Trial & Errors in Toronto

Day 42: Welcome to Ontario! We are making it through the provinces at a faster rate now that all the major cities are closer to each other. Chad has been a hero driver and has basically driven this entire trip.

We switch off sometimes, but usually our destinations are only 2-3 hours a part and Chad wants to “hear the sweet-nothingness of the keyboard typing” to knock the blog out of the way for the previous day. Thanks, Chad 😊.

In the morning, I woke when I heard the campers next to us packing up around 7 a.m. (they camped in an actual tent on the lawn of the Carleton Place Wal-Mart, Ontario haha) and went back to sleep. Chad was hard core out and was snoring a little.

Snoring side-note: Chad doesn’t snore …. But halfway through the trip he started to snore. We are talking the soft purring kind of snore, but it can transition into really long pulls searching for air. Either way, I have woken up multiple times to poke him awake enough to stop the noise.

We have found out after trials of pillow positions: Chad cannot have his head propped up too high otherwise he will snore. There. Problem solved. Just sleep with a thinner pillow and everything will be alright!

With slightly drizzly weather, the Toronto skyline popped up with skyscrapers and an expansive infrastructure.  I had planned out hitting a bakery for a bagel with lox, then stopping in for coffee to post the blog post at a café and then we would drive the strip through the downtown space.  Sigh, expectations are terrible when things don’t work out they way you plan.

The bakery is probably really good and their desserts/loaves looked tasty, but I wanted to try their lox sandwich they had posted online for $3.50. I know! That’s wicked cheap for a lox bagel sandwich…usually they are over $12.

It was Mother’s Day Sunday and the bakery shelves were almost cleared out by the time we arrived in the later afternoon. The tired older grandma running the show was a little crabby and there was no menu to look at. She built the sandwich on the still warm bagels (sesame and poppy seed) with lox, cucumbers and lettuce. No cream cheese? The price also jumped to about $8 a bagel sandwich….I think because of the fixings?

So, maybe just stick to the baked goods at Grodzinski’s Bakery. The chocolate brownie was fabulous. The lox sandwich made me appreciate the smoked salmon a lot more without the cream cheese. They had nice looking houses in the area, though.

Next, it was blogging time. I found a cute café that had umbrellas hanging from the ceiling and they also had WiFi, but when we arrived all of the seats with outlets were taken. The occupants wouldn’t be moving anytime soon. Ugh. Maybe later De Mello Palheta Coffee Roasters. And, Chad and I both had to really use the Washroom (Canadian, eh?). Thankfully, a few doors down was another café and we were able to snag a space with power. They also had public washrooms! Ah, all better.

Chad and I hung out at the café for a little bit recovering from our morning adventure fails. We tried their ham and mozzarella quiche, drip coffee and the ginger-lemon tea. Upload speeds were awesome and we became happy again once the caffeine kinda kicked in.

After the café, we drove their main strip all the way into downtown to a mini version of Times Square called ‘’Yonge-Dundas Square”. Around the corner was the large ‘Toronto’ sign in Nation Phillips Square where I wanted to get a picture. There are a few one ways there and we took a few wrong turns (Google Maps is a little slow with directions sometimes…).

Eventually, Chad was able to pull up to the Nathan’s Square (illegally parked, kinda) while I hopped out, ran across the yard and took a picture of their little light of sign haha. Some people also had the same idea as me, so I wasn’t the only one.

Now about 4:15 p.m., we wanted to head out of town to get a jump start towards Niagara Falls and to get some gas at Costco, but we took a few wrong turns again. We ended up at the harbor front by Lake Ontario and were stuck in traffic in their Entertainment District for about 30 minutes because an event let out. We moved 3 miles. Ugh.

Ok, so maybe we can make it to Costco Gas before it closes at 5 p.m. Crawling by with congestion, we pulled into the pumps at 4:50 p.m. YES!!! We got up to the pumps, Chad hopped out and then hopped back in after staring at the screen on the pump…. WE FORGOT THAT CANADA COSTCO ONLY TAKES MASTERCARD. NOOOOOOOOOOO. We have Visa…..

So, we waited in traffic, took wrong turns, made it in time and still lost lol. Great. Super happy campers, we found gas later up the road and zoomed to our sleeping destination.

Saving the day, we were able to find a really neat Yemen restaurant called the Yemen Cuisine Monasaba. We tired the half chicken in rice and the steak stir-fry with a pita bread look alike. The food was really tasty, but the steak took the cake. It was a great ending to a funky day.

There was also an extra order of bread that came out for someone, no one claimed it and the confused waiter didn’t want to waste the bread. So, we were served a second helping of bread! Thanks!

Chad drove into the night around the bend towards Niagara Falls and we camped at Wal-Mart near St. Catharines. I was half asleep and almost fell asleep on an unmade pillow fort. Chad was wide awake. We are total opposites sometimes. When one is up, the other is usually down haha.

Lesson of the day: Expectations are bad. Let it flow and just be. Sigh. Yes, that is how it should be.