Holiday to Canada in Aug 2024: Day 2 – Morning in Toronto

It took me a long time to fall asleep. Not sure whether that was just because of the noise in the corridor or what, but I guess I fell asleep eventually.

I was up around 2am – that’s not unusual for me. Vick managed to sleep through to 4am.

We found a Starbucks close by that opened at 6am. With it being a Sunday, plenty were closed, and with it being Labor Day on Monday, a number of them would be closed then as well.

We wandered out just before 6am and headed along Queen St. We stopped off at Nathan Phillips Square to take some photos of the Toronto sign and the lovely clock face in the dark.

We found a nice little Starbucks store with some booth seating inside. Another nice and relaxed start to the day.

We had a lot planned for the day, starting off with the F1 Grand Prix at 9am, followed by a Toronto Film & TV Hollywood North Experience tour, starting at 11am close by.

The afternoon would be based around a visit to The Cheesecake Factory in the north of Toronto, followed by a likely snooze in the afternoon. In the evening, we had a visit to the CN Tower, which isn’t too far away from our hotel.

From Starbucks, we walked back to the hotel and checked out the Exec Lounge for breakfast which turned out well.

The Exec Lounge was one of the best we have seen in North America. It was well appointed and had great views.

The breakfast was pretty good as well. Vick was happy with the oatmeal. I tried the pancakes and sausage and scrambled eggs.

We decided to wander down to the harbour prior to meeting up for our film tour. It was likely going to be a high step-count day.

It was a lovely temperature, but we could feel the heat in the direct sun.

There were great views of the CN Tower throughout our short walk down to the harbour.

We only had about 30 mins back at the hotel before we had to head out again to David Pecaut Square for our Hollywood North Experience.

We met our guide Jaqueline Pillon, who took us around a number of Toronto TV and movie locations, telling us stories about being an actor in the industry. She has her own IMDB page.

The tour starred at 11am and comprised us visiting 12 stops (or so) over just short of 3 hours. The stops included:

1. Walk of Fame around David Pecaut Square
2. Royal York Hotel on Front Street
3. Union Station on Front Street
4. Toronto Dominion Centre on Wellington Street
5. Bay Adelaide Centre on Bay Street
6. Cloud Gardens on Temperance Street
7. Elgin & Winter Garden Theatres on Yonge Street
8. Old City Hall on Queen Street West
9. Nathan Philips Square on Queen Street West
10. Toronto City Hall on Hagerman Street
11. Church of Holy Trinity on Trinity Square
12. Yonge-Dundas Square on Yonge Street

Jaqueline was the first to acknowledge that she may have already reached her acting peak, but what she didn’t mention was the fact that she had received a bravery award for saving a drowning man! Wow! That became evident when we looked her up on IMDB.

There was only one other guest on this tour: Montana from Australia, so Jacqueline made it feel very personal for us.

At some stops, Jacqueline used a tablet to show scenes from films and TV shows that were filmed at that location.

Some of these were difficult to view in the sun, but it was interesting to see how the real location was transformed into scenes in a small number of movies and TV shows.

Some of the discussion was more focused on Toronto as a city, rather than specifically related to the film industry. She mixed it up well.

We were surprised in the end how few TV and movie sources were used in the tour. They included:

• American Psycho (Union Station)
• The Shape of Water (The Elgin Theatre)
• Suicide Squad (Yonge Dundas Square)
• The Handmaid’s Tale (various)
• The Incredible Hulk (Yonge Street)
• Suits (Bay Adelaide Center).

The scenes were primarily from shows that we were not familiar with, other than Suits, which we had recently box-binged from seasons one to nine.

Suits was one of those series that pretended to be based in New York but was (almost) entirely filmed in Toronto.

That fact led to a number of high-profile LA-based stars leaving the series due to the travelling and time away from home.

The highlight of this tour for us was in visiting the Suits office building, the Bay Adelaide Center, but that only took about 5 mins.

Our guide was very knowledgeable; she name-dropped well-known actors that she either knew or knew friends/relatives of those well-known actors.

She also pointed out the sensitive way in which the old architecture had been integrated with the new in a number of places around the city. We couldn’t have agreed more.

Overall, it was an interesting tour, and a useful way of learning more about Toronto.

But ultimately, it was far too long. 90 mins would have been enough.

We finished the tour just before 2pm.

We were desperate to get back to the hotel and even more desperate to get to The Cheesecake Factory for a slap-up meal.

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