First few days - Arriving, Toronto and Niagara Falls

So, here it begins. I arrived without any problems on Monday, July 7th. The flight was nice, even for Economy Class. i could even doze off a little bit :)

My cousin then took me to this home about half an hour away from Toronto Pearson airport. I then hit downtown for the afternoon and I was completely open-mouthed. I was never on another continent, I was never even in another time zone, and here I am. Everything is soooo big but it still works properly - that’s kinda cool if all you know quite well is life in Switzerland and Germany.

I used the subway and at first I was like, why does this take so long? At Bloor-Yonge, i decided to get off and walk the rest to Union Station. Oh my. You got a whole other kind of distances here in CA but it’s kinda cool. I like walking and I figured it’s easier to get to know the city at street level. it just turned out like that. I then hit Subway (the sandwich store) and it tastes even better than back in Switzerland at a better price (anyone surprised?).

Speaking of prices it’s not like ultra-cheap, I think still more expensive than the US but no way like in Switzerland. Foot-long Subway sandwich? 8 CAD which is about 6 CHF. In Switzerland it’s the same + 10 additional CHF. Something else that is kinda cool here, is the free WiFi in almost every place. For a tourist like me, this is a blessing since you can’t just be on a roaming subscription all the time.

I was then walking through Toronto, getting to know the city a bit. I mainly walked down Yonge Street and then went to the place near CN Tower, Rogers Centre and Ripley’s Aquarium, but didn’t go into any of them (yet). The jetlag hit me then (I am travelling back in time 6h), so when it was afternoon for most of the people I was feeling like I should go to bed. So I went to my cousin’s place and had a nice evening with his family.

The next days I could hitch the ride to Niagara Falls and had an afternoon to spend time there. It’s something you have to see yourself, it really is wonderful. I like how they balance the needs between the Niagara Falls as a place of nature, tourism and power supply. You don’t feel rushed through even though it’s quite tourist-y. I even caught the Maid of the Mist (the Canadian-side ship that brings you to the two falls) on the first try, no waiting in lanes. I was glad they gave away the plastic ponchos though, otherwise my camera wouldn’t have survived. You do get wet in your hair and at the bottom of your pants if you’re wearing jeans like me, but it dries away in no time at a sunny summer day like this (~25°C).

So that’s it for the moment, for photos follow this link (publicly available even if you don’t have Facebook).