After another 4 hour bus journey we arrived in Toronto on a pretty dull Thursday afternoon. We got the subway and found the hostel pretty quickly as it was right on top of Dufferin subway station. What we hadn't banked on was that our 'boutique' hostel, actually shared a retirement home so there were walking aids galore (might come in handy after a few shandies) and the unmistakable whiff that only an old-peoples home can muster. We only wanted a base from which to explore Toronto, and there were quite a few others our age (ie. under 75). The room we got was spacious too with a view of the CN Tower in the distance so we were happy.

We went straight to the Entertainment District for a look about and in search of food. I narrowly escaped a showing of Dirty Dancing as the only tickets left were restricted viewing and we headed down towards the CN Tower and the Rogers Centre. The CN Tower is incredible. It completely dominates Toronto's skyline and you can't help but gawp at it. We were tempted to go up to the top at that point but the weather wasn't great and the forecast was much better for Sunday. After some food in the Baton Rouge we headed down to The Rogers Centre, the home of Toronto's Baseball team, the Blue Jays (pausing every few minutes to stare up at the CN Tower!), where we discovered that the Chicago White Sox were in town on Sunday, so got some tickets.

After a stroll along a windy harbourfront we headed to the financial district, where we found a cosy little bar to pass some time while the weather brightened and sourced opnion on where to head that night. Thinking a film might be a good plan, we headed up to Yonge and Dundas, via Old City Hall and a massive indoor shopping mall,  The Eaton Centre (check out the birds in the pics - I thought they were real for a while!).  With nothing taking our fancy at the flicks we had a drink in the Hard Rock Cafe and caught the subway back to the hostel.

On Friday morning we had more of the city to explore so made the most of the included breakfast and set off for Bloor-Yonge (Yonge Street is the longest in the world apparently), and then walked down to the harbourside to book our trip to Niagara Falls. With that sorted we went to St. Lawrence Market in Old Toronto to see what was on offer. Toronto is said to be the most ethnically diverse city on Earth (As much as 50% of the city is made up by those who weren't born in Toronto), and it shows, especially in the markets. The rest of the Old Town wasn't really that old, and after looking at the original Flatiron building we went back along the to the Entertainment District and then out to the Museum. Although we didn't have time to look around, the building is impressive enough - big glass pyramid-like structures tacked onto the side of a building that you'd usually associate with a museum. Before going back to the hostel we got the subway up to Casa Loma. Casa Loma is a chateau-like building that was built by............................., remarkably managing not to shrink anything in the hostel laundry when we got back.

With chores done we went out the evening, following the advice of the barman in town and heading to The Annex, not far from our Hostel and near the University. Dinner was in an Italian, Serra and was fantastic and the friendly waitress recommended The Green Room. Afterwards we found some pretty good live music a block away from the reastaurant and then set about finding the Club. In the next bar we went into the barman looked horrified when we told him where we were looking for as it's a "grungey hangout" and recommended yet mroe bars to try. We decided to stay local, and a drink or two later it was soon 2am anyway, so we headed back home.

For shoarma be at Maroush place. Just go in to the store and the rest whil gide his self. TRUST ME!!!!!

Sure it's not the newest or nicest hotel.But it was good,rooms were big,hotel located right by the action,cheap price (because it was off season), Good restaurant (Golden Griddle),pool,hot tub,good bed.Everything I needed.No complaints.

My husband and I took a trip to Niagara Falls in 2006. We couldn't decide if we should stay on the United States side, or the Canadian side. So after seeking a lot of opinions from other people, we decided on the Canadian side. I am really glad we took the advice of others. The United States Falls really isn't visible unless you are on the Canadian side. Of course, on the United States side, you can walk down the steps and be "on" the falls pretty much, but as a whole, for a great picture, the Canadian side is better. The Horse Shoe Falls are on the Canadian side, but they are at an angle, so the pictures are awesome of it too. There is an IMAX theater that we went to that showed a movie on Niagara Falls history which was interesting. We also went to the Niagara Falls museum which we really enjoyed. They have a lot of the contraptions there that people made to ride in, to try to survive going over the falls. We skipped the whole Maid of the Mist tour. It looked really cool, but there was a huge line and neither of us really wanted to do it.
We went to the "whirlpool" area that is down stream from the falls because it sounded really cool, but it was kind of a disappointment (see picture for visualization). They have the cable cars you can ride in over the whirlpool, but since it really wasn't cool when I looked at it for free, I decided I didn't really want to pay money to look at it more from higher above. But hey, that's just me.
There was a cool street, I can't remember the name of it, but it's where the Ferris Wheel is, that we really enjoyed. They have quite a few rides beside the Ferris Wheel, they had the reverse bungee ride, etc, etc. We went to one of the 3-D experiences there, it was called Dinosaur Island I think, and it was fun.
One of the nights we went to the Casino. Pretty much every hotel has a shuttle that goes over to the Casino. We had our car there, but we still took the shuttle to the casino. We found that if we left in the car, we had a hard time finding a parking spot at the hotel lot when we got back. I think the hotels are pretty booked in the summer months, so parking can be scarce.
We also went up into the Tower. I can't remember what it's actual name is, but it's looks like the Stratosphere in Las Vegas (Again, see picture for visualization). It was really cool though. We didn't wait long in line to go up. Once up there, you can get unbelievable pictures of the falls. The two shots I have of the falls that are from up above, were taken from the top of the tower. The top of the tower is round, so you can walk around to other side of it and you can see Toronto in the distance.
We had a lot of fun during our stay at the falls, but we were only there for two full days and that was enough!! I would be really bored if I was staying there any longer than that. You only look at the falls for a brief time and then what?? I would only plan on going there for a weekend, maybe three days at the most.

This winter in Sudbury has been crazy ... one minute it's cold, then the next minute we have to put on our spring coats; then snow arrives and melts the next day ... Our weather is usually consistent; slowly getting colder in November and in late November and December the snow arrives ... then by the end of Dec/Jan/Feb the lakes are hard enough. The Science North staff (a wonderful museum-you must see) makes a large skating rink on Ramsey Lake ... but this year ... ummmm ... I not quite sure about the weather, this year, so we didn't chance skating ... I prefer HARD SAFE ice :)

As a result of the 'mixed-up weather there are a 'zillion-million' pot-holes in Sudbury this spring ... the roads expanded and contracted each day/week ... with the continous change in the weather, this past winter, municipality of Sudbury has the 'roads cut out for them' LOL ... nasty on the drive and one road actually collapsed in NICE ... they fixed it for now ... the driver wasn't hurt

Don't get me wrong, Sudbury is a nice place to visit, but I'd wait until summer weather, roads repaired, and with the leaves on the trees which make each street that more beautiful ... Visit the Big Nickel ... and tell me if you pass through, we'll meet for coffee!!

I did with Bill oneday from Texas ... Dan and I enjoyed the TB meet-up ... I'd/we'd do it again!!!!

-Legal Age is 19...so if your under that,then you can't drink in bars,or gamble at the casinos,but if your with a bunch of people in the very crowded boston pizza,you can get quite a few sips of their drinks,no one will notice,but you can't sit in the bar part,after 10pm. You can also always drink in your hotel room -Best places to eat/drink : Breakfast/Lunch/Brunch: Golden Griddle,Denny's Supper:Boston Pizza,Planet Hollywood,Hard Rock Cafe Drinks (alcholic):Boston Pizza Coffee:Tim Horton's Attractions to see: The Falls! -walk up to see them,if it's in season you can go on maid of the mist,and various other boats Sky Wheel,Ripleys,Lots of different wax museums,Local stores,or stores near by,Go over to Buffalo to shop,or go to Toronto to shop. I don't think as a family vacation it would be very fun...but maybe it's because i'm old? (18 lol)... Pick Disney World for the kids!, Niagara Falls is a good place just to party it up really... It is kind of a tourist trap aswell,a meal at a restaurant is exspensive! compared to what I see in my city. You probably wouldn't want to rent a car...it costs $10-$15 to park each day,and everywhere you go. My uncle ended up leaving his rented van parked at our hotel instead of his,because it was $10 at ours and $15 at his.Also everything is within walking distance. Get a hotel right in the action.(Clifton Hill) Ours was the Imperial,not the nicest or newest of hotels, but comfortable to sleep,hot tub,and right by all the action. Although the off season is cheaper,it's not as good as, the falls aren't lit up,and you can't go on the maid of the mist.We went in April and it was freezing as if it was still winter! Better idea to go in the summer! Any questions feel free to ask me!

My friend Gillian and I decided to book a flight to Moncton about 2 months ago.  Westjet was having a one-day sale, so we just went for it.  Gotta love last minute stuff and booking flights without planning anything.  I love it!

Today the rental car has been booked in Moncton, the hotel for the one night has been booked.  So that means we are set for our adventure. 

Our flight leaves at 8pm on Westjet from Toronto to Moncton.  I can't wait to arrive.  I have never been anywhere in Canada and can't wait to experience the Canadian Culture.  My friend Gillian came over last night and we discussed our plans of what we want to see.  So we are kind of mapping out where we want to go but also don't want to be on a time limit. 

Our first stop on Saturday morning is the Hopewell Rocks in New Brunswick.  From there we will be crossing the Confederation Bridge into PEI and from there, we are just jumping on a highway and letting it take us to wherever it leads!  We don't have anything else booked and wherever we land in PEI, that's where we'll be staying in a B&B. 

Tonight I'll be picking up a carry-on luggage case since I don't have one of my own.  I'm not packing much either as noone will be dressy over there in the restaurants or pubs.  My mouth has already started watering over the Lobster, can't wait to have some real seafood and not this frozen crap in the supermarkets! 

Can't wait to get out of this city on Friday and head to the Celtic lands of the East Coast!

The fruit-tella dress. Sat next to Tom Hanks, Forrest Gump.

My review is based solely of the service of the kitchen staff ... the food is great, coffee is hot, and prices are very fair ... so if you in the area of Sudbury ... stop by for some breakfast ... Oh, I met up with 2 Travbuddies their ... and what we did while socializing was to turn on the laptop and of course check out Travbuddies ... If you can improve this site ... or provide a web-site ... that would be helpful to others ... Thanks

And that's how my first South American experience starts: with a 11h30 min flight to Buenos Aires!

We reached Kingston at about 7.30pm on Monday and set about working out how to get to the hotel, a 'Super 8 Motel', similar to Travelodges. A shock was in store when we asked the bus driver where the hotel was. "Oh my god, you don't want to stay there, it's full of prostitutes and druggies, I wouldn't be surprised if there're needles in the mattress". Fantastic, so despite decent reviews on TripAdvisor (rapidly becoming our on-line bible) the hotel was a hell-hole. We had a pretty uncomfortable few minutes whilst we tried to work out what to do and the driver suggested better hotels. A few minutes later she called me to the front where she could see the hotel. Turns out she'd made a mistake and was thinking about another hotel in a neighbourhood further out of town. So, with panic subsided we checked-in and had a quiet night, in a basic but clean hotel.

After spending more than the budget allowed so far, and aware of all the things we wanted to do in Toronto, we decided that we'd have to do Kingston as cheaply as possible. We were only a 30 minute walk from the centre and Lake Ontario so we wandered into town first thing on Tuesday. I had a romantic notion of hiring a car and driving from Kingston to Toronto in two days and stopping off along the way but after visiting four car rental offices it became clear that unless we paid a huge premium for one-way rental it wouldn't be possible. So, we needed to re-think.

Kingston's quite a quiet little town (compared to the others we'd been to anyway) with one main street, some very attractive streets around that and a number of historic buildings including a grand town-hall. It's on the east end of Lake Ontario at the mouth of the St. Lawrence River. It's strategic location meant that that it was once an important military town and even briefly the capital.

We headed through town and towards the Town Hall and tourist info office. Armed with a map and some walks to do we headed off along the lakeside. It was cool but bright and midgies were out in force, which provided me with loads of entertainment with Em flapping away at them. We walked through the very historic and pleasant University area and back towards downtown for lunch. After picking up sandwiches we sat down in the park infront of Town Hall and overlooked the Lake and fortifications.

Across the water from town is the Royal Military College and behind that is Fort Henry, an old British fort. It took about 45 minutes to walk there, stopping off on the way to see the memorial for ex-cadets of the Royal Military College. Fort Henry's quite impressive, with a great vantage point over Lake Ontario and now serves as a military  museum, with an intersting tour of the site and some rooms left as they would have been, and some displays of weaponry from British Army History.

Time was cracking on so we walked back to Kingston for some dinner in The Keg, and had the biggest plate of Fajitas I'd ever seen before retiring (stuffed) to the hotel at about 10pm.

With any romantic notion of driving along Lake Ontario quashed, we decided to stay on in Kingston for an extra day. This wasn't a bad thing at all, we were enjoying a much more relaxed atmosphere in Kingston and saving a bit of money.  So we had a relaxed wednesday morning strolling back into Kingston. We had hoped that we could fo a cruise around 'The 1000 Islands' and then onto the Penetentiary Museum, so off we went again to the tourist office. One hazard of travelling across Canada is that once you're out of the big cities, tourist attractions don't open until at least May 1st, mid-May in many cases, and neither was operating. The other hazard of travelling Canada in the Spring is the weather, and we were caught in a pretty heavy snow shower.

After seeking refuge and an early lunch in Subway, we found that the snow quickly gave way to sun again and we took the free ferry to Wolfe Island, one of The 1000 Islands. The short trip across the Lake gave us some great views of The Royal Military College, Fort Henry and some of The 1000 Islands, although there isn't much to see on Wolfe Island itself so we stayed on the ferry and headed back to Kingston.

We got back to town, had a wander round a bit more of old Kingston and decided that our frugality allowed the budget to stretch to pint watching the Chelsea-Liverpool Champions league match followed by a burger in a Hockey bar, rounding off a very quiet but enjoyable couple of days in Kingston.

Having so far been impressed with the cities we've visited, we were expecting great things from Canada's capital. In fact, Ottawa was a bit of a diappointment. We arrived at about 2pm to some lovely weather and quickly found our hostel. Despite being quite friendly and having had some good reports it wasn't especially inviting and I could tell Em was far from impressed. However, it was cheap, fairly central and seemed clean enough despite a drab interior and cobbled together bed-linen (none of which, I hasten to add, would have particularly botherd me). 

We picked up some tourist leaflets and set about finding town. Despite a number on conversations up to this point about the budget, what we can/can't afford and the need to have a few 'quieter days' (ie. no beer) it was Em this time in need of a beer, struggling a touch to come to terms with the difference between her expectations of a a hostel and the reality (although to be fair it was a lot worse than I'd stayed in and we'd been lucky in Montreal - which had been fantastic). So we had a quick beer and on we went. We walked through Byward market, a four-block area of pubs, bars and cafes based around a central market building. Normally that would appeal to me, but it seemed pretty drab and a little bit run-down, despite being the 'where it's at' according to the hostel guy. It's definitely got some beatiful buildings, the grandeaur of which you can't help but admire. It also has some museums that look quite interesting. We followed a walk taking us past all the historic and prominent buildings in Ottawa including Chateau Laurier, the National War Memorial and Parliament Hill (which was closed) amongst others. We followed the trail across Portage Bridge and Victoria island into Gatineu (formerly Hull), Quebec for some good views of Parliament Hill. After that it was along the river and past the very contemporary Museum of Civilization. Alexandra Bridge and more good views of Ottawa took us across the Ottawa river and back into Ontario toward Byward Market, passing the Nattional Gallery and (another) Notre Dame on the way.

We had dinner in a nice little sun-trap before having a look around Byward Market, and (spurred on by Em being keen to avoid the hostel for as long as possible) we found a decent bar and had a few drinks whilst planning our next move. We didn't need long to reach the conclusion that it would be better to move on to Kingston the next day. So we went back to the hostel and Em was so worried about bed bugs that she used her mosquito-proof and bed-bug proof sleeping bag liner. It can now add Nick-proof to its repertoire.

The coach options were 10am or 5pm, so we opted for the 5pm, thinking we could give Ottawa at least the majority of the day to appeal to us. The Canadian gods were clearly unhappy with our less-than-positive view on the Capital and no sooner had we left the hostel the next morning than the heavens opened and the rain didn't let up for the rest of the day. We sought refuge in a cracking little diner and had a 'Big Zack' breakfast before opting to go shopping in the Rideau centre (not that we're fair-weather sight-seeers of course!) and bought Em a much-needed jacket.

To be fair to Ottawa, we arrived on a Sunday (much of Ottawa seems geared toward friday and saturday nights), didn't properly visit the main attractions/museums, the weather on monday was ver poor (after a blissfully sunny 10 days) and Ottawans in general seem very pleasant and helpful, in-line with the rest of Canada. In hindsight, we'd been a bit spoiled in Montreal too. However, apart from the sights I'd mentioned the rest is very unappealing. On the way out of Ottawa we went through the 'Downtown' area of Ottawa, which was so uninspiringly beauracratic we were in no doubt that skipping town early was the best choice, and after four big cities in a row we were definitely looking forward to Lake Ontario.

Not sure what we're going to do here, probably outdoor activities...

Let's be honest. There are not any Great Hotels in downtown Sudbury,ON. If they exist they are playing a really good game of hide and seek. This Best Western does have a good location. Their only parking is a small lot across the street and it fills up quickly. I had to jam my rent car into a tiny space up next to a building. They serve a free breakfast in a dingy breakfast area but it's not really worth eating. On both days the coffee wasn't good and cold cereal was the only thing worth eating. The room was okay but they didn't clean up well or give me new towels after my first night. The room key they gave me had a different number than the actual room I was staying in so it caused some confusion and I went back to the desk. One night a baby was crying next door and the walls were so thin I thought the kids was in the room with me! I was searching for a pacifier when I woke up. In a pinch you can stay here one night. Just try not to get pinched in Sudbury!

Sudbury is surrounded by rocks ... everywhere ... and as mentioned in previous blogs it is a mining city, growing so fast that apartments are few if any and housing prices are $200,000+ for a basic old house or $285,000+ for a small new house ... My husband and I drove through the city wondering of our future and if this city will be the place where we will buy a home ... couple of days later we went driving and just looked and photgraphed the ice melting while I thought of my/our future dreams and prospects ... I walked along the boardwalk that leads to Sudbury's Science North ... a key science museum that brings tourism into this booming city ... as I walked, taking in the cool air, my mind was filled with 'should I do this or do that, apply there or here, take course now or then, which universities do I apply to in Dec.08' ... man, just taking photos and travelling seems much much easier but it all goes back to the mighty dollar which makes me ponder what I should do or pursue in order to accomplish travelling and meeting nice people like YOU ...

Weather here has been fluctuating, warm one day and cold the next, with snow falling on April 30th, 2008 ... where was the snow coming from ... I'm happy it's slowly warming up and buds are popping up all over this May 5th, 2008 ... Tulips will be the first to pop up ... I look forward to flowers blooming ... new life brings me new energy and new outlook on life ... the confusion of what to do is figured out within a week of me going out and seeing and smelling new life ... my mind frees itself of old ideas and new ones bloom ... the excitment of colour in each new flower growing excites me as does new avenues I will travel through in the upcoming spring/summer

Enjoy these pictures that represent Sudbury, Ontario, Canada ... and look at the ice melting and imagine what you'll see ... as I do ... ice will continue to melt, and the new life of spring will flurish ... and for us huddled in our houses (here in Sudbury) in the winter finally we can get out and enjoy this side of the world thinking of the possibilities of visiting your side of the world ... in time we'll visit; slowly but surely, just as the ice melts here in Sudbury!!!