Oh, Canada!

Toronto:

 

            Due to flaky internet and continuous activity there has been a bit of a hiatus in the postings of late.   Peter, the pugs and I left Detroit over a week ago and crossed over the border into Canada heading for Toronto.   We have a friend, whom we met at Christmas on a cruise.   I was anxious to visit with him as well as reconnect with my cousins who live just north of Toronto. 

 

Niagara Falls:  We camped south of Toronto, but strategically near Costco.   Our first visit was Niagara Falls.   Pictures do not capture the full sensory experience of these falls.  The Canadian side offers the best view by far.   We walked the full length of the falls----which stretch nearly a mile.   They consist of the American Falls and the Canadian Horseshoe Falls.   This was my first experience with waterfalls shaped like this.   Very impressive!  We took a city bus to see the Class VI rapids that result when the Niagara river enters a narrow gorge-----scarier than the Grand Canyon---the roar of the water was deafening.

 

Balls’ Falls:   This conservatory was just half a mile from our campsite AND they allowed dogs on leashes so we dropped by one afternoon to check it out.   The landowners really were named Ball and there really were a large set of falls.  The Ball family moved into the area in the early  1800s and proceeded to divert the river upstream from the falls and build several mills below the falls.   They  had a grist mill for grinding grain into flour, a saw mill, and a woolen mill.   Very industrious people.  Interestingly, Ball’s Falls has the same horseshoe shape as Niagara Falls; on a much smaller scale, of course.

 

 

Kensington Market:   While exploring Toronto, Peter and I learned about an alternative shopping area on the west side of the city. I’m always on a quest for Christmas gifts so we hopped on a streetcar and buzzed across town-----right through “China Town” (they don’t even bother with “international district” here).   Fun, fun, fun!   Great food, fabulous shopping and the aroma of something sweet, cloying and possibly illegal in the air.

 

 American Falls and the Canadian Horseshoe Falls.   This wasictures do not capture the full sensory

  

 Ottawa:   From Toronto we drove east to Ottawa to visit Maddie.   Maddie is my neighbor in Florida.  She spends summers in Ottawa and winters in Florida.   However, Maddie is fast approaching her 90^th birthday so she is looking to sell her Florida place and stay year round in Ottawa.   I’ll miss her.  She wants me to let you know that if you are interested in living across the street from me in Florida for the winters---she will consider your offer on her 2 bedroom, 1 bath place.

 

Montmagny---Leaving Maddie was bittersweet, but our ultimate Canadian goal is Nova Scotia.   Unfortunately, to get there we had to pass through Quebec.   Where to start?   My French lessons consisted of listening to the Singing Nun record when I was a teen.  Peter’s French is limited to ethnic slurs----this didn’t exactly set us up for success.  We both assumed that Quebec would be a BILINGUAL state---as is much of the rest of Canada.  Wrong assumption.  We camped next to the  Centre d’ Migration on the Saint Lawrence Seaway.  We assumed this would be a resource center for people immigrating to Canada and we could get some resources for English/French.   Nope.  It was about animal and bird migrations.    We walked to the Tourist Information center across the river.  No one spoke English.   We walked to the museum at the end of our street, which Peter assured me was about awards----he’d looked up the word:   It was an accordion museum.   The only ones truly comfortable in Quebec were the pugs----they don’t understand anything anyway.  On the good side the food was amazing!