Once upon a time in Canada - in the thick of it in Toronto

That really quirky café/restaurant, off the hotel lobby, surprised me the following morning by serving up a good selection of breakfast options though I am never going to accept that Orange Pico Tea is any substitute for English Breakfast Tea. An early foray was down to the lakeside and walking along beneath the trees lining and shading it I came across a warning sign that surprised me. It warned about a particular bird that is likely to attack you showing a picture of one which, I subsequently found out, is a Red-Winged Blackbird. Then, just as I was taking a picture of this curious sign, a jogger went past and I witnessed one of these birds swoop down from a tree over him and take a swipe with its beak at his head as it flew over him. It brought back to mind an incident I had partly noticed in Montreal where such a bird gave a small group a hard time in a park there. Being long involved in the design and construction of big multi-functional shopping centres I was keen to get into the Eaton Centre, a very iconic such place long vaunted as the ideally dramatic enclosed shopping destination. Some might argue that the last such big project I worked on, St David’s 2 Cardiff, took its inspiration from Eaton Centre. Which does not explain why it took me a couple of days to work out how to get into it, or that, apart from the name on some facades, where it exactly was in the dense massing of very high rise buildings. But I did find the ways in and out eventually, almost by accident, and enjoyed exploring this iconic development. At the south end of Eaton Centre is another name of significance, this time one that lives long in the history of Canada, The Hudson Bay Company, now a department store company, so not exactly as it was in times long gone by, fur trading etc, but still a name with magic in its sound.

As you will not be surprised to hear I have a particular interest in the buildings I come across, the Elton Centre clearly being one but also on anything particularly unusual and part of the University there is certainly unusual, see the attached picture.

That was found whilst making my way back towards my hotel with just a general direction to head in. Another bonus from that walk was stumbling across the modern art museum, the Ontario Art Gallery, another interesting building in its own right but a lucky find as I found that the next day after 5pm there would not only be free entry but a free and full preview of recent Inuit art, which I greatly enjoyed. A lucky break that as the exhibition of the Inuit art was not going to be open to the public until the day after I had left Toronto. Another city, another observation tower, this time the famous CN Tower. I went up to the main observation decks and could have gone to an even substantially higher deck, but decided not too as I still felt I had left my stomach on the ground below. The decks were really crowded, especially as it was a beautifully clear bright sunny day. In offering to take a picture of one family with a spectacular backdrop behind them I fell into another interesting conversation. They were over from Malta for a holiday and knew Oxford well as one of their daughters was at Uni there. They were somewhat scandalized that I had not been to Malta and did their best to encourage me to go, telling me it was an easy place to explore and enjoy as it was so small.

Then there was the BIG experience I just had to do whilst there, and that was to go to Niagara Falls. I had intended to do it independently by train or coach but decided to book a day tour in which getting on a boat at the Falls to get really close to them, was the main but not only focus. Hence with a coachload of others gathered from a wide variety of hotels, we set off on what was meant to be my last full day in Toronto. Being on such a tour coach does mean you get a driver/guide/minder who usually does their best to inform and entertain you. On the way out of downtown Toronto he told us a story about one of the big, prestigious, flashy buildings there, the headquarters of one of the biggest banks in Canada. Just to be different they had their new headquarters built just outside of the finance district and to make it even more special/flashy they accepted the recommendation of their architects to have gold dust incorporated in the glass panels that completely clads the big tower block. They accepted the proposal having been told it would cut down on solar glare and heat gain as well assist in insulating the building. Being a bank they were the ones who bought the gold to be used. It turned out they purchased substantially more than was required and used and, subsequent to the completion of the building, sold off their surplus gold. In the meantime the gold price had rocketed so, when that surplus was sold, they made a lot of money on the deal, so much that it even covered the cost of the gold used in the glass panels plus some. There was a lot of other ‘stuff’ told us on the trip nearly all of which has dropped so far into my memories that I can’t recall it without a technical upgrade. One aspect I do recall without the upgrade was tuition on how to sound like a true resident of Toronto by the way we say Toronto. It was said to be Trono, then more slangy as Trona, but then, on the train to Vancouver and talking to a true past resident of Toronto, Joan, she encouraged me to say it as it was intended, Toronto.

Getting to the visitor servicing ‘town’, that is the Canadian area on the north side of the falls, we were marched, processed, herded, and streamed down to the pontoons against which the boats that are to take you up to the falls are waiting for you. Along the way you are given one size does not fit all red plastic poncho which I got lost in for a while though I felt I had a better time of it than the rather rotund man near me who almost got defeated by his until his wife and two kids struggled him into it. I ended up next to them on the boat and we chatted about the fun of being at the Falls, getting soaked on your lower arms and legs where the cap does not reach, trying to take pictures between dousings and just chattering with others about the fun of it. That family, mum, dad and two young boys, mum and dad originally from Columbia but many years of becoming US citizens living and working in Los Angeles, now doing a “what shall we do tomorrow” tour around the northern States and into Canada. I hope they had no problem getting back into the States after all the issues there have been recently. I loved those brief interludes of chance meetings with people from so many different backgrounds. While I contemplated that and the so long awaited visit to the Falls, I sat in the sun eating a chicken burger whilst gently steaming as I dried off. After that back on the coach to get to Niagara-on-the-Lake, think quaint and well preserved old small town, where there is a statue to George Bernard Shaw who lived there for a while and the small theatre there had, when I was there, Stephen Fry appearing in a play. https://www.niagaraonthelake.com/ A joyous day and so lucky with the beautifully fine sunny day as, the day before and while I was taking a late afternoon rest in my hotel room before seeking out another enjoyable and tasty evening meal, I was roused by a deluge of a rain storm, where all the big tower blocks across the road from my room window, disappeared behind the dense curtain of very heavy rain.