Toronto #1

Karen
12. Aug. 2016
2 Min. Lesezeit

I live north-west from Toronto downtown, near Wychwood Park, the area which just isn't on the downtown maps anymore. It's quite nice and doesn't feel like being in such a big city, but I have to admit that I thought it would be easier to get downtown with public transport. Maybe I only failed to understand the public transport in Toronto, but in my opinion it's much less comfortbale than in cities like Berlin, London or Paris. They only have 3 or 4 subway lines, then they have trams, busses and the GO Transit train and bus for longer distances into the surroundings. The problem is that they fail to have a public transport app which shows you how to get where you want by giving your start and destination point. There only are separate maps for subway, tram and busses which make it very difficult to find your way when you don't have a clue which station is nearby and how the station is called where you want to go and which transportation is going there.

I met a girl on the flight who I wanted to meet yesterday to do a sightseeing-tour with her, but regarding our lack of orientation and possibility to contact each other (no mobile data and no possibility to call each other) we unfortunately failed to meet up. Once again I noticed how much we are depending on our mobile devices. Need to get a Canadian SIM-card!

I made a Hop-on-Hop-off bustour through Toronto, had a rest at Tim Hortons (the Canadian counterpart to Starbucks combined with McDonalds you might say), joined a boat trip on the Lake Ontario, walked along the Harbour, visited the CN Tower which has a few meters glass floor on top – really scary, but cool – and tried not to get lost in this huge city. On my way back home I first walked into the wrong direction from the subway station so that it took me 40 min instead of 20. Fortunately I walked past a pizza place and could get my dinner there. Saved my evening as I was starving! :-D It was an exciting but also very exhausting first day in Toronto as it's 35°C here.

Funny facts about Canada:

The doors of public toilets always have gaps on the sides so that you can look inside (my friend Jeni told me it’s the same in the US), I definitely don’t like it – privacy please!! Also the front part of the toilet seat is missing on public toilets. And in general toilets are filled with much more water than in Germany, first I thought they were blocked. :-D
Enough toilet facts! ;-) There are more important things to tell: I loooove this country! There are so many ginger men around! <3 Maybe due to many Irish immigrants…