August 21, 2025

Thursday

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Good morning. It is a beautiful brisk morning. I got up and went for a walk to find coffee and a pastry. Not sure which direction to head in so I chose to walk southeast down Yonge St towards Lake Ontario. Yonge street seems to be one of the main drags in town.

I made it to Sankofa Square. Here I found a Starbucks but decided not to go with something I am used to. I found the Hop On Hop Off bus, something we are are familiar with, starting point in the square and picked up a map from them. Then I decided to walk back towards the hotel and stop at a small coffee shop I saw along the way. Fusettes was the name of the shop.

Fusettes doesn’t appear to be part of a chain of store. They made a good cappuccino. The pastries looked a bit too “hippy” like for me. They had some blueberry muffins in the oven. The banana whole grain oat muffins on display didn’t look particularly appetizing. I probably should have waited for the blueberry muffins to come out of the oven, but it was getting close to the time for Mary to get up.

After my coffee I walked back to the hotel and stopped at the bistro cafe in the lobby. I got Mary a coffee and some yogurt with fruit. Certainly, looked better than the banana whole gain oat muffins. She was still sleeping when I got back to the room. Wakey Wakey.

After Mary finished her coffee and yogurt, we walked down to SanKofa Square and bought the tickets for the Hop On Hop Off bus. There are 13 stops on the tour. It begins with Sankofa Sqaure, goes up Yonge Street and stops at Welleseley Street, continues up Yonge Street to Yorkville and hangs a lefts. According to the guide this put us in the middle of the Fashionable Yorkville District. It is a top destination for affluent shoppers at its high-end boutiques, galleries and design studios, especially on Bloor Street's "Mink Mile." The area features chic cafes, polished bars and fine-dining restaurants. Its posh hotels host Hollywood insiders during the Toronto International Film Festival.

The side streets are lined with picture-postcard Victorian homes with ornamental gardens. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, Toronto has a law which prohibits altering the outside appearance of the homes. I say this is unfortunate because some of the homes were obviously derelict and a few were even boarded up.

Stop 4 is at the Royal Ontario Museum. The Royal Ontario Museum is a museum of art, world culture and natural history. It is one of the largest museums in North America and the largest in Canada. It attracts more than one million visitors every year, making it the most-visited museum in Canada. Stop 5 is at the Casa Loma. Casa Loma (Spanish for "Hill House") is a Gothic Revival castle-style mansion and garden in midtown that is now a historic house museum and landmark. It was constructed from 1911 to 1914 as a residence for financier Sir Henry Pellatt. The architect was E. J. Lennox, who designed several other city landmarks. Casa Loma sits at an elevation of 140 meters (460 ft) above sea level, 66 meters (217 ft) above Lake Ontario. Due to its unique architectural character in Toronto, Casa Loma has been a popular filming location for movies and television. It is also a popular venue for wedding ceremonies.

We decided to stick with the bus but want to go back to Casa Loma. The next step was at Spadina and Bloor streets and the Bata Shoe Museum. A museum dedicated to 4,500 years of footware. The guide didn’t seem to think much of the museum. Stop 7 was at the Art Gallery of Ontario and Chinatown. Toronto has one of the largest Chinatowns in North America, centered around Spadina Avenue and Dundas Street West. It's a vibrant area known for its bustling markets, diverse Asian restaurants, and shops selling fresh produce, herbal medicine, and souvenirs. The neighborhood is also a hub for cultural events, particularly during Chinese New Year celebrations. It looked a lot like the Chinatown in San Francisco.

The next two stops were at the CN Tower and the Ripley’s Aquarium. The CN Tower is a 553.3 m-high communications and observation tower in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Completed in 1976, it is located in downtown Toronto, built on the former Railway Lands. Its name "CN" referred to Canadian National, the railway company that built the tower. There is a revolving restaurant and observation lounge. Not really interested in this. We have been to several towers and yes there are great views but not much else for the $50 or so dollars it will cost.

Stop 10 was at the Radisson Blu Hotel and the Harbourfront Center. From here you can take a ferry, water taxi or other conveyance out to one of the islands just off the shore of the city. One of them apparently contains a small amusement park: Centerville Amusement Park. Goofor famles with young children. Stop 11 was the Hockey Hall of Fame. Again, we aren’t hockey fans and probably wouldn’t enjoy that. Although the building did look interesting.

The “Old Bank of Montreal Building houses The Hockey Hall of Fame. It is an impressive 19th-century financial building at 30 Yonge Street. This site was the Bank of Montreal's head office until 1949 and a branch until 1982, known for its architectural significance and subsequent restoration.

Stop 12 is at the St. Lawerence Market. It appears to be a market similar to the one in Firenze. Various shops, vegetable and meat markets and restaurants. This one looked a little too clean to be anything other than a tourist attraction. The next and final stop was at the Distillery Historic District.

They have taken a number of the old distilleries buildings and turned it into a tourist attraction. We stopped here and got off because it was past lunch time and it was the last stop. It looked and felt a lot like walking though the old Ghirardelli Chocolate Factory in San Francisco. Most definitely a tourist destination.

We walked around a bit before spotting what looked like a small brew pub. Unfortunately, it was a false front for a very large and commercial brew pub called Mill Street Brewpub. I ordered fish and chips, believing due to the English heritage in Canada they would be good. Mary had popcorn chicken lettuce wraps. Neither of took more than a bite or two before deciding it wasn’t worth it to finish them. We paid and left. We walked though the distillery area a little. There isn’t much here.

We walked back to the Hop on Hop Off bus stop, but got there just as the bus was pulling away. The buses are supposed to be twenty minutes a part so we decided to walk back to the St. Lawrence Market stop which wasn’t that far away. We were a block and a half from the distillery bus stop when another bus passed by. Too late to make it, so we continued on to the market stop.

We got to the market stop and there were a few people waiting, so we decided to walk though the market while we waited for the bus. This was a very nice market a lot like the one in Firenze or Milano. We were disappointed we didn’t stop here of lunch.

When we got back outside there was a fairly large group of people waiting for the bus. Apparently, it had been close to forty minutes since the last bus. It would be another five minutes before a bus would finally show up. We filtered onto the bus and found a set downstairs, we didn’t care about being upstairs because we had seen the majority of the route already. 

Well, all was ok but, like the last bus the microphone didn’t work. The guide was upstairs so those of us downstairs couldn’t hear anything. The condition if the bus was more noticeable now, and the bus was in deplorable condition. We could and did forgive the guide on the first bus for not having a working microphone, but two buses without microphones. That was bad enough but at the next stop there was another large group of people who had been waiting for nearly an hour. However our bus was near capacity when we drove up, and the staff was telling people the bus was full and another bus would be a loving in a few minutes. Honestly people weren’t having it. There was a lot of yelling.

We got back to Sankofa square about 3 and walked back to the hotel.  A nap was called for, probably due to the time change. It was a little over and hour later when we started taking about dinner. I suggested that we go to one of the places the guide had talked about on the tour bus – Fran’s.

Fran’s is a chain of diners or coffee shops. For the most part are open 24 hours a day. There was one just a couple of blocks from the hotel. It is like walking back into the Maple Café in Ukiah in 1960. Teal and pink color scheme. Vinyl booths with rolled stuffed backs and fake grey granite formica tops.

There is even counter service with stools. Stools of stainless steal bolted to the grey speckled vinyl floor, topped with a round teal vinyl swivel seat without a back. Not very comfortable looking but so, 1958! The menu could have been a replica from 1960, but it was probably the original.

Mary ordered a piña colada, no so 1960’s to serve liquor but oddly appropriate here. I opted for a chocolate milkshake to accompany my Monte Cristo. For the young folks a Monte Cristo is a sandwich which consists of three slices of bread. Between the slices are turkey, cheese and ham. This is then dipped in and egg batter, much like you would French toast. Then it is “fried” until golden brown.

A Monte Cristo is usually served with French fries, and this being a throw back in time, it was. Now usually, the Monte Criso is served with strawberry jam, but this being Canada wasn’t. I inquired of the waitress if I could get some she said sure but it is better with our Canadian Maple Syrup. The strawberry jam wasn’t anything special, just the little tasteless packets you see nearly everywhere. So, after trying one bite with jam I decided that maybe the maple, excuse me, Canadian Maple Syrup, would be a better choice.

After all French toast is bets with maple syrup. Well, folks, the votes have been tallied and maple syrup has it all over tasteless strawberry jam. How many years have I been missing out? PS, at “home” we usually use Log Cabin “maple” Syrup, which may or may not actually have any actual maple syrup in it. In this case the more subtle flavor of the real stuff works much better than the super sugary Log Cabin,

Mary ordered a chicken quesadilla to accompany her piña colada. This would not have been typical diner food in the 1960’s. The presentation on the plate was stark to say the best, The round tortilla just sort of sitting quartered on the plate, accompanied by two small paper cups. One red with what might have been a 1960’s interpretation of salsa, and the other which contained sour cream, a 1960’s interpretation of crème fraîche.

Over all my dinner won out over Mary’s. Hers was fortunately dulled by the alcohol in the piña colada. The chocolate milkshake was served in the stainless steel cup which came directly off the 1960’s style mixer. It was a true flash back to when the actually used ice cream, milk and chocolate syrup to make a milkshake. Screw you McDonalds this is what a milk shake is supposed to look and taste like, not with waxed paper cup stuff you serve.

After dinner it was a nice walk back to the hotel. We sat in the bistro downstairs and ordered a drink and tea, and played a game of canasta before calling it a night.

Buonanotte and ciao, Enrico and Maria