So, with the antibiotics given to me by the good doctor in my back pocket, we set off to see Toronto.

Wednesday, after the conference was over, a few of us wandered off to a Vietnamese restaurant in the Chinatown (yeah, a bit ironic, but it works). Now, envision this. I had done nothing, nor eaten anything except for 2 bananas and a bowl of soup for 3 days. I woke up with an appetite. For dinner, I ordered the large fondue, not really knowing what to expect, but hoping for something big. I wasn't dissapointed, as you can see here. I had a plate full of beef and shrimp, and another plate full of veggies. A third plate held a bunch of rice wraps. When soaked with water, they became editable, a bit like how pitas would work. You cook your meat, toss in some bean sprouts, lettuce, and hot sauce, and munch away. Yes, I guess I really was sick to actually eat vegetables.

The following day, we went to the science center. Now, that was kind of interesting. But perhaps even moreso, was what we saw on the way back. It was a McDonalds with underground parking.

Even later that evening, we wandered around a bit to inspect some buildings we had seen during the car ride to the science center. On the way, we caught a nice sunset. We even ran across a moose who posed for a picture.

On Friday, we wandered off to a castle build in the early 1900's, called Case Loma. The guy had it built, and ran out of money before it was finished. The big portion was done, but things inside, like the swimming pool, were never completed. Here is a picture of the outside of Casa Loma. Here is a nice view of the city from the castle tower. You can also get a good view of the courtyard. There's geeks everywhere you go. This guy participated in QuakeCon 2004.

That evening, we went on a Hippo Tour. The tour's are on this vehicle, which is part bus, part boat. You drive around the city, with a tour guide pointing out stuff. Then whenever that's done, the bus just drives into the water and the tour continues. This is one of my favorite pictures, taken from the bus (while in the water). Afterwards, we just drive out.

Friday, of course, was Canada Day. Something like our Independance Day. So they run around having parties, waving flags, doing fireworks, etc. We did go to see the fireworks, which began around 10:30pm at the lakefront. The Canadians really liked their fireworks, and "oh'd" and "ahh'd" the entire time. We personally found it to be a bit short and unimpressive, but whatever keeps Canadians happy :-)

Perhaps slightly more interesting than the fireworks, was the Canadians trying to watch them. There was an 8 lane highway behind where we were sitting at the shore to watch. The cars kept pulling over to watch them, blocking 4-6 lanes. There were two "mounties" (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) who desperatly went car to car trying to shoe everyone along, but it was a losing battle. As soon as soon cars left and he moved on to others, additional cars took their place.

Alas, there were so many people there, that we would have been outside for hours waiting to get on the street car to take us back to the subway. We instead decided to hoof it, walking 3 miles or so to the station. Oddly, in the midst of thousands of people downtown during all this, we ran into Chemboy, who was willing to walk along with us. Even on Monday, my legs are still tired from that walk.

Saturday, we started off by going to the Art Museum. The only thing they let us take pictures of were the sculptures upstairs. Then we hit the subway yet again and wondered downtown. Today was a trip to Center Island. It has games, rides, food, beaches, restaurants, but most of all, really cool looking scenery. Here is a family of swans, a picture of the city across the lake, some folks fishing, Shana with some flowers she really liked, the beach itself (from a pier), a look at Lake Ontario, a maze, a lighthouse, and the boardwalk. As you can see on the right, some people actually live on this island.

Saturday night, we weren't quite content to just stop. We decided to hop on the subway and go all the way out to the end to see what was there. What we found was this sculpture of a bus.

Then on Sunday, it was time for the long trip home. We stopped at a rest stop on the way, which had a nice view out back. That's where we took this picture of what we think is Lake Raystown.

And that's it for our Toronto adventure.