[password] shipnavire1
[status]
:position 43°42n 79°24w

Aug 8

Victoria to Toronto August 1

Back on the road again. 5am, bleary eyed, packing like a finely tuned machine.

Car, ferry, bus, train, plane.

"We are going to play poker," said an elderly man in the next seat. We'd managed to get on the right bus and he and his wife were giving us helpful directions to get to the airport.

"How long have you been playing?" I asked.

"84 years," he said, "I started when I was two".

Canadian people are very friendly.

Back on yet another airplane we flew five hours and lost four hours to Toronto. Gritty eyed we figured out Toronto transport system. Fortunately David knew it a bit from growing up here and a few subsequent visits. We got the very modern sky train to town, then subway, then staggered a few blocks in the dark to Linda's with our luggage which felt like it had doubled in weight. Linda, David’s cousin poured us a glass of much needed wine. Yay we stop for a few days.

Toronto Aug 4

Usually when I'm travelling I'm looking for the exotic, to examine cultures different to mine but this time I'm very content that this Canadian culture is similar to my own.

Toronto has been a haze of shopping sensory overload. Makes me realise the demands choice has on us. When choices are very limited things are much simpler, less stressful. I've been in 10 clothing shops in a large mall today and very quickly my brain cried enough and couldn't cope with any more options. I had to feed it chocolate before it would work again. Peanut butter chocolate.

But enough grumbling. We stay in magnificent luxury at cousin Linda's. We have our own bathroom! She's a lovely host, and her fridge is stocked with stuff you can't get in a Majuro supermarket.
 Last night we visited the newest member of the family and I got to hold one week old Leandro, son of cousins Jess and Manny. I tell you those unfulfilled grandmother hormones were raging. 
Our life in 38' of plastic and a sweaty 32 degrees seems so remote now. But I have another month of glorious Western civilisation to come yet.

Toronto Aug 6

Today we move on. Traveling and seeing new places is all very interesting. But travel and getting to know people is where the real richness lies for me. Then of course the food.

David is the master of reconnecting with old friends, and maintaining relationships with his geographically distant family, and on Thursday night we had dinner with Doug and Christine. Doug and David met in the late 60's, and 46 years had lapsed. Who knows what these people could have been like. But of course they turned out to be lovely, lively, intelligent, and interesting people. 
They shouted us to a top Toronto French restaurant, Le Select. What a culinary treat. Highlights were grilled goats cheese on pickled beets, and red deer with rye berries. The restaurant was elegant without excessive formality and the service very good. The abysmal service in Majuro temporarily faded into a distant bad dream. Doug it turned out is a guitar player and we are to meet again at the tail end of our trip and play music together.


Uncle Jim and crispy quinoa salad were the next day’s treat. We borrowed cousin Fiona's car and navigated our way to Hamilton, a challenge because a) David having to drive counter intuitively on the right hand side, and b) a bit rusty not having driven a car at all for 18 months. 
Jim is 90 and completely with it. I'm delighted that David has such good longevity genes in his family. Jim is extremely well travelled and made for great company over lunch in a restaurant in a lovely old house in his neighbourhood. My salad of lamb, feta and watermelon sang with the crispy element of fried quinoa. I'll add that to the Majuro salads.


Back via yet another shopping mall to hold the week old baby again at Jess and Manny's. Ethiopian takeaways for dinner. We ripped up pieces of fluffy injera pancakes and scooped up spicy lentils. Injera is a sourdough pancake made with GF teff flour.


Many thanks to Linda for her continued generous hospitality. I'm feeling very looked after on this trip.


Next stop cousin Mary's from where we leave for Halifax on the East Coast.

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