THE BIG SMOKE

When we told people we were going to Toronto, most everyone asked the same question... "why?"

Well, both Michelle and I had never been, we have a few friends who live out here that we've never visited and I really wanted to see TSN's so-called "Center of the Universe". So for 5 days & nights we experienced Toronto and guess what? We loved it!

If you were to take Commercial Drive, Main Street, Robson Street plus a little bit of Victoria and smash them all together, you would have Toronto, a wonderfully diverse, cosmopolitan and surprisingly clean city filled with great architecture and things to do. We stayed with our friends SEAN & LEA who live in KENSINGTON MARKET, a great little area filled with vegetable stands, quaint eateries and more vintage shops than you can shake a stick at. We played tourist and saw QUEEN STREET, MUCH MUSIC, THE CN TOWER, UofT, YORKVILLE, ROSEMONT, THE HOCKEY HALL OF FAME, UNION STATION, ST. LAWRENCE MARKET and we attended a taping of THE HOUR at CBC.

We also ate some amazing food at places like MINI, BISTRO DE SELECT, GIANCARLO TRATTORIA, LA PALLETTE, SUPER MARKET, ONE RESTAURANT and THE DRAKE. Toronto seems to really be into French Cuisine as there are a number of French places to choose from but all of these places were funky and worth trying. One of our favourites however was a little joint in the Market called PATTY KING that sold $1.25 DOUBLES, a small fried, curried chick pea sandwich from Trinidad & Tobego that tasted like gold. Gotta have a double! ! !


It was also cool to see some old friends. SEAN & LEA ofcourse who were gracious enough to open their fantastic home to us and made us feel so welcome, their hospitality was over the moon! The Marley Boys, RYAN & JAY who came out for all the big events and thanks to Ryan, we got to see the CBC and a taping of The Hour, good times. BETH & ANGUS who have probably been living out in TO the longest from the Vancouver crew and are doing fantastic. NICOLE & JUSTINE, gals who I went to High School with and who it was great to reconnect with. Finally, we got to hook up with SHONA which was awesome, she's now in Toronto continuing her Art Education.

All in all, it was really hard to leave Toronto as our friends and experiences within "the Big Smoke" were all positive and all memorable. We even had three big birthdays there, Shona, Sean and I all celebrated one within 3 days of each other, which was pretty cool. We can't wait to go back and experience more of Toronto but for now, check out the adventure HERE!!!.