I originally planned on spending eight days in Toronto, but I chose to add an extra day as I had a feeling eight days would not be enough to fully enjoy the city. My instincts were right…and I still didn’t have enough time to do all the things I wanted to do there! I had plans on checking out a cat cafe, Eaton Centre, a women’s only spa…but I couldn’t make the time for them. Then there was discovering new places to visit…right when I had to fly back home. Why couldn’t those sites that had those “Best Places To Visit In Toronto” lists also mention the Cheese Boutique? I didn’t know such a place existed until I was at the airport waiting to board my flight back to SF.
I still did everything else I wanted in my nine days there, however. Photo dump time!
Another reason why Canada >>> the States? They got the full Toys R Us experience!
I also had made what little time I had to visit Mississauga, a city 15-20 minutes west of Toronto, and their bougie fancy mall known as Square One.
There were two places I HAD to visit if/when I traveled to Toronto (otherwise I’d hate myself). The first was the Hockey Hall Of Fame:
The other place was where I spent my last full day in Toronto: the CN Tower!
And the city views from the tower was just…
There was no better place to watch the sunset on my last full day in Toronto.
It was fitting that the day I had to depart, it rained. Silly me thought it was the city crying for me because I had to return back home.
One nice thing about having Global Entry is that you really don’t have to wait in long lines during customs/declarations.
By the way, when it came to jet lag, I had it worse when I returned home than when I left home. I don’t know if it had to do with taking an evening flight back home and only seeing darkness the whole time, or that I was “losing hours” flying east to west even though the flight took five hours long. It took me almost a full day to adjust my body back to west coast time. Even when I woke up the day after I returned, I felt like I was still on east coast time. It said 12PM on the clock, but body thought it was 3PM.
Some traveling tips…
–install a measurement conversion app on your phone. If you have very little knowledge of the metric system like me, it can be very helpful!
–also get the Xe.com app on your phone for monetary conversions
–contact your bank stateside to find out if your bank has a sister bank in Canada, just in case you need to get Canadian dollars (and need to shop at a Costco where they don’t take Visa debit cards)
–if renting a car, call the rental car agency beforehand to see if they accept your US debit card or not. This was another thing I learned the hard way, as I rented a car from one company that required a credit card to keep my reservation. I didn’t have one, my reservation got canceled, and I had to scramble to find another rental car agency that accepted my debit card. (Alamo came through, and they didn’t charge a security deposit, either.)
–forget Duolingo: you’ll get a free little French lesson while going around Toronto, as many of their signs are in English and French. Now I know how to say “exit” and “south” in French! 😆
–there are rude Canadians around. You’ll definitely see them when there’s awful traffic downtown. Didn’t encounter one myself, but bless you if you make a wrong turn that backs up downtown traffic (and pisses off pissed-off drivers) even more.
–not really a tip, but the whole time I was there, when locals asked where I was from, I said California (and the “Bay Area” when I got specific). Never “from the US”/”from America”. Why embarrass myself like that?
A lit-up heart from The Big Apple store.
This was my second Canadian trip ever, the first taken on my own, and my first-ever visit to Toronto. It definitely will not be the last! Merci beaucoup for all the fun times, Toronto! ❤
Lex Writes On 