The Hall Clan Takes Toronto: Adventure 1 of 2

April 4, 2014

Today after that horrible AC disaster, we waited for Daddy to get home from work and headed out to Fayetteville, where we were flying to Toronto. We just grabbed some fast food for dinner and we fed Cam some fries. Well he got mad at us because apparently he wanted them whole and not cut up LOL. As soon as we gave it to him whole, he stopped fussing. Strange kid. ;)

We love that silly boy. We just went to our hotel and slept because we had a long day tomorrow.

April 5, 2014

We woke up early to catch our flight. That airport is so small! There was only one place for breakfast (or food of any kind) that early in the morning, so we took turns going. Bianca and I first and then Daddy (Cam was asleep by then). Yay for prepackaged muffins and a bagel! lol

Cam woke up once daddy came back and he walked around to get his energy out, and it worked . He was good on the plane!

Once we got to Toronto, we got our bag, AND IT WAS DAMAGED! The bar was broke on it, making it hard to wheel. UGH! Great. We reported it, but there wasn't much they could do since we weren't going to be here for long, so they said to just bring it in to Fayetteville when we get back. Alright, sure. So we got our car and spent forever installing the silly car seat for Bianca. It was awful. I hate renting car seats. A billion Cheerios and frustrations later, we were on the road to our hotel in Vaughan. MAN it was FREEZING out! Burr! After we settled in a little bit, we decided to head to the huge mall around there and walk around and eat something. It was an awesome mall! There was a Lego Land there. We didn't go, since our kids are so little, but we took pics out in front of it LOL.

  And more pictures

We were starving by then, so we decided to eat at the Pickle Barrel, which was super yummy!! After dinner, we went into the Disney store and let the kids pick out a stuffed animal, Ariel for Bianca and Skully the bird from Jake for Cam. It was so exciting for them, well Bianca LOL. We stayed at the mall walking around because, why not? Didn't buy anything, but it gave us something to do. Then we made our way back to the hotel to take a dip in the pool! Bianca had fun, and Cameron REALLY loved it! It was a bit chilly, but it was fun.

April 6, 2014

Today we were going to the maple syrup festival we were looking forward too, yay! We decided to go when it first opened so it wouldn't be as crowded(and we had to check out of our hotel anyways). It was a great decision because there were no lines for pancakes when we got there! First, check out my bump and this video! <3

  Bianca was super excited to see snow on the ground, haha!

We walked down a trail to the building where they had pancakes, hooray! They were very good, except for some reason Cameron did not want any and just threw them on the floor, which was fun. 

After the breakfast mess we went down the elevator to explore around outside!

They had fun things like a carriage ride and pony rides. Of course we tell Bianca about the pony rides and of course we didn't know that costs extra, oops. We let her do it anyways though because we're that awesome of parents. ;) The carriage ride was fun, Cam enjoyed himself, and so did Ariel.

Pony rides were next! She just HAD to have the white pony!

And Cam made friends with a dog haha! We walked the little trail they had there next. It was hard with Cam's stroller since there were a few steep hills, but it was worth it. We got to see exactly how the syrup was made and got to taste syrup straight from a tree, which is actually clear and tastes like slightly sweetened water. It takes a lot of boiling to give maple syrup that caramel yummy taste. Worth it though!!

When we finished the trail, it was not even 1130 yet, so we left and returned our car to the airport. Next we grabbed a shuttle bus to our Toronto hotel! Cameron slept thankfully and Bianca and her new BFF Ariel played the whole ride.

The ride was about an hour long, but they dropped us off and we went to our hotel and tried to figure out how to get to the hockey game we had tickets for. It was almost time for it and we figured we were going to miss it since we couldn't find it on the map. We were going to take the subway, but nothing went that close to it apparently. Boo to you, Toronto! We took a cab instead. Oh well. We got there and all was well. They gave the kids some free hats, which was pretty sweet! Cam didn't want anything to do with his, but Bianca wore hers for most of the time. She wasn't too excited about the game, just about the pizza and popcorn that we got to munch on during the game LOL. It was fun though to see a real Canadian hockey game. Our team won, yay! We left before it officially ended though. Bianca made friends with the little boy sitting behind us, they were cute. I'm glad we figured it all out and got to go!!

So we get out of the game and expecting to see a bunch of taxis out in front since it was a big game, we see this:

NOTHING!!!!! No taxis ANYWHERE! What's up with that, Toronto? Ugh! And it was cold. So we waited and EVENTUALLY a cab came and we got in it (despite someone else almost stealing it when it was our turn). The cab ride was longer because I think he took us around town and through traffic on purpose, ugh! But whatever. I don't know if it was because it was a Sunday that cabs weren't out, but it was lame. We rested a bit in the hotel room when we got back and then tried to find some food for dinner. The best we found while walking the underground tunnels, not wanting to brave the cold with our kiddos? Tim Horton's. Yay for crappy grilled cheeses. Oh well. We relaxed a bit at the hotel and then went swimming! Their pool was cool, it was heated and you could swim from the inside to the outside! Bobby and I swam outside for like a second, but it was so cold, even if the pool was heated you'd be an idiot to go out there for a long time. The kids had fun, so that was good. What a day.

April 7, 2014

Today was our last and only full day here, so we were off to conquer Toronto! We got some Tim Horton's for breakfast since we knew where one was from last night lol. Our first stop was the CN tower right when it opened cause we're that smart. It was fun. Cam slept through the beginning of it, yay! Bianca showed Ariel all the pretty views of the city. Luckily Cam woke up in time to walk on the glass floor, which is the coolest part of the tower. Bobby put a foot on it, so that was a success. ;) Overall it was fun and a good place to get out of the cold!

                                                             Our hotel!

After the CN tower, we decided to try to get to Toronto's Little Italy to get some lunch, since we heard it was good. So we tried to find a subway. Eventually did. Stopped in the train station for a pic first lol.

And so, to ride Toronto's subways, you apparently MUST have cash. Would have been nice to know before hand. And it would be nice if they placed ATMs near subways stations. That was a pain. Then you had to get a token??? Ok, whatever. Got them. The subway itself wasn't bad or hard, we're pros at riding subways by now. Got out at where Little Italy was and it was weird. You had to walk for BLOCKS to get to anywhere that seemed decent. So we took one of the street cars and thank goodness we did. It was so cold out there, burr!! We found a place to go, and it was good (maybe we were just super hungry at that point though LOL). 

Then we took the street car BACK to the subway, put the stupid tokens in, and went to where it SAID this cool castle thing was, Casa Loma. Not. Anywhere. To. Be. Found. You'd think you'd see a big castle thing sticking out somewhere, but no. UGH!! Poor Bianca, she was walking everywhere since she has pretty much outgrown her stroller, so she was exhausted, my feet were killing me, and we asked like 5 people for directions and none gave good ones. We eventually found the castle and decided to huff it UP THE BIGGEST HILL I'VE EVER SEEN (ok exaggeration here, but it was still huge!!!) to finally get there, probably about an hour after we arrived in the area. It was awful though. Toronto, you're public transportation and signage is AWFUL!!! And you're cold.

It was worth it (I suppose lol) though. It was beautiful inside, and I think it was Bianca's favorite part of the trip so far (minus the swimming). She kept going around proclaiming that it was her castle, and this room is her royal bedroom, and that one is Prince Cameron's room, and that is the royal dinning room, etc. It was hilarious. Here's our pics of "her" royal castle!

Then we walked through an underground tunnel they had there, and it was cold! But Miss Bianca did not want to wear her jacket, silly girl. She's always loved the cold. It was fun and I'm glad we finally made it.

We knew the area really well by then, so we were able to walk back to the subway just fine, especially since it was downhill a lot of the way this time haha. Oh boy did we need a rest when we FINALLY got back to our hotel! Poor Bianca especially. She fell asleep on the short subway ride home. We relaxed until dinner time, and then decided to head to the mall that was connected to our hotel via the underground walk ways (DC should have stuff like this, just sayin lol). We ate at the food court and it was wonderful too, especially to not have pizza and grilled cheese LOL. Then we just went back to the hotel, too exhausted to swim tonight (plus we wanted our bathing suits to dry in time for our plane ride tomorrow).

April 8, 2014

We woke up early so that we could eat a good breakfast today! We asked the hotel where a good breakfast place was nearby (preferably through the underground tunnel), but alas, there was one, but we had to walk a few blocks outside. Eh, so we did it anyway. It wasn't that spectacular though. Of course. And you had to pay extra for good syrup. What's up with that, Canada??? Oh well at least we had a real meal since our day was going to be filled with plane rides and airports. 

Then we walked back in the cold and drizzly weather to our hotel, got our junk, and walked across the street to the hotel where the airport shuttle was coming. We got on, went to the airport, and started on our first flight of the day. We were early, so we hung around the airport for a bit, but it was all good.

To be continued...