Danni travels on!: Toronto, Days 3,4,5

My plan before coming to Toronto had been to take 3 different walking tours.
A free walking tour is not initially free, the idea is that you spend as much as you want to, which means that the guide has to be good. So far, all tours I have attended in the past have Ben absolutely fantastic (my first being by a Canadian giving an English tour in Munich).

So it came to a surprise even to myself that I did not attend any at all. Instead I created my own tours all around town. The neighborhood we were staying at this week that seemed so shabby to me at first now has entered my heart. Shabby yes, but also colorful, international and with lots of design and cute little cafés. I am sipping my very first Orange Mocha today and it is great. Wanna know where to get that? R/Squared Cafe on Queen Street West.

Anyway on day 3 I took a leisure day. It was probably a bit of jet lag left that made me feel quite tired. So I just read a lot laying on the bed (a cool book by a former Runaways member named Cherie Currie). Then I went back to the Early Bird cafe to read a bit more and of course write my first blog entry, then returned to the room. When Rene was finished with his conference for the day we met up at Rogers Centre to watch my very first Baseball game ever! Toronto's Blue Jays against the Arizona Diamondbacks. I must be frank, I didn't know the rules much despite having watched an endless number of baseball movies. Rene knew a bit so he explained to me and the rest we guessed.
Unfortunately it seemed quite a lame game except 2 or 3 situations involving a home run and a ball being caught out of the air next to the back wall. The catcher crashed with it, but he still caught the ball! Wow!
The roof was open, the air was warm and we had a good look on CN Tower as well. A very cool experience for 20 dollars each.
And: I had missed my first opportunity in New York in 1999 to see a baseball game, so I guess it was high time to finally see one.

Day 4 started at AGO, the Art Gallery of Ontario. I couldn't find much art that thrilled me. Most of it were collections of private collectors, Canadian art and a lot of European art, mostly being from around 1600 until 1800. I am a frequent visitor of Art museums though, so I am a bit spoiled. Please don't take offense if you are from Toronto.
It is a great museum. I liked it's architecture a lot.

By accident my next stop was the Yonge/Dundas Square. What a collection of flickering screens and giant posters. I bought a hot dog at a kiosk there and then proceeded towards the center of the square, where I got a free "jerky". What is that you ask? It is a dried meat snack, in this case with dried ginger pieces on a stick. Nice but I wouldn't buy it. Way too expensive.
I took the metro southbound to King Street where I wanted to get cash from a bank. I discovered one, but the machines read "Instant teller", which confused me. I had expected "ATM" or "cash machine" or something like that. (Rene later told me ATM means Automatic Teller! Machine). As I still was confused I wanted to ask a clerk who came towards me with a great box. In it was a lot, I mean a LOT, of ice-cream and he offered one to me. So I got the cash and then seated myself in a leather couch and licked away happily inside the bank building.

In the vicinity was famous St. Lawrence market which I had a walk through. As I was not so keen on buying any fresh groceries I left quickly again and instead spend some time watching birds getting a bath in a small fountain in a park.

The last thing I did around this area was visiting the Design Exchange, a much praised must/do for designers. What I found was a small collections of timeless furniture objects, old radios and LP players. I had a fun talk with a guy about an LP player and an old telephone which made us rethink to the time when there were the wheel/dial phones. He said thank you, nice talking to you and left. Again I found it quite strange that people here in North America do this /for me strange/ kind of small talk.
How are you doing today? Nice talking to you. Nice dress, I like it (to a complete stranger in the street car)... I assume I fail at most situations being a shy and silent opposite.

In the evening Rene and I met at the Hard Rock Cafe at Yonge/Dundas and had a great meal. The ribs were the best I ever had eaten and the strawberry smoothies were delicious.

On Day 5 I had planned to visit the Toronto Islands. To get there I was on one of the newer street cars in town. There were two older ladies sitting next to me who were obviously no frequent street car travelers as they were confused about not being able to talk to the driver (which was possible, but unlike in the old street cars through a window) and who were not really sure where they were heading.
When one of the women announced the street car as being "sooo futuristic" I was smiling to myself. This kind of modern street car had been introduced around 2000 at my hometown of Bremen in Northern Germany...
As I found out the ladies wanted to go onto the islands as well, I gave them a hint on where to get out and where the ferry was. It astounded me, not for the first time, that I was finding my way around a new city better than people who were actually from it.

The ferry ride took about 20 minutes and showed some spectacular views on the skyline.
When arriving on the island I headed straight for the centered pier, where I bought 2 Pizza slices. I wanted to sit on the beach and eat them when suddenly I was attacked from behind by an enormous seagull, which swooped over my head. Out of shock I dropped one piece of pizza just as the shitty bird had expected, but I snatched it back and threw it away in a trash can, because I didn't want the bird to be successful. Still swearing I headed back to the pizza shack and ate the remaining piece there.

Next door was a bike rental. I received a heavy lilac bike with a huge handle bar and headed off towards Wards Island on the Eastern side. Every now and then I took some photos and rode the wooden track back towards the center. The wooden planks made a nice musical sound, when I was passing over, just like a xylophone.

The other side of the island towards Hanlan's Point, where the small city airport is situated, is quiet and green and full of boat and small yachts. I passed a cute quacking duck family which was just crossing the street when I came by and watching a couple of planes taking off over the skyline of Toronto.
As I was quite tired from carrying the heavy rucksack full of eventual needed things and cycling for approx. 12 km, I returned the bike, marched back to the ferry and went home to freshen up. An hour later I had to be at the campus to meet Rene and to catch the bus with everybody to the Conference Dinner.
It was a yellow school bus that took us to the Mill Street Brewery Pub at Distillery District.
The area looked quite cool, it was old brewery buildings with new shops all around.
The conference dinner provided interesting snacks for all the guests until the 3 main dinner self/service points were opened: there you could build your own hamburger or fajita or poutine set.
There was one free drink included. I took a delicious fruity cider originally from Toronto and it was tasting great.

When we decided to get back we experienced one of the older street cars being stuck in the middle of a crossing. It's electrical string had wiggled itself around the wires hanging over the streets. It couldn't move, even when the driver tried several times to pull it off. The traffic was starting to jam, our supposed street cars could not pass and we were still trying to decide where to head to get another ride when suddenly a wire from above the street hit the ground and several small explosions followed. People were still crossing the streets, until a fire brigade came and closed the site down. It was quite amazing.
So we had to walk down a few blocks and to catch another street car home.