Kingston and Toronto

Paul J took us to CJAI radio station, the very local public radio for Amherst Island.  We were interviewed by the hosts of the "Udder Morning" show.  It was an interesting chat, including discussions of Richard's sculpture, and Sandi's work.  We luckily were not asked about US politics or about the local windmill controversy.

Next we went to the ferry, where we walked on board.  Paul Y,  Richard's old climbing buddy, picked us up, and gave us a little tour of Kingston.  We stopped by Paul's sailboat, which is relatively large and impressive.  We met Paul's wife Dorothy at Le Chien Noir restaurant.  Sandi remembered the dress shop next door where she spent a lot of money; Dorothy knew the shop as well.  Paul is planning on a big sailing trip next summer; Richard may get to go on part of the trip.  Richard missed out on a similar trip a few years ago, due to a health situation.

We went out to see the Rideau Canal, which runs from Kingston to Ottawa.  It was originally built by the British military as part of moving the capital of Canada to Ottawa.   The canal was opened in 1832.   Kingston had been the capital, but was considered too subject to American attack, which never came.  But after the war of 1812 it is easy to see why people were concerned.  The Rideau Canal is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

After that stop, they dropped us off at the train station.  The train was 10 minutes late, but no problem.  We arrived at Toronto Union station.  We had considered taking the subway to our hotel, but decided that luggage on the subway during rush hour was a bad plan.  We took a taxi.  Our hotel was the Madison Manor hotel, in the University of Toronto area.  We ate at the pub next door, and then took a long walk through the very large Chinatown, and around the University.  We were amused that the garbage cans everywhere were made by a company for which that Sandi does work.

On Tuesday, we headed for the Art Gallery of Ontario, where we had tickets to see the Lawren Harris show.  The show was curated by Steve Martin; yes, that Steve Martin.  Harris was one of the Canadian Group of Seven painters.  My favorite Harris paintings were simplified and idealized paintings of mountains.  We bought a print of Mt. Robson, which Richard has climbed.  We saw a lot of fine work from the other members of the Group of Seven, some of which was somewhat similar to that of Harris.

On the way back to our hotel Richard picked up some scrap cardboard to protect the print.  We had a pleasant lunch at Fresh restaurant, and then took the streetcar to the harbor, where we walked to the ferry dock, and took the ferry to Ward Island, one of the Toronto Islands.  Cars are not allowed on the islands, bicycles and carts were used instead.

Overgrown cottage

We were fascinated to see the cottages on the island, wondering exactly how they do their grocery shopping.  There are no stores on the islands.  We walked around the island, and had a pleasant dinner at the cafe. We took the ferry back to Toronto, and then walked back to the streetcar stop.  Sandi ended up with three blisters from all the walking.

Toronto skyline

On Wednesday, we checked out of the hotel, and had a very interesting visit to the Bata Shoe Museum.  It has historic and native American shoes.  The shoes and clothing from the Arctic regions were especially interesting.   We had lunch at Fresh again, and then started our journey to the airport.

Eskimo boot

Richard had what he thought was a clever plan to get to the airport.  We would walk to the nearby subway stop, change trains to the airport train, and do the whole thing for less than $10 per person.  We took the elevator to the subway line, and got on the subway, only to find that the subway train was going out of service, so we needed to get off and get on the next train.   When we arrived at the correct subway stop, we had to take two elevators to get to ground level, where we discovered that we needed to walk two blocks on city sidewalks to the airport train station.  Recall that we had six bags, at least one of which was quite heavy.  We ended up taking three elevator rides at the train station, mostly due to bad signage.  The UP train to the airport is actually quite nice.  We finally got to the airport, where we we had to get on another train to go to the correct terminal.  At the end of that train ride we had to take two more elevators to customs.  Sandi sailed through customs with her Nexus card, while Richard spent ten minutes in the regular line.    Our grand total of trains taken was four, while we took eight elevator rides.  Total time, about 1 hour 45 minutes, but became a joke in terms of how complex the trip became.  Going forward, Sandi will use this story whenever I try to get cheap on transportation.  ;-)

Our trip home was on Delta, through Detroit.