Left apartment late this morning, catching the subway into Downtown around 9.50 am. We worked out the ticket system and asked locals which stop to get off .. turned out to be Union Station. Every North American city has a Union Station I think, we have seen quite a few anyway! This Union Station was not impressive as we have previously seen though, so a quick visit to the Visitor Centre and off we set to explore Toronto.

First stop was the CN Tower, the tallest structure in the city with a viewing deck some 346 metres up (114 stories) .. there are floors and towers above this level. Total height is 553.3 metres, completed in 1976 and built by Canadian National Railway as a communication tower but has since opened it to the public to enjoy the views of Toronto and its surrounds. It held the record for the tallest free-standing structure in the world until 2007 when it was surpassed by the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. In 1995 it was declared one of the modern Seven Wonders of the World.

We continued to look around the city, walking north up University Way to Queens' Garden and the Ontario Provincial Parliament House, then down Yonge St, the latter being much more intersting as far as architecture, shops and people are concerned. We found it easy to navigate around the city and were back at our AirBnB by 5.15pm via the subway.

Tuesday 1st October

Today we decided to walk into Downtown and back again ! 22,000 steps and 17.3 kilometers round trip !

We went in via Little Italy, Kensington Market and Chinatown and right down Spadina Avenue to the Waterfront. Continued along the harbourside walk in glorious sunshine, today being unusually hot at around 28 degrees, all the way to Bay Street. After an enjoable walk outside we then joined the "PATH", Toronto's underground city, which provides pedestrian access to all parts of Downtown without having to be out in the open.... particulary useful here in winter ! Find more information about the PATH on Google and YouTube.

Above ground again at City Hall, we walked further along Bay St, then turned left at Dundas and back through Chinatown again, and then Little Portugal. On the way we happened across a small produce market happening in a park not far from our apartment, and after a look around we arrived home by 4pm. Subways are great for a quick commute into town but exploring the suburbs today has been really interesting. Along our travels today we added substantially to our wall art / mural collection.

To finish off our time in Toronto we met up with and had a most enjoyable dinner out with Heather, Tania's relative and her husband Michael. It was lovely to spend the evening with them catching up in general, and sharing our holiday highlights to date.