Last Sunday was my thirty-fifth birthday. I can't even believe that I've already been thirty-five for a full week. I really can't believe that I'm thirty-five at all... but there are a lot of things I can't believe, so I suppose I'll add that one to the pile! We started the day with breakfast at Tim Horton's - because I don't know if you can actually claim you've been to Canada if you haven't actually had Tim Horton's - right?
Our first stop after Tim Horton's was Casa Loma - a 98 room mansion built for Sir Henry Pellatt from 1911-1914. Pellatt and his wife lived in the house from 1914 to 1924...the house cost about $3.5 million to build and covers 64,700 square feet with amenities that included an elevator, an oven large enough to cook an ox, two secret passages in Pellatt's ground floor office, a pool and three bowling alleys... just to name a few. The house was taken in 1924 by the city for unpaid taxes and the building was left vacant for years.
When the city increased the property taxes in 1923, Sir Henry Pellatt held an auction and sold off over $1.5 million in art and $250,000 in furniture but it wasn't enough and the house was taken the next year. In the late 20's the house was operated as a luxury hotel and was a popular nightspot for wealthy Americans during Prohibition. The stables were used during WWII to conceal research and production of sonar devices for U-boat detection; "under repair" signs were hung up to allow workers to come and go without suspicion. The house underwent a 15 year, $33 million renovation from 1997-2012 and reopened for tours shortly thereafter.
The house and all of it's rooms are open to the public - the tour was self-guided and you listened to information about the house with hand held radios. There were also plaques telling you information about the house and we pretty quickly realized that if we took the time to listen to each 2-3 minute blurb about some 16-18 rooms, read all the plaques, take in the sights...not to mention that the entire third floor was a military museum and you could take spiral staircases up...up...up into both of the towers - it was a LOT.
We ended up spending about three hours at Casa Loma and I feel like we made a pretty thorough tour of the place, but I also see how you could easily end up spending an entire day looking around the place. We ended up missing the stables but that was mostly because portions of the house were decorated for a Halloween event and I wasn't walking through what amounted to a tunnel of terror just to see the stables, ha-ha! The house also has escape room style events that take place in each of the two towers - one is magic themed and the other is WWII themed and they both looked incredibly fascinating! If you are planning a trip to Toronto - Casa Loma is not to be missed - it's amazing!
Since we'd foregone the hop on/hop off bus on Sunday, we drove to Casa Loma and from there we popped back over to the harbor for lunch at a spot called Amsterdam Brewery that had delicious food and excellent views of the Toronto Harbor. After we finished our lunch, we took a short walk over to hop in line for a boat tour of the Toronto Islands - a group of fifteen small islands that ring the Toronto Harbor. The bus tour was a part of the hop on/hop off bus ticket and made it seem like we'd gotten our monies worth since we didn't actually ride the bus that much!
The views of the Toronto skyline from the boat were incredible - the "post card" view of Toronto that most people know is shot from the Toronto Islands and so I made sure to snap plenty of pictures! There is an amusement park on one of the islands, a small airport on another and a yacht club on yet another - and people also live on the islands. A house on the islands is much cheaper than living in the actual city but there are only a set number of homes on the islands and you could wait up to 150 years for the chance to own one - so basically, you might put your name on the list but die before the opportunity arose. And just because your parents own a home, you have no guarantee that you will - homes revert back to the island to be sold when the owners die - they cannot be willed to family members!
After our 45 minute cruise around the islands, we were so close to the Beavertails shop that we went back for round two - after all, it was my birthday and so I got to choose and I figured, if I wasn't going to have a birthday cake I might as well have another Beavertail! This time I got a Maple Pecan Pie offering and my Mom chose Strawberry Cheesecake - both were divine but we also agreed that our favorites were the chocolate items we got the day before!
We then scooted over to Graffiti Alley - which is exactly what it sounds like. It's an alleyway that is filled with graffiti that is constantly changing and evolving whenever someone sees fit to take a couple cans of spray paint and go to work! I am always blown away by graffiti because I don't see how anyone can paint so amazingly with a spray paint - but some of the art work was truly impressive.
Our final stop of the day was to check out the Toronto Legislative Building in Queen Elizabeth Park and I had to snap a picture of one of the little black squirrels hopping around all over the park. I thought they were the cutest thing and told my Mom I'd bring one home as a pet... although I think my dog would eat it, ha-ha! We made our way back to the apartment and packed up our things before walking two blocks down the street to have dinner at the Loose Moose - which was a loud sports bar but the food was really delicious and I was perfectly thrilled to have fried dill pickles, a Sprite and some chili as my birthday dinner!
We set out for home on Monday morning around 7:00 and the trip was quick, easy and uneventful. I cannot say enough about what a wonderful city Toronto was - it was clean, the people were nice (it's Canada - duh) and there was so much to see and do! I know we didn't even begin to scratch the surface of what the city had to offer and I'd definitely be open to returning to Toronto again in the future! I'd also highly recommend that if you're planning to visit Toronto, you purchase a City Pass because it will get you into some of the big attractions: the CN Tower, the Aquarium, Casa Loma and more... it's a must have.
So - there you have it. A long weekend spent exploring Niagara Falls and Toronto - some amazing memories made and another year of life started in style!
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