July
31, 2006
Hello from Toronto – Summer in T.O.
Positively Rocks
It’s been a pretty amazing summer so far. The weather has
been pretty good since as far back as April. Occasionally, we’ve
had rain showers and thunderstorms, but much of the rain has actually
fallen over night. The weather on the weekends has been great for
the most part, perfect conditions to enjoy all the activities and
festivals that the city has to offer. I decided earlier this year
that I would be spending this summer in Toronto without any major
travel assignments overseas. So this is my chance to focus on local
explorations.
Toronto's Old City Hall
And the offerings are amazing: I already wrote detailed articles
from my explorations at Toronto’s Doors
Open architectural festival, my exciting day at the Dragonboat
Festival on Toronto’s Islands, the Taste
of Little Italy, Summerlicious
– Toronto’s restaurant festival, the
Celebrate Toronto Street Festival and Afrofest. There are simply
not enough hours in the week to cover all my explorations since
I have decided to head out and discover as many places and activities
as possible right here in Toronto. Here is a little summary of some
of the other activities I have participated in that I haven’t
had a chance yet to talk about in detail.
Serenity on Toronto Island
On June 25, 2006 I headed out to Toronto’s
Pride Parade, one of the biggest parades in Toronto, and one
of the largest of its kind in the world. This year’s parade
theme was “Fearless!” to indicate how far Toronto’s
queer community has come and how far they still have to go. From
its original roots as a protest event, Toronto’s Pride
Parade today has become a real family affair with special
events for families and children. The city has embraced this event
and it has great support from the mayor, the police, various corporate
sponsors and politicians from all political parties. The big events
of Pride Week included the Flag Raising Ceremony at City Hall, Pride
Awards and a Gala Dinner, the Dyke March as well as the dazzling
Pride Parade. Seven entertainment stages provided entertainment
with about 650 artists, the Community Fair included participants
from a large variety of community groups, and the Marketplace enticed
the crowd with merchandise, clothing, and various accessories and
treats.
Colourful Pride celebrations
Then on July 14 and 15 not only did I attend a street festival,
together with my team we actually participated in the Salsa
on St. Clair Festival. This festival was held for the first
time last year and attracted more than 200,000 participants in its
first year. Telelatino, Canada’s Latin broadcasting network,
developed the idea for this festival and organized a huge street
party. This year the crowd was even bigger than in the first year.
Participating in the Salsa on St. Clair Festival
We had a table together with Skills
for Change, a local immigrant settlement agency with whom we
collaborate frequently. To jointly promote our two organizations
we were holding a draw to give away a one-week adventure trip along
the Inca Trail in Peru. The trip itself will be provided by G.A.P
Adventures, the flagship sponsor of our Travel
Story Contest, and a leader in environmentally sustainable and
socially conscious travel. Over two days we spent almost 20 hours
in the sweltering sun, interacting with the crowd, and many hundreds
of people wanted to get to get a chance to explore the mysteries
of Peru.
Stilt walker at the Salsa on St. Clair Festival
In between these special events I have also had a chance to explore
the city by bike and on inline skates. A couple of weeks ago I cycled
out to the Scarborough Bluffs and spent some time in one of my favourite
Toronto spots: the Rosetta McClain Gardens. This
is a beautiful public garden with gorgeous flower beds and serene
sitting areas, perched high above Lake Ontario with great vistas
of this peaceful expanse of water.
Rosetta McClain Gardens
From there I cycled east through a variety of parks abutting the
Scarborough Bluffs which are essentially cliffs
formed from eroded packed clay soil. They stretch for about 14 km
along Lake Ontario in the east end of Toronto, and at their highest
point they rise 65 meters above the water. The most interesting
formations can be found around Bluffer’s Park,
a large waterfront park featuring a sandy beach, picnic areas, walks,
lookouts, and berths for over 500 boats.
Strange formations at Bluffer's Park
Toronto, with its location right on Lake Ontario, is a haven for
cyclists and water sports enthusiasts, and the waterfront has numerous
extensive parks right on the shoreline that are ideal for picnics,
sunbathing and relaxing by the water. The Martin Goodman
Trail is a multi-purpose recreational trail with a length
of about 22 km along Toronto’s Waterfront and gives inline
skaters and bicyclists a chance to exercise and soak up the sun
right next to the water. Last weekend I strapped on my rollerblades
and explored the Waterfront Trail along Toronto’s West end
in Etobicoke, and the nicely paved trail continues into Toronto’s
neighbouring cities Mississauga, Oakville and Burlington.
Monarch butterfly near the Etobicoke Creek
But serene nature experiences not only await at the waterfront,
the City has several other spots that allow you to get away from
the hustle and bustle of urban life. Last week I spent a couple
of hours exploring Riverdale Farm, Toronto’s Necropolis and
the surrounding Cabbagetown Neighbourhood. Riverdale Farm
is actually an early 20th century farm that has been turned into
a learning opportunity for urban dwellers that exposes them to farm
animals and a rural environment. The peaceful park outside Riverdale
Farm is a favourite destination for school groups and adults who
relax under the shady trees and cool off in the public fountains.
"
Riverdale Farm
Right next to Riverdale Farm is the Toronto
Necropolis, one of Toronto’s oldest and most historic
cemeteries. Dating back to the 1850s, it houses a collection of
Victorian buildings and sculptures and is one of the most picturesque
locations in the city. The recently restored cemetery entrance,
chapel and office are fine examples of High Victorian Gothic architecture
and the Necropolis is a favourite destination for photographers
year-round.
Entrance to the Toronto Necropolis
Both Riverdale Farm and the Toronto Necropolis are surrounded by
Cabbagetown, a historic neighbourhood with a very
interesting history. The name “Cabbagetown” dates back
to the mid 19th century, when Irish immigrants decided to plant
unusually large cabbage patches on their front lawn. Cabbagetown
has one of the largest and most impressive concentrations of Victorian
architecture in all of North America. Local residents take great
pride in their properties and embellish their homes with well-tended
front and back gardens and the area is a magnificent location for
a relaxing stroll.
Victorian beauty in Cabbagetown
So many other neighbourhoods beckon to be explored: I have spent
some time at Harbourfront and recently took a walk
through Toronto's main Chinatown and the adjoining
Kensington Market where exotic fruits and unusual
foods can be purchased at reasonable prices. The sheer variety of
Toronto's neighbourhoods is mind-boggling and it feels like you
are doing a virtual trip around the world by just walking a few
blocks or hopping on the subway. I have made several forays into
the Victorian serenity of Riverdale and the adjoining
hustle and bustle of the Danforth, one of my favourite
neighbourhood hangouts.
Chinatown at its vibrant best
These past few days have been busy too. On Friday, my entire crew
at the office and I went to a local Pakistani restaurant in Toronto’s
Thorncliffe Park Neighbourhood. The entire neighbourhood
is perched on a hill overlooking the Don Valley and was developed
with numerous high-rise buildings in the 1950s and 1960s. Today
Thorncliffe Park is one of the most densely populated and most multicultural
neighbourhoods of Toronto with a large proportion of recent immigrants
from Muslim countries. We had an absolutely delicious dinner with
a selection of Pakistani dishes at Iqbal Restaurant. Several of
my co-workers are from Pakistan and we have had a great introduction
to Muslim foods and traditions. Toronto offers so many great opportunities
for cross-cultural connections. We shared six different delicacies
including chicken, lamb, beef and chick pea dishes and had a wonderful
time sampling this varied cuisine.
An imposing church on the Danforth
After our truly delicious dinner all of us headed down to Queen
Street East where the Beaches International Jazz Festival
was being held. This festival is now in its 18th year, and has become
a crowd favourite since its 1989 inception. We started at Woodbine
and right away ran into our favourite: Dr. Draw, a highly
energetic Moscow-born electric violinist surrounded by a team of
dedicated musicians. This band produced a highly eclectic, unusual
type of music with a diverse mixture of beats with modern and classical
elements thrown in. In addition, Dr. Draw has a highly
physical performance style and it makes you wonder how he plays
the violin so well while jumping up and down. We saw several other
rock and reggae bands, and a 3-person group named Johannes Linstead
entertained us with virtuoso flamenco rhythms. Incidentally, this
group won the Best World Album in 2004 and has top ten charting
albums. In total the Beaches Jazz Festival featured over 30 performers
in its StreetFest and ten headliners on the Main Stage.
Dr. Draw draws us in with his infectious music
I dropped by at the Beaches Jazz Festival again with two friends
yesterday, and at the north end of Kew Gardens we saw Toronto’s
Mayor David Miller being photographed with members of the crowd.
Mayor Miller makes appearances at many community events and is very
approachable. So we decided that we too would get our picture taken
with Toronto's mayor.
Mayor Miller with the 3 of us.
We then strolled over to the Main Stage and checked out some of
the ecclectic clothing, jewellery and art on sale in the various
booths that were located throughout Kew Gardens. People were getting
henna tattoos, others were getting readings by psychics, and the
majority of people were relaxing on the grass, enjoying the music.
Some folks were also getting their surprisingly accurate portraits
done...
Amazingly realistic
On the Boardwalk we enjoyed the hot Spanish rhythms
of Puente del Diablo before we checked out the action at
the beach volleyball courts. One of my friends is a visitor from
Austria, so this was her first introduction to Toronto while my
other friend is a fairly recent immigrant who doesn’t yet
know the city very well either. I quite enjoy taking new arrivals
around the city, introducing them to all my favourite spots. As
a city on a lake that looks like an ocean, the waterfront is a great
attraction, and it's a really cool place to hang out.
The Boardwalk is where it's at...
To explore more we then hopped into the car and decided to pay
a visit to the Distillery District, a former distillery
dating back to 1832. This complex encompasses more than 40 historic
buildings that make up the largest and best preserved collection
of Victorian Industrial Architecture in all of North America. The
Distillery District has been restored recently and has become one
of Toronto’s hottest entertainment areas with its restaurants,
cafes, galleries and artists’ studios, a brewery, theatres
and retail outlets. Every Sunday the Distillery features a farmers
market and numerous festivals draw huge crowds throughout the year.
The Distillery District
Our “Introduction to Toronto” driving tour continued
and I took my friends downtown on Front Street and showed them the
Gooderham Building – Toronto’s own triangular Flatiron
Building. Then we admired Old and New City Hall,
the classical splendour of Osgoode Hall, the imposing
Richardson Romanesque structure of Queens Park
– seat of Ontario’s provincial government, and the Neo-Gothic
splendour of the University of Toronto campus.
After a brief tour through Chinatown we had a sneak
peak at Little Italy and ended up for dinner in
the picturesque Annex neighbourhood on Bloor Street
West, just west of Spadina. Along the way we drove through Portuguese,
Ethiopian and Korean neighbourhoods.
The Flatiron Building
Finally we had a lovely dinner at the Country Style Hungarian
Restaurant, a neighbourhood institution for decades, which
impresses with its tasty authentic European meals, reasonable prices
and huge portion sizes. All three of us enjoyed a Wiener Schnitzel
and to top off a delicious meal we enjoyed “Palatschinken”,
a mouth-watering dessert featuring a crepe filled with apricot jam.
Can a Schnitzel get any bigger than this?
Each one of these experiences deserves its own article, but there
are just so many things to see and do in Toronto, I just can’t
keep up with the stories. But I am hoping this little medley of
stories will give you an idea of Toronto’s diverse neighbourhoods,
culinary offerings, exciting festivals and things to do during a
great long hot summer.
Useful books about Toronto:
Related articles:
Toronto - A pretty
hip place
Toronto - Sights,
Culture, Shopping
Toronto - Festival,
parks, sports and recreation
Check out why I love Toronto
An interview with Doors Open
- Toronto's architecture festival
My visit to Doors
Open 2005
My visit to Toronto's 2005
Celebrate Toronto Festival
My visit to Doors Open 2006
Checking out the Taste
of Little Italy 2006
My visit to the 2006
Celebrate Toronto Street Festival and Afrofest
A tour through Toronto's historic
Saint Lawrence Market
An interview with Caribana,
Toronto's Caribbean festival
An interview with Pride
Toronto
An interview with the Toronto
Wintercity Festival
Images of Toronto during the winter
of 2006
Looking forward to my brother's
visit to Toronto
Hello from Toronto (2) - Exploring
the waterfront by bicycle and the CN Tower
Hello from Toronto (3) - Exploring
Niagara Wine Country and Niagara Falls
Hello from Toronto (4) - Exploring
Toronto's west end neighbourhoods
Hello from Toronto (5) - Novice golf,
exploring the Kawarthas, & a final bike ride
Here are my
reflections after my European visitors left
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