East Toronto and the beaches...
Today we took a tram to the Beach suburbs of Toronto with the intention of walking back home from there. We were not sure of the distance before we started but it was about 14km by the time we got home according to Runkeeper.
Pretty simple actually and within a block we came across this sign.
Hans walked along the path looking west towards downtown. Note the light green doubledecker trains they have here. We were not sure whether they are commuter train (we think so) or long distance trains.
Lunch time for Hans and what better place to have it than inside St Lawrence Market. Buster's Sea Cove had far more customers than any other eatery there so that will be it.
Buster's Fish and Chips was enormous and very tasty. Hans finished the fish, but had to let go of half of the chips or so.
Meanwhile Di persisted with the "waterfront path" but at times was annoyed by having to basically walk along the edge of the road where clearly industry overruled the public good. Again, pretty ugly.
But it eventually got better at North Shore Park near Toronto's Outer Harbour. The path started to go through "bush land" with water glimpses.
Occasionally the path even got pretty...
Finally Di reached the waterfront - first at the Toronto Windsurfer Club.
Di stopped for a break here. The surrounding area was nice with some grass, shade and picnic tables which were being used by a few large groups for a lunchtime BBQ. Smelled good.
The "waterfront path" from this point on to the city is all along the side of roads. Not too good for walking but this section was a little more interesting - the bridge was closed to vehicles but still open for pedestrians and bikes at each edge. The council had warning signs posted of a 200kg limit and the bridge was in terrible condition so it was almost as if they thought it would be OK to lose a few bikers or walkers - not too reassuring.
Like Hans, Di intended to have lunch at St Lawrence Market but on the way she got distracted by this superstore in a warehouse area. Lots and lots of Chinese people were going in and out.
Aaah - Di's kind of shop. A huge warehouse full of Asian speciality foods and produce. Everything looked great. This veggie section had lots of ingredients that Di had not see or used before. What's a lobo? On the top shelf near the right, it looks like brown sticks. Some more research required.
The other fabulous thing was that like Walmart they had tasting samples offered in different locations. Of course Di tried these too but avoided the pickled sea cucumber (next time...maybe)
The highlight was this section, where the locals seemed to be getting their lunch. Everything looked good and was very cheap but BBQ pork is a favourite in our family, and that counter had a queue, so Di's lunch choice was simplified.
Delicious, fresh BBQ pork for lunch for $2.84. Forget St Lawrence market (for now).
Di loved the T&T supermarket and if only we had a kitchen here she would have shopped up a storm. After happily wandering every aisle it was time to move on.
On the way home Di went to a nearby Dollarama (the traveller's friend) for some snack supplies for our bus trip to Montreal tomorrow. Another bargain $3.75 for sweet treats.
Also on the way Di passed through a park with a lot of homeless people resting on benches and the grass. One chirpy man said good morning (yet it was afternoon) and asked if Di was interested in going with him for "a Pizza and a Pepsi". The question that came to mind...who's paying? She declined graciously.
Home around 1.30pm with Hans close behind. We compared notes snd photos then rested for a few hours (as the day has heated up to close to 30 degrees again).
After a few "pre dinner" drinks in the room we headed out again, on a quest for more drinks and later dinner.
It was all happening at Dundas-Yonge Square (aka Toronto's Time Square). Today appeared to be a youth Unity Festival on but the rapping and music was rubbish for us oldies, so we moved on.
As we have found out so often, the buskers were better than those on a stage. We loved these guys, lots of fun even though they murdered "Smooth" by Santana. "Ghostbusters" theme and Stevie Wonder's "Superstition" were better. We donated to their "tuition fund" and listened for a while.
The guy with the microphone below was doing his best to yell over the top of the music about "Jesus is love"...
But in a Saturday night crowd there will always be a mix of views and characters. The guy with the sign "Gods create hate" was about 20 meters from the microphone guy, with the band and us in the middle. Tolerance is a great thing in big cities.
After a few blocks of fruitless searching for a pub or bar with good karma nearby we headed to the Flatiron area instead where we had noted quite a lot of bars. Yep, it was easy to find a few candidates there and we chose an Irish pub, called The Jersey Giant, with big open windows, a typical pub interior and a crowd.
Hans chose a Richards White from a $5 pint list - different but it grew on him so a second followed without hesitation.
Di chose a lethal but delicious Cosmopolitan cocktail - 3 shots combined of vodka and triple sec and topped up with cranberry juice. Very "Sex in the City". Too easy to drink and one was enough
We lingered at the pub and then around 8pm looked for dinner. We decided against anything heavy and expensive so our local Turkish kebab place was an easy choice - the local cops ate here too.
We are feeling satisfied with our drinks and dinner and are happy to step back into our hotel, out of the Saturday night mayhem. We realized that we actually haven't taken a photo of Bond Place. It looks very 70s on the outside but then inside has been very much modernized and we were quite happy with the place.
Back in the room, we realise that a good ol Bourne movie is on so good night.
No comments:
Post a Comment