Summer Break - Toronto, Canada

Toronto was only an hour drive from Niagara Falls, and we had organised to have dinner with Phil's cousin, Emily.  She had only been in Toronto for a week herself, and has recently relocated with the company she works for, in Sydney.  It was really nice to catch up with her, and we had a great evening. The next day, we got the ferry out to Toronto Island. It is only about a 15 minute ferry ride, and we got a great view of the Toronto Skyline. The CN Tower stands out, and looks very similar to Centrepoint Tower in Sydney. We had such beautiful weather, and the island was heaps of fun!

A nice shot, with the CN Tower sticking out the top of my head!

It is a beautiful island, just off the city.  It has lots of waterways where people can hire boats, kayaks and canoes, and their 'beaches', for swimming.  The boys found the first water they could, and were playing in the fountain.

Then we came across the sprinklers (you can see them as tiny dots in the photo above).  They had a great time playing in the water, and 'shooting' each other with them.  They took huge delight in pointing them at some girls feet, and helping them cool down - the girls did ask them to do it!

Then they got to cool off, and dry out, as we walked around a bit more of the park.

 Next we walked out on the pier, and got to see a bit of the beach.  It was a bit too cool for us - and we didn't have our cossies, to swim, but they have lifeguards everywhere.

We hired a bike, to see the rest of the island.  It was lots of fun, but the idea was to wear the kids out. Unfortunately, they couldn't reach the pedals, so Phil and I did all the pedalling, and we had to stop at the playground for them to wear off some energy!

The next day was rainy, and we were planning on taking it pretty easy.  We checked out some of the shopping in the city. We had lunch in the food court at the Eton Centre, which is apparently huge - no-one in our family are shoppers except me, so we didn't see much!  Toronto has almost 27 miles of underground shopping, called The Paths, which is amazing, as well as a little confusing.  It is basically an underground world, which would be very handy in winter when the weather is 30 degrees below zero! We walked into Dundas Square, which is apparently Toronto's take on Times Square.  In the square they have TO Tix, which is where you can get cheap tickets for same day performances that are on around the city.  We tried to get tickets for the Wizard of Oz, but they didn't have any left.  They told us that you can get 'rush' tickets at the theatre, which are cheaper still! We got tickets at the Ed Mirvish theatre for that evenings performance, which we went to with Emily.  It was an amazing production, as one would expect from Andrew Lloyd Webber, and the kids were suitably impressed (as were Phil and I).  Hopefully everyone around us wasn't too disappointed when Quinn announced, very loudly, at intermission, that "the bad witch actually dies at the end!"

 

On our last day in Toronto, we went for a walk to Harbour Square.  It is a lovely space right down on the Harbour, and has permanent stages and seating set up for outdoor concerts.  Unfortunately, there was nothing going on when we were down there, apart from some summer camps.  I don't think Canada had started their summer break, so it was all a little quiet.  Still, it was a great spot for the boys to run around, and that is where I got a picture of the boat, above, and is also where lots of Harbour cruises left from.  

Apparently, any visit to Toronto isn't complete without a visit to the Hockey Hall of Fame.  They are pretty fanatical about their ice-hockey, and we had a fun afternoon there.  There were heaps of pucks, masks they have worn through the ages, and shrines to different players going back to the early 1900's. There was plenty of interactive stuff as well - the locker room was set up above, where Ryan is sitting, and you could line up to have a go at shooting a goal in the simulator that Luke is playing above.  There were also Wii ice hockey games, and you could be an announcer for an ice hockey game, as well as a 3D movie.  It was lots of fun, even if you are not major ice hockey fans, like us.  Saying that though, we did watch some of the Finals series, which was between Chicago Black Hawks, and Boston Bruins.  When we were in Chicago the boys got photos with some people dressed up as the Black Hawks, trying to drum up support for the Finals series.  We were close to Boston when the Finals were played - so we kind of felt a bit a part of it!  For the record, Chicago won in 5 (the finals is best of 7 matches - they know how to stretch things out over here).  The couple of matches we saw went into overtime though, so it was very close.

I was hoping to get along to the St Lawrence Market, but everyone was tired and over it, so we didn't get there.  It is only a food market, but it is meant to have a great selection of fresh food, and is housed in an historic building. There is a market in Montreal, where we are going next, so maybe I will get along there. 

Summer Break - Niagara Falls

We left Chicago, and broke the trip to Niagara Falls, staying the night in Detroit.  On Saturday morning, we crossed the Ambassador Bridge which took us from the USA to Canada.

As you cross the bridge, the flags change from USA to Canadian, which was novel.  I had some good photos of customs too, but as we went to the booth at the border, the woman asked if I had taken any photos.  I must of hesitated as I said no, cause she asked for my camera and told me that I had to delete the two photos I had taken of the booths.  She was pretty full on about it - and I deleted them, but the boys had both taken pictures on their i-pods from the back seat, and were panicking!  I had to take my sunglasses off, and we had to open the back door so that they could check the boys when we handed over the passports.  It is a wonder she didn't search the car for any other people, considering I seemed to pose such a security threat!

Anyway, they let us into Canada, and we headed to Niagara Falls.  We went to the Falls on Sunday, and it was a beautiful sunny day, and really busy.  I was surprised at how built up it was close to the Falls, but I guess that is their bread and butter.

This is a picture of us in front of the Canadian horseshoe falls.  It was an amazing green, as it went over the falls.  Below is the Maid of the Mist, which is a big boat that is constantly touring up to the falls.  I don't know that you get a better view, just wetter from all the spray, and we got wet enough just walking along the top!

 Below are the American falls (crazy, I reckon, but there is a big rivalry between the two countries, and owning different parts of Niagara Falls).  A lot of people advised that you get a better view of the falls from the Canadian side, and I think they are right.  If you are on the American side, you are pretty much behind the falls.  You can see in the photo below, they have built a viewing boardwalk on the American side that you can walk out on to get a better view.  This is the big green pylon on the left of the photo.

 The water is coming over at an amazing speed, and you can see all the spray from the sheer force of the water.

 A view from the side, gives a bit of an idea of the amount of water - it is pretty amazing...

 We chose to do the 'Journey Behind the Falls'.  You go down 150 feet in an elevator, don these attractive yellow ponchos, and get very wet!  It was fun, and you walk about 1/3 of the way around the back of the falls, and get to see out from behind the Falls.

 The tunnels behind the Falls, are very damp and cold (obviously!)

 I got a bit snap happy, but some lovely photos in front of the Horseshoe Falls, at Niagara.

 Each evening, they illuminate the Falls, so we decided to come back for that.  That happens around 9pm,  and then on Fridays and Sundays, they also have fireworks at 10pm, weather permitting.

 I even managed to take my camera off Auto mode, to take photos which actually showed the colours of the Falls - I was pretty proud of myself!

 The fireworks were pretty spectacular, too.  As I had the slow shutter speed for the night photos, Quinn helped me get these somewhat artistic shots below, as he was standing very close and jumping around, as he had to go to the bathroom.  These are the shots I got!

 

The next day at Niagara Falls, it was a bit rainy and overcast, and everyone was pretty tired from our big day, and late night - a great day just to hang out and play at the caravan park.  We had a few swims at the indoor pool, the boys loved shooting hoops at the basketball court, and were pretty stoked to hire a go-kart.

 Even better, it started to rain during the hour that they had the go-kart, so not only did they get to drive around the park, they got to do it in the rain.  They were pretty happy!

On our last day, we spent the morning at the Niagara Falls museum, learning about the war of 1912 in Niagara.  It was a fun little museum, and the boys got to dress up like the red coats, and play with some imitation rifles.  Then upstairs they had some memorabilia of souvenirs from Niagara Falls over the years, and narrative about people who had tried to cross the Falls - tightropes and barrels seemed the favoured mode of transport.  They had a beam set up, so everyone had a go to test their balance.  I don't think any of us would have made it across!

 

Below, is a shot of the Niagara Whirlpool, from the Niagara Glen Nature Reserve, where we stopped as we were on our way to Toronto.  The lines you can see, are for the Whirlpool Aero Car, which traverses the river above the whirlpool.

Summer Break - Chicago

We headed into Chicago on the train, which was a bit of an adventure for all of us.  It was a beautiful sunny day, and we headed to Millennium Park, which was finally completed in 2004 - over schedule and over budget.  It was a great place to wander around, and had lots of different spaces.  Here is a bit of a photo tour of our day here.  We started at this big shiny structure, known as the bean (as it is shaped like one - just not from this angle where Quinn and I are standing!)  It is really cool, and everyone walks around and under it, looking at their reflection, 

 and at the right angle, you can get a great photo withe the Chicago skyline in the background.  We tried, but if you look carefully at the photo below you can see Phil taking the photo, me standing there, and the boys running around like crazy people!

Next, we went past the Jay Pritzker Pavilion.  It is an outdoor concert venue, with speakers all through, and a really funky design.  The Tuesday we were there was the first outdoor event for the summer, a film showing a concert of the Rolling Stones.  We would have liked to have seen it, but it didn't start until 7.30pm, and we weren't going to be able to walk around the city all day, see the film and get home without a meltdown.  Fortunately, on Thursday was the opening night of the Blues Festival.  When we came into the city then, we planned on staying for that, which was great.

Next stop was just by the Crown Fountain.  This area had a display of art by an American/Japanese artists, who designed these big ceramic structures, then paints them.  He calls them "Dangos", meaning rounded form, or dumplings in Japanese.  They were a bit of fun, and something to look at on our way down to the Fountain.

 The fountain is bordered at the north and south ends by 50 foot tall glass towers that display images of the faces of Chicagoans, which is constantly changing.  Then every few minutes there is a water fountain which sprays out of one of their mouths, which the kids loved to run through.

 Some of the kids were paddling in the water, which was about ankle deep, but the boys decided to get right into it and run through it and get completely wet!  They were also filming something while we were there, so there was this guy in a business suit with all these camera people around, and he had to walk through the water at least 20 times, doing the same thing.  It was a nice place just to relax, in the middle of the city.

Chicago is renowned for it's architecture, and we wanted to get out on Lake Michigan, so we combined the two, and did an architecture tour which went up the river, and then out onto Lake Michigan, while describing the different buildings in the city.  We signed up for the tour, and then had a little wait - everyone was going a bit stir crazy, before we got on the boat!

 

The picture below shows some of the bridges in Chicago.  It has 18 movable (opening) bridges, in just 2 miles.  They only open about twice a year, to let boats in and out.

Some of the buildings we saw going up the river include:

The Wrigley Building, of the chewing gum empire.  Wrigley Stadium is also the name of the baseball stadium in Chicago.  Apparently, they initially made washing powder, and would attach a stick of gum on each box.  They discovered that people were buying the washing powder for the gum, and started making chewing gum, exclusively. 

Next are the corn cobs.  Apparently this architect decided that there were no straight lines in nature, so these buildings were designed with no straight lines. The lower levels have car parks and shops, with apartments up the top.

This is the Trump building, which is a skyscraper and condo hotel, built in 2001.  It was the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere, until it was surpassed in 2009 by the Sears tower, in Chicago.  There are lots of other famous buildings in Chicago, including the John Hancock Tower, but these are all I have photos of!  Below is a picture of us on Lake Michigan, with the Chicago skyline in the background.

 We had to have a rest day on Wednesday, and just swam and hung out at the caravan park.  On Thursday, we went into Chicago again.  We went to the Museum of Science and Industry, which was great fun.  We all had a really good day - we were there for most of the day, and still didn't see everything.  They had a special exhibition of an old working coalmine from Illinois, which the boys really enjoyed.  We went down in the original lift, and got on the train to see coal mining equipment.  Got a picture of this long wall miner for my dad :)

There were lots of other exhibits which fascinated the boys including submarines, the weather area where they simulated a tornado, a plane simulator which we took a ride in, and the human body area where they ran on a giant treadmill, like a mouse!  After the day there, we walked down to the shores of Lake Michigan, which is their beach. It is much nicer than I expected, given that it is a Lake - albeit, a very big one...  It was a cool windy day, but still a nice spot for a photo.