Royal York Toronto - 28-30th August

We got back to central Toronto around midday. We travelled along a 20 lane highway on the way; quite scary; and only got slightly lost! Having dropped of our hire car we crossed the road and entered the Fairmont Royal York Hotel, one of the poshest hotels in Toronto. When it was built in 1928 it was the first place in Toronto with elevators and flush toilets! It is absolutely huge and has an oppulence of its own with a lobby, mezzanine and then upper mezanine floor all lavishly decorated with chandeliers, thick carpets and amazingly ornate ceilings and walls. We felt a little out of place with our back packs and hiking shoes! However we had decided to see how the other half live and used our airmiles to book in for 2 nights. We were too early for check in so we left our bags in a checked bag room and went off to explore in Path (the underground shopping centre).
At around 3pm we went back to the hotel and went to our room; the bell boy brought up our bags from the checked bag room and showed us how to work the telly! Celso immediately found the snacks and scoffed down a Mars bar. When we looked at the price list it was $4.50 so we decided we would have to go out and buy one to replace it (they cost around 90c in the shops). We took a look at the laundry list as we had quite a pile; the cheapest item was underpants at $6... so we would have to look for a laundromat too.
We went out and explored the hotel (see the photos) and then went to look for a supermarket to buy some fruit and a Mars bar. We ended up in Buskerfest; a Toronto street busking festival with artists from all over the world; and had fun watching various acts such as Elvis (who only moved when money was placed in his bucket), a Japanese chap who played digeridoos and lots of jugglers and jokers.
I tried to write the blog in the eveneing only to find that the hotel charged for internet access; all the cheap places we have been have given us free access; so I had to log in to a system that was down the road a few blocks, but the connection wasn't very good and I gave up.

On the Saturday we visited Buskerfest again, went to the laundromat, wandered the streets and generally hung out. We had an amazing Mexican meal and then Tris and I spent a couple of hours in the hotel pool whilst Celso went to the gym.
Today (Sunday) we left our bags in the checked luggage room again and went on the ferry over to the Toronto Islands where there are beaches (one a nudist beach, where we were treated(?)to a full frontal of a rather podgy middle aged man!); a huge park; an 18 hole frisbee golf course and a small funfair. We rented a 4 man bicycle and explored the islands.. Tristan was determined to do the steering so we had a couple of hairy moments!
Then we collected our stuff and made our way by subway and bus out towards the airport where we are staying in a motel that gives us a free airport shuttle for our flight to NY tomorrow at 8.50am and free internet access!