Advertisement
Published: June 27th 2006
Hello world,
My day of stairs consisted of:
1. Climbing up and down a very narrow and scary winding staircase at Casa Loma (a mansion aka "castle" built in the early 1900's) to reach the top tower with a great view... but I went weak in the knees about halfway up when I realized how many flights there were and how small the steps are.
2. Walking down the stairs from the CN Tower revolving restaurant to the observatory deck and experiencing the glass floor... you can look about 50 stories down through the glass beneath your feet... AHHHHH!!!
3. Walking up (well, elevatoring up) three floors to find a vending machine that isn't out of water or broken. I finally called housekeeping for a toothbrush for my Mom and asked where I could buy water since the machines wouldn't let me, and they sent a couple of bottles up. Hurrah!
Well, in more detail, this morning I rolled out of bed around 8 and explored the hotel while my family was snoring away. I was extremely happy to find a Globe and Mail outside my door since I feel news-deprived. Then after much nagging, the fam got up and we went to Richtree Marche (e with the accent) which apparently is a market sort of thing... it is cafeteria-style but with lush surroundings, baskets of fresh fruit spilling out, and stations selling things like omelettes to order, French toast, prepared and self-serve salads, crepes, and things like pasta and sandwiches at lunch. It was delicious but a bit overpriced... then we walked around until Candy had to go meet the Disney marketing people, and my Mom and I booked a tour with a Chinese tour company for Niagara Falls - eek we'll be surrounded by HKers yakking away on Wednesday!!!
We met with a relative who works downtown for lunch and dined at Springroll - a trendy Chinese/Thai fusion place with pad thai, cashew chicken and rice, grilled chicken caesar, go-go iced tea (ha ha), and even pho! The food was mediocre but the decor was very loungy so I guess it's ok for the price. Of course I got into a tug-of-war with the relative since she wanted to pay for all of us and she won in the end =(
Then we took the subway and cabbed it up to Casa Loma, a very pretty mansion/"castle" built around the turn of the previous century. We took lots of photos and walked up the stairs which still give me the heebie-jeebies - can't wait to show you guys the photos! We also made reservations for the revolving restaurant at CN Tower since we planned to go in the morning but when I checked with the concierge, I was told today is the 30th anniversary of CN Tower (hurrah.. pffft) and tickets were 3 for $30 - BUT we'd have to wait for 1.5 - 2 hours. Err, that's not worth our time... so we thought we'd try to get in for dinner tonight and got reservations at 8:45 pm which include admission =)
We backtracked to the hotel to nap (jet lag zzz) and then it's shopping time at Eaton Centre!!! My Mom bought sandals at the first store we went to, then we rushed off to H&M before our dinner. WOW! Good deals on very cheap and trendy stuff for one season, but the XS is a tad big and some of the clothing is poorly made so it doesn't quite live up to the hype... but I'm intrigued enough to head back tomorrow. I bought a top, and my Mom racked up about $200 there lol... she doesn't have time to shop very often so I guess this is one of the few times she can!
Then we went to CN Tower and got to bypass the huge long lineup to the restaurant. The food isn't quite gourmet, let's say it's more gourmand but the portions were *huge* - none of us could finish our food. I had literally half a chicken! We arrived at dusk and missed the sunset since it was cloudy, but we saw the transition into the night scene. Gorgeous and definitely worth the money since the prix fixe is $48 including admission and admission is $23 alone anyway! We lingered over dessert until 11 pm, then cabbed it back home. We're finding it much easier to cab around since subway costs $2.75 each anyway and a cab ride to most places (CN Tower, etc) is only $7 after tip.
Anyway, I'm rambling so I'll stop. It's also 1 am so I should go to sleep... I'll promise to upload photos tomorrow, they are definitely worth a thousand words! 😉
re comments:
1. I'm going to Queen St West tomorrow, have to figure out where the stores are exactly - I think it starts near my hotel so I'll have to double check my tacky cartoon tourist map
2. England? HA! Brazil is playing tomorrow, hurrah! I wish I could just plant myself somewhere at a bar or cafe and watch but I suppose my family would be upset with me 😉 And I'm far from Pacific Mall now so I don't think I can go back... although I should check for other local GTA deals. Thanks Matt!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.097s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 5; qc: 44; dbt: 0.0758s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
matt
non-member comment
sounds like you are having fun! how is the weather there? extremely hot? smog alerts? so do you reside in the downtown core? taxi fare seems so cheap! you should go watch a baseball game! tix are so cheap! and one more thing, i copied and pasted ur link IE and it took me to some french ski travel blog. i was getting so confused b/c it seems plausible that you of all ppl would of went skiing. And its french, so i assumed you might of went to Quebec already or something. But then it started getting very far fetched b/c the ski resort was in Vermont. However, i rationalized that Vermont might be plausible too b/c its just across the border from Quebec. Funny story.