Through a combination of my sister living there for close to 15 years, an extended work stint in 2007 and numerous business related travels to the city, Toronto doesn’t feel like a vacation destination – and that’s not a bad thing. With Dad and I both having some favourite haunts in the city, we hit a couple of them over our three day vacation.
Travel
Steam Whistle tour
Steam Whistle is probably my favourite Ontario beer. My typical arrival pattern to Toronto involves having one (or two) of these on the Porter flight into Toronto Island, dropping my bags at my sister’s place, then picking up a case of the green cans/bottles at the Summerhill LCBO.
Ok Blue Jays, Let’s Play Ball!
A confluence of events brought my Dad and I to Toronto. I had a few vacation days to burn, my sister was traveling which left her condo available for us, Dad had the points for a free flight, and the Blue Jays were wrapping up a home stand against Seattle and Texas. That made plans for a three day trip come together very quickly.
Saturday: Three days, three baseball games, and a steady diet of cardiac arrest inducing food and drink kicked off shortly after arrival at mid day. After touching down on separate flights, we met up at the condo, quickly unpacked and made our way down to the stadium. Before entering, we pass underneath this sculpture outside Rogers Centre (“The Audience” by Michael Snow) which always makes me smile:
Not knowing much about the Seattle Mariners, we take in batting practice to try and learn about some of their hitters:
We make our way up to our seats for the Saturday afternoon game. Not too shabby for $14. I have to pinch myself that I can see professional sport for less than the cost of a junior hockey game in Halifax. Jays win 7-0 in a very entertaining game:
Wandering in Banff
Banff is a picturesque town, full of charms to the wanderer. As my last post on our trip, here are some pictures taken of the town on a number of walks over a few days.
Banff Avenue:
Eating in Banff (aka: bison, bison, bison, elk)
I generally eat pretty well wherever I go on vacation. Some advance planning of the “can’t miss” places goes a long way toward making that happen. When I was doing my advance scouting for Banff, it became apparent early on that there wouldn’t be enough days in the itinerary to try all of the places that I wanted to. Here are the highlights of a week’s worth of delicious food and drink.
I violated a key travel rule – never return to the same restaurant twice on the same trip. I broke that rule because the food was so good on the first visit to the Bear Street Tavern and there was a menu full of things I wanted to try. On the first visit, they were running a Thursday night special on their bison short ribs. I saw this menu item arrive to a salivating customer at the table next to us as I was considering my order and it swung my decision. These were incredible – enormous, meaty and tender with crispy bits of BBQ sauce clinging to the edges. The beer off to the side is Tree Brewery Hop Head IPA from Kelowna, BC. Ignore the salad in the picture (I sure did):
The views from Sulphur Mountain
The weather cleared on Friday morning just long enough for us to make our way to the top of Sulphur Mountain. This was one of the “must do” things on our itinerary. The day before, when we had a downpour in the Banff townsite, heavy snow fell starting about half way up the mountain. Here’s a view of the snow line on the mountain:
Views along the Bow River Parkway
Although our Alberta road trip plans were cut short due to snow storms, we weren’t going to miss driving back from Lake Louise along the Bow River Parkway. It’s a scenic, winding 2 lane road through the forest, well known for its mountain vistas and wildlife sightings. This drive didn’t disappoint.
This is what most of the hour and a half drive looked like – forests and snow-capped mountain peaks. We only saw maybe eight other cars for the length of the drive. I took this picture standing in the middle of the road:
The beauty of Lake Louise
I’d rather be walking through the pine trees / high up above Lake Louise…
That line from the Blue Rodeo song “Western Skies” put Lake Louise on my mental travel map many many years ago. Our initial plans were to spend our first travel day hanging around Banff and to leave on a day-long road trip the following day to visit Lake Louise, perhaps Field, BC, the Icefields and the Bow River Parkway. The night before leaving, with the advance forecast calling for two days of heavy snow in the mountains, we called an audible.
Travel day: Awake at 3:45am, flight out of Halifax at 6:30, arrive in Calgary about 6 hours later. Two hours on a shuttle bus to Banff. Stop at a Safeway to pick up supplies and provisions and by 2pm Mountain time, we’re in our rental car and on our way north. We weren’t going to miss the chance to see Lake Louise, even if it was for an abbreviated visit. The weather gods smiled on us with temperatures pushing 15C and the sun broke through the clouds as we reached the lake. Our travel weary spirits were raised as we walked up a hill and the beauty of this view washed over us:
An Alberta teaser
Mountains, rivers, trees and lakes. A steady diet of bison, elk and beef. Million dollar views everywhere I turned. A strong desire to stay longer in the mountains. That’s the synopsis of my week in Banff and Lake Louise, Alberta. I’m settling in tonight to sort through about a thousand photos (900 of which have a snow-capped mountain somewhere in the frame) and to start writing about this trip. There will be more to come over the next week or two, but here’s a teaser of the beauty that permeated my spirit over the past week:
Memories of games past
Over the past 5 years or so, I’ve been fortunate to be able to combine two of my passions on a number of occasions – travel and football (make it 3 passions if you include stadium food). With the spirit of one of my favourite days of the year (Super Bowl Sunday) upon me, here’s a quick pictorial look back at my football game experiences.
With my love at our first ever NFL game in Philadelphia in late October 2006 (Eagles lose to the Jags 13-6):
In New Orleans for my first Monday night game – Saints lose 31-14 in their home opener vs Titans in September 2007:
My love gets to see her team for the first time in Pittsburgh: Steelers beat Seattle 21-0 on a steamy 34C day in October 2007:
Some dumb luck getting cheap tickets and enough points to get free flights sees us back in Pittsburgh in October 2008, this time for a great rivalry game on Monday night: Steelers beat Ravens 23-20 in OT (to date, the best game either of us has seen in person):
Back in Philly to see my first Eagles win as they dominate Tampa Bay 33-14 in October 2009:
Jets beat the Bills 19-13 in one of their regular season games in Toronto in December 2009:
Another Monday night rivalry game – Bears beat the Packers 20-17 in Chicago. From super swanky club seats in September 2010:
Crazy good luck timing of a business trip landed me in Seattle to see my Eagles lose to the Seahawks 31-14 in December 2011:
Bluenose Traveler 