Let's Travel Canada ~ Toronto, Ontario

I have absolutely no idea how many times I've been to Toronto.  Too numerous to count.  So I went through all my memories and found this letterboxing trip from 2013 to share . . . 

Hal actually had a couple of days off in a row so of course we FINALLY got to do some letterboxing.  This is our very first outing in 2013.  We were going to attend a meet up in High Park on Sunday afternoon and Toronto has quite a few boxes that we haven't yet found . . . we were determined to find as many as possible on our weekend.

First stop was to find Zinnia Up the Garden Path in James Gardens . . . sadly it was missing . . . but we had a great hike and can only imagine how beautiful this park must be in summer.  

Our next stop was to find Global Village Backpackers . . . a quick find once we explained the box's hiding spot to the bloke behind the counter. 

Right across the road from the hostel was a lovely pub called the Firkin on King.  Very nice and pub-bish looking inside and the hamburg and chips were delicious.  Well fortified with hot tea and a great lunch, we were once more on the trail.

Our next stop was to find Family Vice.  I reached way up but could not find the box.  Hal tried as well and not nearly as tentatively as I had.  Nope.  Family Vice is gone.

Our final find of the day was Cora.  We'd made an attempt at this one on a previous trip to Toronto but a special event in the area meant absolutely no where to pull over or park.  This time the way was clear and it was a wonderfully simple find with few muggles about.

Hal had only a few hours of sleep the night before so we decided to call it a day and stayed at a rather nice and inexpensive hotel near the Woodbine racetrack.   Hal found a grocery store for snacks and the beer which he felt he needed . . . LOL . . . and we had a quiet evening and early night.  I warned him I wanted to be up by the crack of dawn because it is so much simpler to find boxes then with a lot fewer muggles and lighter traffic.  We finally made it down to the continental breakfast which really wasn't bad except for the brick muffins around 9 am . . . the rest was pretty okay.  And it was 10 am before we were packed up and checked out . . . sigh . . . so much for the crack of dawn.

 And then Hal decided we needed to wash the van . . . argh!!!

We were finally ready to start letterboxing for the day.  First stop was Redpath but traffic was getting heavy and we were having stopping and parking troubles so we decided to move on . . .
to what was one of my favourite finds of the weekend . . . Chinese Railroad Memorial.  The memorial is stunning to view and so is the stamp.

Next stop was to find Music Garden.  There was an open parking spot right across from the Garden which was sweet.  Unfortunately the box was gone.  Urban boxes sure do have a short life, especially in Toronto.

And then we headed to High Park.  We found many of the Park boxes on a previous trip to Toronto but there were plenty more to entertain ourselves with including a couple of new ones.  Our first find in the park was Hi! Park which was planted in honour of our meet up later in the day.  What a clever stamp!!  

We met up with our son and his girlfriend for lunch at the Grenadier Restaurant.  We had a great visit until it was time to meet up with some letterboxing buddies at the End Those Winter Blues Meet up.  

We had a really nice visit with Bumble, Fiddleheads, Lone R, Herbivore and Tapehead and a newbie who doesn't have a trail name yet.  After a lovely visit we headed of for our second find in the park -- Dog Walk.  That was a tough one because there were just enough muggles on the trails to keep us on high alert.  But we did get it!!

The park was becoming rather crowded because it was a not cold day so we decided to head to Mt. Pleasant Cemetery which we assumed would be much quieter.

We found all three cemetery boxes although the clues in two of them were especially tricky for my brain:  Inky Boy Goes to Toronto, William Barker's Sopwith Snipe and Winter Aconite Up the Garden Path.  We realized we were close to our son's place so we warned him we were coming up after we found one more box.  We didn't find the box though . . . Toronto by Subway:  Rosedale.  A quick cup of tea at Tim's and we were off for home.