After last summer’s adventure in the Maritime provinces, we were excited to explore more of Canada.
Sadly, we were a little disappointed with our time in Ontario. To be sure, we only spent about five days skirting the edge of Lake Ontario from east to west. But we spent decent chunks of time in four cities: Kingston, Oshawa, Toronto and London. (Toronto, the fourth most populous city in North America, is in a class by itself – in a good way.)
Our overall impression: southern Ontario is industrial in many areas, and some places are struggling. There seems to be some major addiction problems in large cities like London. Things just aren’t that pretty or special.
On the western edge of New York State, we had a lovely Harvest Host stay at Tug Hill Estate winery in Lowville, up on a hill and surrounded by wind turbines. We parked on the edge of berry fields, and were accompanied by the field dogs, Bailey and Cooper, energetic, and contained by an invisible fence.
We tried some flights, which included slushie wine drinks. We liked the cider and bought a bottle.
We worked all morning on the winery’s patio before they opened, then departed for Waterville NY and a run on the Black River trail on a hot day. After a Planet Fitness shower and a diner lunch by our highway on-ramp, we headed for the international border and waited 45 minutes to cross at Thousand Islands. We were back in Canada.
We stayed for the night at a commercial campground, Rideau Acres, where dozens of units are set up for the season but some are set aside for short term stays. We felt super lucky to get an amazing spot right on the lake – we paddled in the evening and in the morning.
The next day, we drove into Kingston, Ontario – a waterfront city that was our first urban exploration in Ontario. We arrived on the same day as the Queen’s University graduation, so there was lots of foot traffic and young people in gowns with their families. Lunch at Dianne’s – we picked it for its location and vibe but the food was surprising excellent, esp the cerviche appetizer – then explored the town by foot. Kingston was decent; fairly clean with some waterfront/shipping history, but we were not blown away.
Next up was a provincial park about an hour east of Toronto – Darlington, on the shore of Lake Ontario. To get to the park, you follow a road along lots of power generation property, including a nuclear power plant. There seemed to be a lot of this industrial use along the lake.
For our run the next day, we followed portions of the Great Lakes Waterfront Trail, which skirted a lot of those power generating properties, which controlled wetlands and were undergoing construction that closed the trail in some areas.
We reached Oshawa and turned onto a riverfront pat that runs through the city. We passed a lot of junkies and addicts, which we would see elsewhere in Ontario.
Running is still a great way to get to know at least a little about a place – even the warts.
After cleaning up, we headed ito Oshawa for dinner, at a place called Teddy’s Restaurant & Deli (clearly an institution, and for good reason); we ordered open face sandwiches after waiting in line for a table. A few hours earlier, Trump announced he was breaking off tariff talks with Canada, ostensibly over a digital services tax. “I hope you don’t work in the auto industry,” says a gent in line with us, who seemed generally supportive of Trump’s policies nonetheless.
The next day, we had a faster run on a nicer portion of the Lake Shore trail, starting at Sunrise Rotary Park. It was a Saturday, and we pulled into a parking lot with no spaces, so I had to back up a couple of hundred yards, an adventure with Prufrock that two years ago would have terrified me.
We ran with high school runners doing their repeats. They were impressive and we knew we picked the right spot.
Then it was on to Toronto on a Saturday when a weekend of Pride activities was underway.
Traffic, traffic, traffic.
We tried to execute a plan that had been working for us: shower at a Planet Fitness, which always has lots of parking. (We wanted to unhitch and use just the Lexus to drive around Toronto). That plan didn’t work out. We picked a Planet Fitness at an urban mall on Gerrard Street East near the Leslieville neighborhood. On Google maps the parking lot looked good; fully packed when we got there. So we nervously picked a spot at the rear of a supermarket, along a rail line and a driveway to Home Depot. We were nervous about leaving Prufrock there.
We had made a lunch date with a friend who graciously drove about two hours from Buffalo to see us. We made a reservation for a restaurant, Union, on Ossington Avenue – dubbed by Time Out as the 14th coolest street in the world, back in 2022.
Traffic getting from east to west across Toronto was horrendous as we tried to get to the Distillery District. We walked some more, listened to some music, then on to a honey farm and meadery north of town for the night.
The next day, we took the commuter train in to Toronto from Kings City into Union Station to spend another day in Toronto. This was a much more pleasant way to go. We walked to Kensington Market, and then grabbed an excellend dim sum lunch at Wok City, which we highly recommend. We spent a couple of hours at the Royal Ontario Museum before taking the train back and taking Prufrock to our next stop.
The diversity and immigrant populations of Toronto is strking. East and South Asians make up a quarter of the population, and more than 40 percent is foreign born. The metro region is booming. It leads to lots of great food choices; lots of young people; and lots of traffic and sprawl. Number of immigrants is striking.
We stopped for the night at one of the grimmest commercial campgrounds we’ve experienced (tightly packed, kind of ugly, no wifi, a fire ring filled with cigarette butts. We were up early and on to London, Ontario for early morning work. We found a café (Commonwealth Coffee) where we parked for a couple of hours, then ran on on Thames River trails, passing the Labatts brewery and even more junkies and grimness than Oshowa. We passed one poor fellow huddled next to a soiled wheelchair and I literally thought he would not survive the day.
We had picked up some promotional magazines for London that showcased music, history, dining, sports and more. But on the surface, from what we saw, there are a los of troubles. Maybe you need to get away from the lake and the cities to really appreciate Ontario. One of the few places we’ve visited where we don’t feel the need to go back.
