Toronto

Toronto: The City That Gets Better the Further You Get from the CN Tower

Toronto is the largest city in Canada with a population of about 2.9 million in the city proper and 6.4 million in the Greater Toronto Area. It is not the capital (that is Ottawa), which surprises visitors expecting federal institutions. What it has instead is the country’s most concentrated restaurant and cultural scene, a genuinely diverse set of neighbourhoods, and a lake that is large enough to look like an ocean from the waterfront.

Kensington Market and Chinatown

Kensington Market in the west end is a small neighbourhood of Victorian terraces that has been a food and counterculture hub since Portuguese and West Indian immigrants moved in during the mid-20th century. The streets around Augusta Avenue are dense with independent shops, produce vendors, vintage clothing stores, and restaurants ranging from jerk chicken to Jamaican patties to Portuguese custard tarts. Sunday afternoons from May to October the area is pedestrianised. A good lunch from the stalls costs CAD 10-15.

Chinatown, immediately east, has Vietnamese and East Asian groceries, roast duck hanging in shop windows, bubble tea shops, and older residents who use the neighbourhood as they always have. The area around Spadina Avenue and Dundas Street West has excellent value restaurants. A bowl of pho at several Vietnamese places along Spadina costs CAD 12-16.

St. Lawrence Market

The St. Lawrence Market in the old town east of Yonge Street has been running since 1803. The Saturday farmers market in the north building (open 5am to 3pm) is the real event: Ontario cheese producers, maple syrup in every grade from light to dark, locally cured charcuterie, bread, and the market’s signature peameal bacon sandwiches from Carousel Bakery, available for around CAD 5-7. Get there before 9am to avoid the queue.

The Islands

Toronto Islands are accessible by ferry from the Jack Layton Ferry Terminal at the foot of Bay Street; the 15-minute crossing costs CAD 9.13 return. Ward’s Island and Algonquin Island at the eastern end are residential communities of small cottages that have existed since the 1880s and somehow survived municipal attempts at redevelopment. Centre Island has an amusement park that draws families in summer. The best reason to go is the view back across the water to the Toronto skyline.

Restaurants

The Danforth in the east end is Greektown, with taverna-style restaurants serving grilled octopus and moussaka on restaurant rows along Danforth Avenue from Chester to Pape. A full meal with wine costs CAD 40-60 per person.

Ossington Avenue in the west end is where Toronto’s chef-driven restaurant scene has been concentrated for the past decade. Oddseoul does Korean bar food and natural wine; a meal for two costs around CAD 80-100. Bar Raval on College Street nearby is a tapas bar with a striking curved mahogany interior and vermouth service from 11am, which is an unusual and correct opening time.

Getting Around

The TTC operates the subway and surface streetcar lines. A single fare costs CAD 3.30; loading credit onto a Presto card reduces this slightly. The streetcar routes along King Street, Queen Street, and Spadina are the most useful for central tourism. The subway runs north-south on the Yonge-University line and connects the main tourist areas. The city is also very walkable in the central neighbourhoods; the distance from the waterfront to Kensington Market is about 30 minutes on foot.

The PATH system, 30km of underground pedestrian tunnels connecting the financial district, is useful in winter when surface temperatures drop to -15 degrees. Most visitors never discover it exists, which explains a lot of December photos of people looking windburned.