Google offered me three practical routes. The first one was an east-west straight line across Dartmoor. I say straight line, but few roads are straight here. The time estimate was 1 hour and 5 minutes, but that was a wildly optimistic estimate in my opinion. A direct route maybe, but comprised of many miles of those roads. Those roads are very pretty to drive along, of course, but constantly wondering who or what is around the next bend does not make for a pleasant drive.

The second route offered was a run along the eastern edge of the moor, through the Dartmoor town of Moretonhampstead, on onward to the A30 at Whiddon Down, before a sharp left and a run on the semi-motorway that runs to the north of the moor. That route looked better, but earlier in the year we drove the Mortenhampstead route and I decided then that it was best avoided. It runs for miles as a virtually single-track road, despite it being a classified "B" road, and every corner hides a potential meeting between cars going in different directions. 

The third route looked a bit insane, if you ask me. It involved driving ten or more miles heading east in the wrong direction on the A38, going as far as Exeter, then doing an about turn and heading west to Okehampton on the A30. This route was almost all on the semi-motorway roads, which would mean faster speeds, and not having to creep along hoping that nothing was coming the other way. This third route was 56 miles long, as opposed to the 31 miles calculated for the direct route, and yet was ten minutes faster. This, dear reader, is the reality of driving in Devon, and why I chose to use the insane route in the end.

I will get to drive some of those roads while we're here; it's inevitable. But for pure comfort and peace of mind, I'm always going to opt for the better roads. Clearly I am not a true Devonian.

Eastward Bound - the outward trip

Despite having the sore throat from hell (laryngitis) and barely having slept in the last 36 hours, I feel duty bound to at least start to document this latest episode from the November 2026 run across the water.

Following on from the seat debacle, I checked in for our flights online, and the correct seats were allocated, along with a note that DW was listed as having a "non-visible disability", which I think was how the booking agent justified giving us the seats that she did. So that was a good start.

What wasn't a good start was me having caught Charlie's Laryngitis the day before we travelled, and I was feeling dog-rough on the morning of our flights. Still, there's nothing like popping a couple of Tylenol Extra-Strength and driving for hours to put a little bit if sickness to the back of my mind.

*This was as far as I could manage for that Friday night, the remainder of this post was written on the Saturday and the Sunday that followed

We had decided to do the country run from Chatham to St. Thomas to avoid the construction on Highway 401. It's a lovely drive up Highway 3, but it does take longer. Add in the fact that two of the roads north of St Thomas that I had intended to use to get to the 401 were closed for construction and what should have been an eighty-minute drive took two hours. Not that we were in a hurry, but we may have been better braving the road works. On the subject of road works, Ontario is the worst place for closed roads. I understand that work has to be carried out, but there's never any advanced warning, so you're driving along and all of a sudden there are barriers across the road, and very often no diversion route shown. Given the grid system of roads in these parts, there's always an alternative, but how hard would it be for those responsible to put a sign up maybe a kilometre or two ahead of the closure?

Back onto the manic Highway 401, we made good time with only the intersection of Highway 6 at Guelph slowing things down. Coming through Milton we'd already decided to avoid the mess on the 401 south of the airport and to use the toll road, Highway 407, and go north of the airport. It's a little further but the 407 at least keeps moving. Google Maps Directions didn't like the fact I used Airport Road to get to the airport itself and not the 427, but it was all good as we rolled into the valet parking lot at Toronto's Park 'N' Fly facility. I may use that northerly route again, even though it'll cost me a few dollars; I don't know how much the toll road was this time, and the bill won't arrive for months.

The bag drop at the airport was easy, as was security, and in no time at all we were sat in the departures area with three hours to kill. We've taken to bringing our own snacks because the price markup out at the gates is criminal. DW divined that a pre-made sandwich was going for $12.99, which is scandalous, and double the rip-off price you'd pay for the same thing in a local supermarket. I feel a strongly-worded letter coming on.

We had to move away from our first sitting place at Gate 33 because the piped music there was just hideous, and just too loud to ignore. But we found a quieter spot, and idled the time away with our own sandwiches and trenchant observations of our fellow travellers. We have found ourselves getting to the airport earlier each time recently, but with the unreliability of the road system between home and the airport, it's better to be three hours early than to be ten minutes late when there are flights involved.

While we were waiting to be boarded, there were calls for people to check their carry-on baggage into the aircraft's hold, and because as all the seats were sold, room in the overhead bins was going to be limited. If you volunteered to have your bags checked then it was free, if the airline forced you to do it because your bag was bigger than formally allowed then it would cost you $75. That made me scrutinise other people's bags, and boy do people push that carry-on size limit to breaking point on these longer flights? DW was worried about the size of her bag, but it was half the size of most of the others being taken onto the aircraft, and sometimes people had two big carry-on items. The European low-cost arlines are really strict about carry-on bag sizes, but on the full-service airlines, they don't seem to worry as much.

Our seats on the aircraft, a brand new Boeing 787, were good because we had no one in front of us and therefore had lots of room to spread out in. We had a little overhead bin just above us which fitted our two bags perfectly, so with them stowed we settled in for the flight. The aircraft was pushed back from the gate dead on time, and it fairly dashed out to the north side of the airport for a take off to the west. We must have been heavily loaded because it was a long thrash down the runway before we left the ground, but once up in the air, everything was smooth and relatively quiet. Then it was time to settle in for the six hour, overnight flight.

For this trip I'd decided to use my Android tablet instead of the aircraft's own entertainment system, but my previously downloaded episodes of Fingersmith had disappeared from the Britbox app, something to do with time limits on dowloaded content, so I decided to fire up a film from my own archive which isn't time limited. No sooner had the titles started to roll, then the dinner arrived. Putting the tablet away, I opted for the salmon and rice meal, and was as disappointed as usual with the whole thing. I wasn't really hungry anyway, I don't normally eat at 11pm, and I wasn't feeling brilliant either, so maybe I should have just given the whole supper thing a miss. Once that had all been cleared away, I gave up on the film and chose to listen to an audio book in the hope that I might drop off to sleep with someone talking quietly into my ears. For the first time ever I deployed not only the British Airways blanket, it was quite cold, but I reclined my seat a bit, both things that I don't normally do. I did sleep a bit, though, judging by how many chapters of my book I missed, but grabbing no more more than an hour or two of sleep in the previous twenty, I knew I was going to be wrecked by the time we made our final destination.

The cabin was unceremonially woken by the crew switching all the lights on about an hour before landing, and "breakfast" was served. I declined because I knew that the "egg and bacon" roll that was offered was little more than a bit of pastry with some pulverised egg and bacon inside. Anyway, I wasn't feeling any better.

We were denied nice views of London as the aircraft only popped out of the clouds a few hundred feet from the ground, although I'm greatful that modern technology allows aircraft to land in such conditions. We taxied over to Terminal 5 and given the gate furthest from the terminal, which was a result of arriving ahead of schedule, although it was something that allowed us to stretch our legs as we walked to the little shuttle train that would whisk us to the arrivals area. Unfortunately the shuttle train had a bit of an issue and it was while before we were whisked anywhere, but being on holiday meant that time really wasn't an issue.

We used the E-Gates to get through immigration, a handy automated system that speeds up the entry process if you have all the right paperwork, which we did. I wasn't too impressed with the lady prowling up and down barking orders as to how to use the e-gates, especially as it didn't look like anyone was struggling, but we were through in a very short time and on our way to the baggage reclaim area. The T5 baggage reclaim is massive, and each carousel is massive, too. Even with loads of people milling around it didn't seem that busy, and it was all in sharp contrast to the chaos of baggage reclaim at Toronto's Pearson airport. As ever, our bags seemed to be among the last off, but they were probably first to be loaded on the aircraft, so that was to be expected.

Then it was over to the Sixt Car Rental desk in the lobby of the Sofitel Hotel. I'd pre-booked of course, and told the agent I didn't want to pay more than the quoted sum on my reservation paperwork, but with some jiggery-pokery on the Sixt mobile app, he still secured us an "upgrade" at no extra cost. We had a little confusion as to the correct key for the car at the pickup point, but the ever helpful Sixt staff sorted it all out, and we found our black Peugeot 3008 Hybrid SUV. I'll do a seperate post about the car, but suffice it to say it's not a car that I would choose to buy.

The run westwards to Devon was uneventful, thankfully, despite the mess on London's orbital motorway, the M25. I'd opted to use the M4 and the M5, which is not the most direct route, but it is motorway right down to Exeter, and there are regularly placed service stations along the route, essential when you've flown overnight. I didn't start feeling the effects of the almost sleepless night until nearly at Exeter, and when diving off the motorway towards Newton Abbot and the big Tesco there, the change of driving pattern certainly banished any sleepiness I may have felt.

The first stop in Tesco was to get some credit for my UK cell phone, which in turn allowed us to use the Tesco loyalty card, which took a hefty chunk off the supplies shopping bill. When we visit any UK grocery store, we're reminded just how lucky we are in sleepy Ontario to have so many shops spread among so few people. Every grocery store in England seems to be permanently busy, in a way that Ontario stores never are, and in my sleep-deprived state I wasn't coping too well with the crush. Still, we only forgot a few things, and I pleased myself greatly by remembering the route through Newton Abbot and up to our home for the next three weeks near Ashburton. I was reminded then of how narrow and twisty UK roads can be, especially when heading out into the countryside. The section of road from the A38 to the cottage is, for large sections, effectively only wide enough for one car at a time, and is bounded by tall hedges on each side. We didn't have to back up this time, but we will at some point on this trip.

Then we were at Orchard Cottage again, our little bolt-hole on the edge of Dartmoor, where we'd stayed just nine months before. Having done the essentials, like unpack and have a drink, I fell into bed and slept, instantly, the effects of the lack of sleep and the sickness just knocked me out. But our multi-modal, self-booked, travel plans had all fitted together again, so maybe I was just relieved to have completed the outward leg.

Eastward Bound, November 2026

 

November 2nd, 2026

We're off for our second trip of the year to dear old Blighty, and while we're still three days away from flying, we've had some travel drama already.

Don't get me wrong, I quite like British Airways for our transatlantic jaunts; they have a fantastic terminal at Heathrow, their aircraft are normally pretty new, the staff are universally excellent, and their prices have been very competitive in recent years. But they do have a habit of messing about with pre-booked, and paid for, seating.

Two trips ago, with four of us travelling Premium Economy, we'd booked and paid for two rows of two. For "operational reasons", our seat allocations were changed to a row of four in the centre of the aircraft. I wasn't able to change their decision, so we sat in that four across row, but I did have a moan and claimed a refund of the seat booking fee, which was in the hundreds of dollars. I had a second moan to British Airways because I thought they'd bounced my refund claim, but that was unjustified on my part because they had indeed made the refund, I just hadn't checked the credit card bill properly.

Our last trip suffered the same problem. We'd booked and paid for two Premium Economy seats together, as we always do. When informed of the seat changes, I checked online to find that we, DW and I, were seated in different rows! On that occasion I was able to alter the seating online, more or less back to where we'd originally booked, so I didn't feel the need to claim a refund. I'm glad I didn't because on the trip home, we were upgraded to Business Class, at no cost, so props to BA for that.

For this trip, third time in a row, British Airways did it again. Our two seats together had been changed to two seats in the same row, but with an aisle between us. This time, though, I couldn't alter the seating online as there were no more two-seat sets vacant. DW was bereft, and the prospect of having to sit next to a stranger for eight hours was too much for her, so she did no more than called up BA in the UK and made a very polite, but firm, fuss. Low and behold, we have been restored to a two-seat row, window and aisle, and because it's in front of a bulkhead we get extra leg room, all at no extra cost. The irony is that the seats are directly in front the row we'd originally booked. Well done DW, and thank you British Airways.

The really aggravating thing is that we pay big bucks to choose our seat, and I don't know why we keep getting bumped around the aircraft. I absolutely understand that aircraft changes can impact seating, and even paid for seat allocations are not guaranteed, but why is it always us getting messed around? Yes, we could claim a refund, but if this kind of thing keeps happening, why do they bother charging at all if they then just have to give the money back?

Our return flight seats have been changed, too, but not drastically. Technically I could go for a refund, but we have gained an advantage on the outward leg of trip, so I'll hold off a claim in the interests of balance. Who knows, maybe we'll get another upgrade for the flight home?

Homeward Bound

 

Monday started early, too early as it turned out because DW had thought check-out was at 10am, and we were really pushed to achieve that, but at 10:58 she discovered check-out was actually at 11am. It was time to relax.

Getting out of the underground parking garage was fun as the turns were very tight and very narrow, made harder when we met a car coming the other way. But we emerged out into the sunlight and started to make our way through the traffic of downtown Toronto. The traffic itself wasn’t too scary, but there are traffic lights literally every hundred metres, which makes Chatham look free flowing by comparison. We did make it to the Gardiner Expressway eventually, then headed not home, but to the Square One Mall in Mississauga. We were on a mission to visit the Vessi shoe store there, because, why not when you’re already up in the big city? But first there was the traffic.

Driving on any of the freeways in the GTA is not a pleasing experience. The volume of traffic is daunting, as is its speed in relation to the speed limit, and its alarming tendency to switch lanes, two or three at a time, and never to signal before, during, or after. The most annoying thing, though, is when the right lane, the driving lane, suddenly becomes a right-turn only lane. This happens very frequently and, counter to the instructions in the Ontario Drivers’ Manual, you end up driving in Lane 2, simply to avoid yet another lurch to the left in fast moving and very heavy traffic.

Once off the Gardiner, we had to negotiate Hurontario Street, normally a three-lane each way road with a central median, but now mile after mile of construction work, often closing two of the three lanes, to allow a light rail system to be installed in the aforementioned median. It was slow going indeed.

We did arrive at Square One eventually and parked in the shade of one the many high-rise apartment blocks in that area. The Mall itself is big, and on multiple levels, and quite beyond anything south west Ontario has to offer. The range of shops was interesting, too; Rolex, Armani, Columbia, and the rest. But it was to Vessi we made our way, for DW to spend a fair bit of time choosing and buying some new shoes, so at least the mission was accomplished. We made our way to one of the food areas and had some of Jimmy the Greek’s finest Souvlaki and Falafel meals, because it seems we like Mall food court catering.

When it came time to leave, I had a choice of routes home. No road out of Toronto is a good road, but I opted for the more scenic southerly route and realised that may not have been the best choice. A few miles into the run, I had the option of joining the 407 toll road but decided not to despite knowing that it would not be busy, and carried on down to the Queen Elizabeth Way, the QEW, then ground to an almost immediate halt. Heading west towards Hamilton the road, all four lanes, was crawling along, and as we started to move, it wasn’t at much of a speed. There were no road works or crashes, this was just Monday afternoon traffic. Luckily, I did spy a High Occupancy Vehicle Lane (HOV) off to the left, so forced my way over and joined the more freely moving traffic in it. To use the HOV lane you’re supposed to have two or more people in the car, but as we discovered, not everybody did. We were bowling along, faster than the main part of the road, when all of a sudden, the traffic in the HOV ground to a halt. I was a bit distracted and didn’t immediately hit the brakes, not expecting such a thing in HOV lane, but as I keep a good distance between me and the car in front, I was able to stop quite safely. The pickup truck behind, though, had to veer on to the left-side shoulder to avoid hitting me, which is when we saw that the driver was the only one in the vehicle, the naughty man. I worked out that each time we came to a gap in the HOV lane that allowed vehicles to leave or join it, those leaving were having a hard time slowing to match the speed of the traffic on the main lanes in order to merge. Once I worked that out, I was able to anticipate the slow down. We made it to Burlington and a less busy road, where I realised that the 407 I had decided not to use earlier joined the QEW right there. All that aggravation just to save a few dollars on the toll road? I have learned my lesson.

The rest of the run home was uneventful. We didn’t stop, and managed to upset the Satnav by driving much faster than it anticipated thanks to the increased speed limits on our local highways. I really should update that thing.

It had been a successful weekend, despite paying a king’s ransom for the hotel room, and a ton on other stuff in the big, expensive city. The hotel room was disappointing given the cost, but I think most hotel rooms in Toronto are disappointing given the scandalous charges they levy. The transit system looked after us well, and the show on Sunday night was great. Toronto isn’t a city filled with history, great parks, culture, or sights, but it is a good place to visit once in a while, provided that your savings will stand it. We’ll be back, but maybe not for a while yet.

Katty and The Mooch

For the first time on this trip, the rain was pattering on the windows this morning. Dark clouds scudded across the eastern Toronto skyline and I thought, “Bugger, we're supposed to be going out this morning".

By the time we'd reached street level, though, the rain had stopped and blue skies were apparent, which was what was forecast. This now fine day we were heading to St Lawrence Market, over in “Old Toronto", actually just a ten-minute walk from Bay Street. On Sundays there is a secondary St Lawrence market that sells what we thought would be antiques and the like, but turned out to be largely clothing. There were a couple of stalls with stuff you might see in flea markets on their tables, but not many. Given that there was a DJ pumping out “tunes" at one end of the hall thing the market was enclosed in, we didn't stay long. Personally I will always avoid loud music when trying to browse or shop, but then I'm just old and crotchety. DW did purchase some vegan comestibles at a stall just outside, but then we moved to the market proper, a place we had visited when we were last in Toronto.

St Lawrence Market is two floors of an old building, purpose built I'd guess, that houses stalls selling food, some prepared and cooked, some not. It was heaving in there, but we browsed and came away with two hot sausage rolls for my lunch, to compliment the things that DW had bought.  A couple of the stalls had long lines around them, clearly the popular places to eat, but I'm long past the point where I'll queue for food like that when there are alternatives.

We sat outside at a picnic table to eat lunch and watched the sparrows at work. DW's lunch wasn't good apparently, and my sausage rolls were not quite what I had expected, so it was a solid three out of ten for our meals.

We'd left the “Do Not Disturb" sign off the hotel room door, to give the housekeepers a chance to clean, so we didn't rush back. We walked down to the lake front and then westward past the Redpath sugar refinery, surely the last industrial site in Toronto that remains right on Lake Ontario. We investigated a supermarket we'd not heard of, Farm Boy, and bought a few bits and pieces, all vegan, and while the prices were not cheap, we deemed the place “good".

We then set off back to Union Station to pick up a Subway train, but glimpsing the Old City Hall at the end of Bay Street, we opted to walk to the hotel. Walking the streets of any big city can be hard on your legs and your feet, but the effort was worth it as we took in the old and the new skyscrapers that line Bay Street.

When we arrived back at the hotel, the room had indeed been serviced, so we settled down and rested, in preparation for the main even of the weekend, our visit to the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and “The Rest is Politics US" live show, with Katty Kay and Anthony Scaramucci. DW had bought a nice big vegan lasagna from the Danish Bakery, so that went in the microwave, and turned to be a really nice early supper, lining our stomachs in preparation for the main event.

We set off for the theatre at about six-thirty, heading to the Subway first, then to the streetcar out to Exhibition Loop and Toronto's events area. I think the place used to be known as the Canadian National Exhibition, CNE, but the CN seems to have been dropped. It's a large area with concert and events halls, an open-air arena, theatre, and the football stadium that's home to Toronto FC. It used to be served only by the GO Train and road access, but the streetcar line has a loop station there now, which is very convenient for us public transit types. The only trouble, though, was that we boarded the wrong streetcar at Union Station on our way there.

The streetcar station is underground at Union, and right next to the subway station. As we made our way to it, there was a streetcar already in the station, and I was convinced that the indicator board that hung from the ceiling said it was the 509 to Exhibition. Unfortunately, it wasn't, it was the 510, and I only realised when it lurched to the right at Queen's Quay and made its way north up Spadina Avenue. When you're actually in the streetcar, there's no indication which service you're travelling on, just the next stop. If you don’t know the stop names, then that’s not much use. After a couple of minutes confusion, and asking someone, we confirmed the error and hurriedly alighted, catching the next 510 service going south back to Queen's Quay. There we alighted again and walked over to the station just past Spadina and waited for the 509. This time, as we could see the front of the streetcar, we knew it was the 509 going to Exhibition. I think Toronto's transit authority, the TTC, could do with some indication inside the streetcar as to the service number, just to help out-of-town rubes like us.

As we walked from the streetcar station, we were joined by a couple of women also heading to see “Katty and The Mooch”, and I was happy to guide them as they weren’t sure of their map. Me being me, I had already scoped out the walk on Google Maps, and I’ve been to the Exhibition area a couple of times. It was good to see the football stadium all lit up; the grass was being zapped with artificial sunshine, water, and a bit of pretend wind, because that’s how good playing surfaces are achieved these days.

The show was excellent, two hours of good political comment, a few jokes, and an audience so anti-Trump and pro-Canada that it made me smile. I’m not a rabid nationalist for Canada, but I understand solidarity with the home country well enough.

The ride back to the hotel was easy enough, the transit systems run well into the night, thankfully. It was surprising just how quickly the Subway platform filled up, though, while we were waiting at Union; it was quite like the rush hour, albeit nearly eleven at night.

DW was hankering for some greasy fries, but all the food places were closing as we walked back to the hotel, so we had to make do with (more) peanuts. They went well with the wine we felt duty-bound to finish.

Tomorrow is leaving day, so we stayed up late and packed our bags, hoping to get away at a reasonable hour. Monday, then, is another day.

Casa Loma, and other stuff.

 

Day two of our road trip, and today's plan was to visit Casa Loma, a grand Edwardian pile on a hill overlooking Toronto. But first the dishwasher needed to be sorted out.

DW called maintenance again, and this time a little fellow (I can say that because he was quite little) turned up with a bag of tools. He pronounced the issue to be with the breaker (fuse), but took quite a while to find the one he needed. He did, though, and DW set the now working thing whirring before we set off for Casa Loma.

We jumped on a Subway train heading north on Line One, and alighted at a station called Dupont, at the bottom of the aforementioned hill. Before we tackled the hill, though, we diverted to Tim Horton's for breakfast, something Timmies is quite good for when you're on a mission. Casa Loma is visible from the streets below, and looked especially nice against the deep blue autumnal sky.

We conquered the hill and while regaining our breath, studied the front of the mansion. It was built between 1911 and 1Bla, so isn't ancient. Rather than bore you with my descriptions, here's a link to Wikipedia, which gives more relevant information than the place's own commercial website; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casa_Loma

It's forty dollars for us oldies to get in, which is a bit steep in my view, but you can spend quite a while there because it's quite extensive. The house is now owned by a “Leisure" company, which may explain the high entrance fee, but there were no shortage of takers. We stood behind a group of four teenagers while waiting to buy our tickets, and they each bought their own tickets, one by one, which involved a card transaction and some printing of paper. I might have bought all four in one go and taken the money from the others, but this one-by-one thing is quite the norm here, and not just with youngsters. It's a nightmare to be stood behind a line of office workers in Timmies, obviously there as a group, and all buy their one coffee each. What happened to buying rounds?

Back to Casa Loma, the Pellatt family had to give the place up in 1924 for financial reasons, and all of the valuable furniture and paintings were sold, which is why there are large areas inside that are almost devoid of furniture, and that furniture which was on display isn't really from Pellatt's original collection, although some is. Because the house is Edwardian, it doesn't look old in the sense that some National Trust places can look in the UK, and because the house has been restored a few times over, things do look quite fresh. That is apart from any silver ware on display, that all needed a good polish, and anywhere close to the floor, which needed a good clean.

We were given a map, and there is an online information thing you can get on your phone that gave details of the building and the Pellatt family. It could have done with a bit of structure there, though, perhaps a suggested route through the house. The rooms were grand, though, with plenty of items from the Pellatt family on display. There was also a whole floor dedicated to the Queen's Own Canadian Rifles, the Pellatt regiment, and that was very interesting. There was a short video about the house's role in the Second World War in housing Station “M", essentially a manufactory of items for spies and résistance movements in Europe.

I did get to go up in the roof, and inside the two towers, one at each end of the house. It was an odd experience, too, because the house hosts various related activities, including an Escape Room experience, and for October, a “House of Horrors" thing, so the roof spaces and towers were festooned with spooky stuff. The Norman Tower was open at the top and afforded great views Toronto, especially in the fine weather. Sadly there was a group of three young women monopolizing part of the open area, posing for photos of each other and making a big fuss about it. Don't mind me, I'm just old.

We wanted to see the vintage cars in the Stables, and the access to that building was through a long tunnel. The tunnel was dimly lit and decked out with plastic chains, corpses and other “horror" paraphernalia, which was quite effective in the half-light, but it did make the walk seem very long. I didn't have any idea where the stable block was located in relation to the house, but looking at the map later, it was in an entirely different street!

The stables were also decked out with spooky stuff, plastic corpses laid out where once horses stood, and an old carriage made to look like a Hallowe'en hearse. It still smelled faintly of horses, though.

Then it was up into the roof to see an array of waxworks depicting various Hollywood stars, all of whom had been to Casa Loma on film location. There are a surprising number of movies shot, at least in part, in the House on the Hill.

We'd had enough by then, and made our way back along the tunnel, and out to the fresh air. It was lunch time, anyway.

Walking back down the hill, we found our way to Dupont station again, and took the southbound train to St Andrew, in the Downtown core. From there, after dithering about making sure we were on the right side of the street, which is hard to do when you’re in a skyscraper canyon (I had to resort to using the compass on my phone), we boarded a very busy streetcar and headed west towards the Danish Bakery again. I'd opted to use the King Street route rather than Queen Street, to avoid the need to use a bus where the road was dug up. It was actually a very pleasant walk from King to Queen Street, and another vegan lunchtime treat was enjoyed.

When we'd finished and were back on King Street, we boarded the first streetcar that came along and it turned out to be one of the diverted ones from Queen Street, so that was a bonus. Back in the Downtown Core, it was just a short walk to the hotel without using the Subway.

Back at base, and with 11,000 steps under our belts, we both crashed out for an hour or so. That might have been it for the night, except for Nuit Blanche, that twelve hour art extravaganza taking place across Toronto, starting at 7pm.

At just before 8pm, we shuffled into an amazingly packed Nathan Phillips Square, just in time to see the Marching Band that was due every hour, on the hour, for a ten minute parade. It was good, but would have been better had we been able to see anything. Most of the art installations, good though they were, were so thronged with people that we didn't see much at all. We eventually walked over to Bay Street, then through the Eaton Centre to Younge Street, and back around Dundas Street to the hotel, but not before stopping off at a Shoppers Drug Mart store to get something for breakfast. Toronto is a city that tends to shut down at 9pm, even at the weekend, so it was good to see so many people out thanks to Nuit Blanche.

So that was our day. We did stay up to see something on the TV about the Lockerbie air disaster, which is not a good thing to see when you've a transatlantic flight in the offing. Ah well. Tomorrow is Podcast day, but that's not until the evening. The day, I think, will be in Old Toronto and St Lawrence Market, but who knows?

We're back on the road

After a stationary summer, we're back on the road. We're in the big city, Canada's most populous city, Toronto, for a long weekend. There is a purpose to our travels, namely to see international jet-setting podcasters Katty Kay and Anthony Scaramucci, from "The Rest is Politics US". DW is a big fan, and I have to say is quite excited at being able to see them in the flesh, as it were.

We booked three nights in the DoubleTree in Downtown Toronto, in Chestnut Street, despite the eye-watering price, so that we could explore the metropolis a little, as well as get to see the DW's friends. But first we had to get there/here.

It's always a pain slogging up Highway 401, Canada's busiest road. The speed limit has been nominally raised from 100kph to 110kph, but that makes precious little difference when most people drive at 130kph or more. Speed limits are mere suggestions in this part of the world, and most especially when you enter the realms of the Greater Toronto Area, appropriately shortened by all and sundry to GTA.

It was plain sailing up to London (Ontario), where first the highway was down to a single lane at Colonel Talbot Road for the removal of a bridge, and second, down to two lanes (from four) for some widening around Highbury Avenue. In between these two bottlenecks, the increasingly busy Highway 402 from Sarnia joins Highway 401 so the traffic denisty is instantly doubled. From London to Guelph, the two right-most lanes of the highway were just two lines of fast moving eighteen-wheelers, leaving everyone else crammed into the third lane, dicing with death by tailgaiting at 130kph and more. 

In my head I had the route mapped out; Highway 402, Highway 403 from Woodstock, the Queen Elizabeth Way from Burlington and finally the Gardiner Express Way into the downtown core of Toronto. Unfortunately, the lady in the satellite warned us of severe delays om Highway 403, so we opted for the alternative route she suggested, to stay on Highway 401. That option least allowed us the added service centre at Cambridge, perfect for a pit stop, and a better road, even if it was marginally further to travel. The disadvantage was that Highway 401 is an absolute nightmare as it enters the GTA thanks to the volume of traffic.

As always in very heavy traffic, there were sudden slowdowns, followed by sudden speed increases. The lady in the satellite told us we were heading for "401 Collectors", which would have been fine if she'd mentioned which Collectors, or at least the eventual intersection number after the Collectors. For the uninitiated, the Highway gets split into two running channels in Toronto, on the left are four or five Express Lanes, and on the right are four or five collector lanes, where vehicles leave or join the highway. The Express lanes and the Collectors run parallel, but go for many kilometres separated by an uncrossable median. Therefore, you need to know which exit you're heading for so that you can judge where you can leave the Express Lanes and join the Collectors. With the paucity of information from the lady in the satellite, I naturally missed the point at which I should have joined the collectors and was marooned in the Express Lanes. To add to the confusion, the leftmost lane was reserved for High Occupancy Vehicles (HOV), that is a vehicle with two or more people in it, that can often avoid slow or stopped traffic. I was a bit wary about using it, not least because it was four or five lanes away from the Collectors, but in theory you're only supposed to leave the HOV lane at specific points. Anyway, people drive even faster in the HOV lane than they do in the regular lanes, and I don't like getting chivvied into approaching 150kph.

The lady in the satellite gave us a revised route, the 427 southbound, so at least I knew when to dive off the Express lanes and onto the Collectors. The 427 is the airport road, so I did know where I needed to leave the Express lanes, and despite an appalling lack of signage, I did find the correct exit and started a run south towards the Gardiner Expressway. Did you know that until quite recently, the first sign for the Airport didn't appear on the 401 until the airport itself was in view? A couple of new airport signs have gone up, but the furthest one away is still less than 5Km before the exit from the 401. Signage here is poor, and I'm being kind in my choice of words.

Another annoying feature of the roads around Toronto is the tendency for the right lane, the driving lane, to magically turn into an exit lane. That caught me a couple of times today, although I suppose if I travelled these roads regularly, I'd get used to them.

On the Gardiner it was scarily busy, but the views of downtown Toronto, and Lake Ontario (note the name) were spectacular. We were aiming to drop in at the Vegan Danish Bakery before getting to the hotel, so we exited the Gardiner at Jamieson Avenue and joined the Parkdale traffic, just at school kicking out time. Fortunately we didn't have far to go.

Turning onto Queen Street West, it was only a block or two until we reached the parking lot that we'd scoped out ahead of time. There were plenty of spaces, and no wonder, when I found it that it cost $10 for two hours, which was a bit steep for this part of town.

Then it was just a short walk to the bakery, along the busy sidewalks, something you don't see in Chatham very often. Queen Street is one of the busy east-west-east routes that run parallel to the lake. It has four running lanes, two each way, but the two curbside lanes are mostly filled with (legally) parked cars, and the two centre lanes are shared with the streetcar tracks. Today, there was a distinct lack of streetcars, but more of that later.

The bakery, somewhere that we have visited before, was open and ready to serve us up some lovely grub. It's not cheap, nowhere is in Toronto, but the food is good. After a hot snack, we left with some exciting pastries, which we intended to enjoy later.

Back in the car, we turned eastwards on Queen Street and headed downtown. The reason there were no streetcars was that the road was all dug up at one point, blocking the tracks. There were buses replacing the trams as far as Shaw Street, and we plodded along behind one. The bus turned off at Shaw Street, and was immediately replaced by a streetcar, so we carried on behind it towards our goal. At one point I decided to lurch off to the right in an attempt to get to Dundas Street before the lady in the satellite said I should, but messed up completely and ended up back on Queen Street, behind a streetcar of course.

It was very slow going for the rest of the route, stymied by road works and people doing daft things, but we arrived at the hotel eventually. I dropped DW at the lobby, and took the car down into the bowels of the earth beneath the hotel to park. As with all these underground parking garages, it was all tight turns and ramps. When I did find a space, I had to back into it, with someone sat right on my tail of course, but no dings were collected and I parked safely. I was on level three, but it went down three more levels, as I discovered when I found the elevators. Given the slowness of trying to drive anywhere in this city, and the fact that I had a good parking spot, I decided that the car was staying where it was for the duration of our stay.

DW had checked us in and we made our way to the twenty-sixth floor (I didn't realise the hotel had that many floors) but when I looked out of the room's widow I realised just how high up we were.

The room, while quite big, is a bit tired. We find ourselves saying the same thing about most of the hotels we've stayed at in the GTA. The bathroom is tiny and, horror of horrors, doesn't have a walk in shower, contrary to the hotel's website description and photograph. A walk-in shower was at the top of DW's requirement list, so she was right onto the ‘phone and trying to get something sorted out. Sadly, there was no chance of a room move, not today anyway, but as recompense the hotel offered us two days' free breakfasts. Not a great offer as the hotel doesn't offer vegan food, so they amended the offer to two days free parking, worth ninety dollars, so that was alright. As DW said, it pays to complain. Me, I'm not the complaining type, but I'm glad that she is.

When we'd settled, we went out for a stroll around. We really are in the downtown core, yards from Nathan Phillips Square and the Toronto's City Hall. It's next to Bay Street, Canada's financial centre, and not too many yards from the mega-mall that is the Eaton Centre. There's a bit outdoor art event in Nathan Phillips Square tomorrow, so there were roads closed and barriers everywhere, but we were able to wander around as the evening darkened. We picked up some dishwasher soap in the mall, another exiting tale to tell, and were witness to the sad sight of the unhoused moving into Nathan Phillips Square to make use of the benches under the concrete walkway. It's a bit of an irony that they have to gather in the shadow of City Hall, but homelessness is a growing stain on not just Toronto, but most towns and cities in the industrialised world. It's doubly painful when you see just how much more wealthy the already wealthy have become. Social comment there, but it needs saying.

Back at the 26^th floor, I tried connecting my Android tablet to the TV to watch a movie, but despite instructions for the TV that said it was possible, the software was locked down so I couldn't access the input source choices. Then I tried signing into Netflix on the TV itself, and kept getting all manner of errors, that was until I disconnected my phone, the sign in medium, from the hotel's Wi-Fi, and then I was able to sign in.

We watched a movie, drank wine and beer, and eat pastries and peanuts. At eleven o'clock, DW decided to run a few plates through the dishwasher (we have a dishwasher!) only to find that the thing was completely dead. She called Maintenance and they said they'd send someone up, but an hour later, no one had shown up. Another call downstairs and we were told the maintenance team signed off at eleven, which you might have thought they'd have said earlier.

Then it was bedtime, in a surprisingly noisy room given how far above the street we are. Still, my Loop ear plugs were deployed and I took the customary thirty seconds to fall asleep. What will Saturday bring, I wonder? Hopefully a working dishwasher.

 

Springtime in Toronto - Day Four

 

Photo: Marriott.com.cn

We didn't have to check out of the hotel until noon, but were were ready to roll at about 9am, in anticipation of the young 'uns coming up early. It was a good plan, except that they didn't show, and were both still in bed at 9am. We dawdled about and they eventually turned up at about 1030hrs. It was pouring with rain, too, so they were instructed not to go to Tim's for breakfast.

It was busy in the hotel's lobby, lots of people were checking out, but there were also a lot of people in for the Blue Jays' afternoon game at 3pm. We ordered the car, and waited.

We'd decided to drop Emma and Charlie off at Exhibition GO Transit station so that Charlie could get a last ride on the train before we went home. They were to catch the train to Aldershot, which is right beside Highway 403 and our route home, and I knew that there was a pickup area there where we could meet them. That was all fine in theory, but for a couple of slight issues. 

The Gardiner, closed. Photo: ctvnews.ca

Firstly, the Gardiner Expressway, the highway on stilts through the downtown core, was closed for the weekend. That much I knew, but what I didn't know was that the Exhibition Centre was hosting a massive volleyball tournament for school-age children and everywhere around the Centre was gridlocked. The road to the station was closed off, and it took us an age to creep around the exhibition halls to get close enough to drop them off for the station. Every one of the Centre's parking lots was full, and with the Gardiner closed, Lakeshore Boulevard was at a standstill.

We did drop them off, although not as close to the station as we'd have liked. They missed the train they were going for, but that worked for us because it took us for ever to break free of the traffic jams caused by the Gardiner and the volleyball. Indeed, our Satnav routed us on to Queens Street West, where we'd been the day before, and we crawled slowly westwards with the trams until we got to the part where the Gardiner wasn't closed, and then onto the QEW. The QEW was slow, but we made use of the HOV lane again, and arrived at Aldershot about twenty minutes before the kids. I have to say that I'm never a comfortable user of the HOV lanes in Toronto. People drive far too fast at the best of times, and given a "go faster" lane, the speed merchants want to go even faster, this despite the 100kph limit. I'm OK driving at speed, just not all that happy about being bullied into collecting a speeding ticket. We were OK this wet Saturday because the speed was generally around 110-120kph, not fast enough to catch the attention of the cops, but on other days, 130kph seems to be the minimum in the HOV lane, and I'm not collecting a fine and demerit points because the knob ends in Toronto think the roads are race tracks.

Photo: Google Maps and urbantoronto.ca

When they did arrive at Aldershot, we hit the 403 again and made for the rest area just outside Brantford, to fill up on our last junk food of the trip. I had a Tim Hortons Turkey Bacon Club Sandwich, which I think was missing the bacon (I'd finished it before I noticed). It didn't matter because it was nice as it was, and just right for brunch.

The rest of the trip home was uneventful, thankfully, and free of the rain that plagued Toronto. Travelling west on the 401 on a Saturday was pretty easy, the truck traffic was light and there were not too many people hoping to collect Stunt Driving charges, as there often is during the week. Charlie was pretty good until we insisted on a pee stop at Dutton, and he didn't want to go, but other than that he'd been in excellent fettle for the entire trip.

Back home it was unpacking time, a horrible chore, but it has to be done. I put off firing up the washing machine, because laundry can always wait for another day.

The trip, then, was quite successful. Emma saw Dave. Charlie travelled the TTC and GO, and we grown-ups were able to see Toronto's harbourfront for the first time. I was a bit shocked as to how much everything costs in the big city, and while it wasn't that we didn't have the money, I did resent shelling out such vast sums of cash for stuff that was never going to be value for money.

I was reminded on the trip that Toronto is just a massive collection of cars and roads, with traffic lights at every corner of every block, and a long wait before it's safe for pedestrians to cross the road. With the Presto Card, fares of the TTC and Go Transit were quite reasonable, but those transit systems are quite limited, as we found out trying to get to Old Toronto. Walking's OK but the street crossings, the noise, and the pollution make it less than attractive. I suppose we could have used taxis, there were plenty about, but that would have been yet another layer of cost.

The hotel was OK, it's location was excellent, but the cost not so good. I know I sound like a grumpy old man, but when the cost of a weekend in Toronto far outstrips what you'd pay in New York (and yes, we could drive there), it kind of takes the gloss off things.

Anyway, that's us done with travelling for a while, at least until this oil crisis thing is sorted. Until then, it's back to gardening, assuming that the rain lets up.

Springtime in Toronto - Day Three

 

Photo: ubdining.com

We're getting into a routine. The young 'uns went off to Tim Hortons for breakfast goodies while we did the bathroom thing, and we were set to hit the tourist hotspots quite early.

Our first stop was the CN Tower, just a few yards away from our room, but quite a few yards further from the door of the hotel, given the walk back to the elevators from our room. Outside, as we wandered along the edge of the Rogers Centre, some Blue Jays fans were already gathering for the day's game against the Guardians, bags strategically placed by one of the entry gates to the stadium. This was before 1100hrs, and the game kicked off, or batted off, or whatever, at 1900hrs. That's some devotion. I just looked up which city the Guardians represent and it's Cleveland, Ohio, so almost a local derby.

The CN Tower security gate wasn't too busy, nor was the ticket office, and we wangled a 15% discount on the production of a Metrolinx Presto card, that is the travel ticket for the TTC and GO Transit. It still cost an arm and a leg, though, and I can't help thinking that it's a bit of a rip-off, as are most of the attractions in downtown Toronto.

The queue for the lifts meandered around a sort of an exhibition, the tower celebrates it's fiftieth anniversary this year, but it didn't take long before we were standing in the glass-sided, partially glass-floored elevator and whizzing up the tower at 10-15mph. The young woman operating the lift gave us some statistics in a curious sing-song voice as we rose, but when asked questions, she answered in a perfectly ordinary voice, so perhaps her sing-song thing helps her to remember her lines.

At the main observation deck it was fairly busy, although it wasn't too bad. It's been smartened up a fair bit since DW and I were last here, probably twenty years ago now. A lot of the windows were now floor-to-ceiling, and leaned out a bit, so by pressing myself against the glass, I could look straight down and see the sloping window of our hotel room. The views are, of course, wonderful. Across Lake Ontario to Upstate New York, all of the lake's north shore from Hamilton in the west to Oshawa in the east, and the whole elongated conurbation that is Toronto. There are a lot more high-rise condominium towers clustered around the downtown core now, and where once you could see the Scotiabank Arena (formerly the Air Canada Arena) quite clearly, now it's mostly hidden by the new buildings.

There was, of course, an overpriced snack bar up there (there's a fancy restaurant in the evenings), and there was continual piped music, which was annoying its sheer presence, but also because the people that run the Tower would think it was necessary, especially given the ambient noise created by people talking. Having sated ourselves on the view, we moved down a stage to the area where there are glass panels in the floor. I was pleased, and proud, that Emma, Charlie, and DW, were happy to be joining me on the glass, three-hundred meters up. As I've aged, I have become far more aware of heights, and standing on the main observation deck I could feel the muscles in my legs tense, quite involuntarily, as I went to the windows. Intellectually I know that it's perfectly safe, but my body's built-in systems were telling me otherwise. Curiously, standing on the glass floor didn't faze me, nor everyone else, apparently.

Something else tweaked my old-age sensibilities, and I've noticed this in other places; cell phone cameras are king. Everywhere people were posing for pictures, and sometimes taking up quite large public spaces for long periods just to get that perfect shot. I'm always minded to walk through the space they've commandeered, but DW wouldn't be happy if I did it just to make a point.

As we went back down again, we were dumped into the inevitable gift shop and snack bar, and the place to pick up your "Commemorative Photo" that we'd been obliged to pose for as we were waiting in line to go up the Tower. I don't know why they still do this (see the moan about cell phone cameras above), or why people part with large sums of money for the printed product. But, it's all about milking the tourists.

CN Tower Giftshop Photo: Dreamstime.com

From the CN Tower, we went back to the hotel to drop off some stuff, then headed out to a vegan bakery at Queen West and Brock. We walked over to the streetcar stop at Spadina and Front West and waited on the little island in the middle of the traffic. Traffic is what Toronto is all about, but I'll come back to that in another blog. The streetcar duly arrived and we rattled along to Queen West, then changed to the 501 line that goes east-west along Queen Street. We had to wait a bit because we'd just missed one, and it was a wee bit nippy stood out in the traffic. There are little wind breaks on these streetcar platforms, but no seats, so it was a chilly twelve minutes stood waiting. The 501, at least on this part of its run, didn't have a dedicated running area, but shared the road with the traffic. Given that both sides of the road were lined with parked cars, it meant that the moving traffic was running on the tracks, so there was little speed advantage as the streetcar was stuck in traffic with the cars. That said, it has to be better than a diesel powered bus; much bigger, of course, and zero direct emissions. 

Spadina and Front West - Photo: Google StreetView

It was an interesting run out to the west, away from the downtown core. Queen Street was lined with hundreds of independent shops and eating places, so many of them reflecting the local racial makeup of the area. Tibetan and Nepalese seemed to be the dominant flavours, but there was a real mix. At Brock Avenue we descended from the streetcar and walked the few yards to the bakery, the "Vegan Danish Bakery on Queen". The sign above the door looked like the design from one of those tins of Danish biscuits you can buy at Christmas.

The bakery (right) and the streetcar tracks - Photo: Google StreetView

It is a bakery, but it's also a small restaurant, with the tiniest little booths in the long, narrow shop. The array of food on offer was wonderful and I had a Breakfast Sandwich, some very good coffee, and a cherry turnover pastry. I don't think it was particularly cheap, but the food was good, and all vegan of course. With the predominance of chain coffee shops these days, it's not always easy to find good European pastries, but these were good, very good. 

Our next stop of was Little Canada, a scaled down set of models of places in Canada located in a building at Young and Dundas, back in the downtown area. As ever, we just missed a streetcar and the wait for the next one was cold again. We went past Spadina this time and carried on to University, and Osgoode Subway station. We didn't need to use the subway really, but Charlie was keen so we jumped on the U-shaped line that took us down to Union again, then back up to Dundas, or rather Toronto Metropolitan University, better known as TMU. Little Canada is situated in the same building as the subway station, so it was up one set of escalators, and down another, to get there, all without having to go outside.

Photo: TTC.ca

What can I say about Little Canada? It's a series of highly detailed models of places in Canada, the first one being Niagara Falls. It's all built around HO scale railways, but it's not about the trains, it's about recreating all the buildings, in miniature, but to the same scale as a standard train layout. The trains all move, obviously, and there are road vehicles moving about, all lit I might add, and even the water features look real (indeed, the Bay of Fundy had been recreated with actual water, the tide going in and out - the tidal reach in the real Bay is one of its features). The lights in the models were great, and the ambient lighting changed every ten minutes or so from day time to night time. Other models included Toronto, Ottawa, Halifax NS, St John's NL, Vancouver BC and Victoria BC. There was a model of the Northern Territories in a special cold room, and they're working on a Prairie model now. It was fascinating, for adults and children alike. Me being me I was keen to look into one of the control rooms where all the lights, trains and road vehicles are managed from, and I was particularly taken with the little vehicle loop where road vehicles left the model, went round a loop and then paused to build a gap between their movements as they set out on the model again. We paid around $35 for an adult ticket and I reckon that was about the best value attraction we visited. 

Little Canada's Niagara Falls and Clifton Hill

Supper was in the subterranean food court at Union station again, before we joined the massed ranks of Blue Jays fans as they headed to the Rogers Centre for their game with the Cleveland Guardians, along the slightly grandly named Skywalk, from the station. The evening was spent doing last night stuff like packing, in readiness for our departure on Saturday, which was probably best given the masses of people milling around the hotel while the Blue Jays slumped to defeat. Ah, but they play again tomorrow.

Sad Blue Jays fans - Photo: Reuters and dailymail.co.uk