Tripping in Toronto, Part 4--Chilling with Friends and Fluming on Logs

Sunday night after Casa Loma we went to the house of one of my colleagues for a BBQ. We had gotten to know Dave's family 6 years ago when we went to Orlando for a meeting, and both of us took our families along. He and his wife Jan have two delightful kids who are a little older than Chris, 13 and 14. Chris was in heaven, since they had Rock Band and Guitar Hero! We had a great time visiting with real Canadians, who could shed some light on some mysteries like what in the heck Tim Horton's was...and why it was so difficult to find a place to buy wine! (The story on that is that each province has different liquor laws [like each state does here], and in Ontario Province, beer, wine, and liquor are all sold in separate stores!

The next day we went to the waterfront to take a ferry to the lovely Toronto Islands. This is the CN Tower, the second-highest structure in the world (it used to be the tallest, until Dubai took that honor). Apparently it has a new glass elevator, through which you can look down and see all the way to the bottom!

This was a funky artistic wave park on the harborfront:



On the ferry:



We went to an old-fashioned amusement park called Centreville for the day and had a blast! It was geared toward younger children, but Chris, Mike, and I also enjoyed ourselves. Here we are on some of the rides--I have to go on all the rides that go around and around because Mike gets sick. (Although I'm finding that I'm not as tolerant of that kind of thing as I used to be when I was younger!! Nowadays I'm prone to ride-induced headaches!)



This was an incredibly fast antique (1907) carousel!


Nick riding "Rudolph":

This was a ride simply MADE for Nicholas--an old-fashioned fire truck that goes around on a track. So cute! He rode this ride maybe 15 times!!! And that wasn't enough for him.

Here is a video of him on the ride--look at his delight!

And riding an old-fashioned car:


This was one of my favorite rides--a gondola that goes over the park. Very peaceful, and a great way to get a bird's-eye view of the park!


One of the many rides that goes "around and around"!


Chris was desperate to get Nick to go with us on the log flume (it was a very tame log flume)...and I was skeptical, but Nick loved it! The first time we got finished with the ride, he shot off like a bat out of hell to go on it again! I had to run to catch up with him.


The boat back into Toronto offered some beautiful views of the skyline!!! This photo shows just how tall the CN Tower really is!!! Quite amazing--up close it's hard to tell how tall it is.



I love these ones:



Looking back at the Toronto Islands, all the sailboats are going back to the harbor there...



A historic tall ship in the Toronto harbor:



We had dinner at a shawarma place on the waterfront, and Kieran decided to make a cheeto sandwich after he'd finished his falafel!

Chris with his falafel:
We had a lovely day in the Toronto Islands! Nick still pines for Centreville--every day he tells us he wants to go back!

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