Having had the whistlestop bus tour I spent a few hours on foot checking out some of the places that caught my eye.
The entrance to Casa Loma. When it was constructed the rich owner paid each person who rolled a rock up from the river to the grounds. A young kid rolled the white one up and was told off by the supervisors for not bringing up an appropriate rock and not paid. Seeing this the owner told the kid that the rock was fine and it would be given a prominent location. He also paid the kid more than twice everyone else. A bizarre story but apparently a true one.
Anyway Casa Loma was the home to Sir Henry Mill Pellatt who was a power mogul who made a fortune from the sale of electricity to the city. This house was built for his wife but I don't think he got to enjoy it much because he went bust. The home is now a museum and heavily populated tourist attractions.
This building across the street from Casa Loma is the stables, I kid you not. I think this chap could have used his money a bit better :)
Speaking of horses, here's a tenuous link to a graffiti horse that I saw quite a few times around the city. As with all the Toronto graffiti you're about to see I have no idea who the artists are.
This is my kind of place. Bad News: It was closed. Good News: They were closed because they were at the fair. That's dinner sorted!
During the bus tour our guide made a passing comment that there was some graffiti in the alleys off Queen St West so that was my cue for heading there. What I found was simply mind blowing with enough graffiti to keep me busy for around 2 hours, removing any time I had left to see anything else before heading off to the fair. To say I was in graffiti heaven would be a huge understatement - I was simply in awe. No comments now, just enjoy!
Time to head to the fair as I couldn't find any more pieces.
A view of the CN Tower. I could easily photo this all day, but graffiti is much more dynamic :)
The mounted police in Toronto don't smell as bad as the carts in Montreal.
A rather cute statue on the way to the fair.
I knew I would like downtown Toronto and wasn't disappointed at all. I loved the graffiti and I know it's tearing the city a little bit as there's quite a number that see it as a blight. I'm certainly not in that camp.
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