Selling Travel July/August 19

SELLING CANADA
city profile 53
Toronto
Take a sporting chance on Canada’s most diverse and
well-rounded city says Steve Hartridge
CANADIAN TOURISM COMMISSION
Top stops
Historic Distillery
District
This artsy enclave of
galleries, boutique
shops – buy designer
footwear
at Fluevog –and
restaurants is set
amongst red-brick
Victorian buildings.
St. Lawrence
Market
A real bustling
working market in a
historic building, this
is the place for those
souvenir bottles of
maple syrup,
mustards, jams and
more.
Museum of
Illusions
Designed to ‘trick’ your
senses this interactive
attraction with 80
visual and sensual
illusions is a one-stop
visit for fun and
entertainment.
Theatre land
Toronto makes a
great alternative to
Broadway. Among
the shows playing
this summer are
Come From Away and
Waitress, Hamilton
starts a run
next February.
Square One
Shopping Centre
Near the airport, the
centre has 320-plus
outlets. It runs a
Tourist Privileges
scheme, with savings
– pick up a pamphlet
from an information
kiosk and promotions.
There are few things that can pull a
city or nation closer together than a
sporting triumph – and Toronto was
a city whose residents seemed to
be collectively living and breathing
basketball when I visited in May.
Sporting life
Its professional basketball team had
reached the National Basketball
Association’s (NBA) final for the first time,
and Toronto was literally in Raptors.
The sports bars in the lively
Entertainment District and the pubs down
by the Waterfront were overflowing with
people wearing t-shirts with the team’s ‘We
The North’ motif. The parties got longer
and louder after I left, as the Raptors
became the first Canadian team to win the
title, setting off an outpouring of city and
national pride.
Although Toronto doesn’t have
to go through hoops to
attract visitors – last year
was another record year
with the city welcoming
44 million travellers –
sport is one of its many
draw cards. The Raptors
and ice hockey’s Maple
Leaves both play in the
Scotiabank Arena, on the
edge of downtown, whilst
baseball’s Blue Jays pitch up at the
Rogers Centre.
My hotel is the Royal York Hotel, a
Fairmont property, which is coming to the
end of a huge refurbishment. Royal York
is ideally located and immediately across
from Union Station, the starting point for
the epic cross-country train,The Canadian.
Toronto’s islands
Leaving Royal York, I stroll down Front
Street, to the recently renovated CN
Tower. A glass-fronted elevator takes me
to the lookout level, 1,116 feet above the
ground, in less than a minute.
From the three new observation level
windows, the views of the city and planes
taking off from the domestic Billy Bishop
City Airport are sensational.
A little-known fact is that Toronto has
islands, located just a few minutes away
from downtown. So after leaving Ripley’s
Aquarium of Canada, with its sharks and
stingrays, to another day, I make the short
walk down to the ferry terminal at The
Waterfront for the 10-minute
crossing to Toronto Island Park.
I pick up my bike and
cycle past some of the 260
cottage-style homes on the
island – actually more than
a dozen small islands linked
by bridges - along the seawall
that protects the park from a
black and restless Lake Ontario.
There are walking and bike trails,
a wading pool, beaches, restaurants and a
petting farm. But perhaps the best reason
for visiting are the views across the water
of Toronto’s skyline.
If the shoe fits
Back on the ‘mainland’ I take the subway
line to Ontario’s Parliament buildings and
then make the short walk to the Royal
Ontario Museum, with its collection of
dinosaurs and ancient artifacts.
I drop into the Gardiner Museum, with
its cool ceramic art, and the Bata Show
Museum, which traces the history of
footwear from Neanderthal deerskin slipons
to the boots worn by astronauts on
the moon. torontonow.com
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