G’day all,
The third leg of our trip was 10 days on the East Coast of
Canada and America. After returning to Vancouver we got a flight to Toronto,
before going to New York and finishing up in Boston.
Toronto
As Erin had already been to Toronto in February for work,
this stop turned into Erin showing Marty around re-visiting a few sites
as well as seeing some new ones.
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| Toronto Skyline |
On our first day Erin took Marty on a walking
tour around the downtown and old town of Toronto. During the morning we went to
St Lawrence market and the Hockey Hall of Fame. The Hockey Hall of Fame had displays
on all the NHL teams as well as American and International hockey and the
Stanley cup. After the Hockey hall of fame we walked around the
sport stadiums before going to the distillery district in order to try out the
Mill Street Brewery. Following this we made our way to Chinatown for dinner and
some drinks to finish the day off.
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| Marty with the coveted NHL Stanley Cup |
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| Old School Aussie Hockey Jersey |
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| Beers at Mill Street |
On Saturday we got up early in order to catch a bus to
Niagara Falls. We arrived in Niagara about 11am and headed towards the falls.
After checking out the falls and taking some pictures we had a look around at the
tourist park they had created there. They had a wax museum, Ripley's museum,
planet Hollywood as well as other theme parks. It was crazy. When we got back
to Toronto we decided we wanted to watch the Chicago v Boston Stanley Cup playoff hockey game so we
went to Wayne Gretzky's bar in the entertainment district. Gretzky is a very
famous hockey player.
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| Niagara Falls |
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| At Niagara Falls |
Sunday was our last day in Toronto but as we were not leaving till that night
we were in no hurry. After getting up late ,our Airbnb hosts, Antoniella and
Orlando, had cooked us a Jamaican style breakfast, with sawfish and ackee. We
sat around for a while and ate and chatted with them.
Once we got into downtown we decided to check out the Toronto Islands. So we got the
ferry over to Hanlan's Point and walked from there around to Ward's point. On
the way we checked out Centre Island, where there was a dragon boat festival on. When we got back to the Toronto waterfront we
discovered a festival celebrating 1812 (not sure why) but there was old
tallships and we watched as they did a parade of them all, even firing cannons.
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| Toronto Islands |
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| Old Tall Ship |
That night we got on an overnight bus to New York. Toronto
was our last stop for Canada and we had an awesome time in our 14months living there!
New York
After the overnight bus ride we arrived in New York about
9am. As we could not check into our hotel we dropped our bags off at a luggage
storage place and had a look around the city.
First we walked through the Broadway section of the city, 42nd street towards
5th avenue, and were completely overwhelmed by the insanity of New York. We
wandered towards Bryant Park and had a look at the New York library. From here
we went to check out Grand Central station. After Grand Central we headed
towards the Empire State Building followed by Madison Square Garden. We then went
and checked out Times Square.
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| New York Library |
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| Grand Central Stataion |
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| Times Square |
The heat and lack of sleep started to take its toll at this point so we picked
up our bags and headed to our hotel.
On the Tuesday we had decided to explore Central Park so we
got off the subway near there and rented some bikes. We first did a lap of Central
Park stopping every now and then to look at things, the reservoir, lake etc. After
this lap and some lunch we headed towards the Central Park Zoo. At the zoo we
saw birds, snakes, tortoise's, sealions, monkeys, a snow leopard, red pandas,
lemurs and penguins. We watched a Sealion's feeding as well.
On the Wednesday we had another day of sightseeing so we got
up a bit earlier and went back into New York. First we went up the Empire State
Building and got a bird’s eye view of New York. The Empire State was built in
just over a year, in the early 1930s. All the info about it was very impressive and we
got some good photos from the top. Following this we walked down toward Battery
Park to get a look at the Statue of Liberty. We decided to do a cruise around
the harbour which included the statue, Ellis island, Brooklyn Bridge and the
area around lower Manhattan. We then had a look around Battery Park before
heading up to Wall Street. At Wall Street there was the New York Stock Exchange
and Federal Hall where George Washington became president. We then went to the
9/11 memorial at ground zero/world trade centre. The 9/11 memorial includes two
massive pit waterfalls which are in the places of the twin towers that fell in
the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It is in a park like setting and around the
waterfalls are the names of all those that died because of the attacks.
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| Empire State Building |
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| Erin with the Statue of Liberty |
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| 9/11 Memorial |
Following this we headed to little Italy and Chinatown for some dinner. We then
got the subway and went to the Nederlands Theatre on Broadway to see 'The
Newsies' musical. This is the same story as The News Boys movie and was very
good. There were a few changes to the movie but all the actors were amazing and
the crowd very vocal in their appreciation.
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| THE NEWSIES!!! |
Boston
Thursday morning we got up early and headed to Boston. When we arrived we made
our way out to our Airbnb place and had a rest for the afternoon, as well as
planning time for Europe.
On Friday we headed into Boston and started on a walking tour we had found a
brochure for. This tour took us to the Paul Revere house. Paul Revere was the
man who is known for warning the Americans that the British were coming during
the war of independence. After this we walked up through little Italy and over
the Columbus bridge. About this point we started following the Freedom Trail
which took us on to Bunker Hill where a major battle between the Americans and
the British took place during the War of Independence. Still following the
freedom trail we then went to see a ship, the USS Constitution, one of the
oldest US Navy ships. Heading back over the bridge we went to TD Garden and
the sports museum, to look at Boston Bruins (NHL), Boston Celtics (NBA), Boston Red Sox (MLB), New England Patriots (NFL) and other Boston sports related
memorabilia.
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| Little Italy in Boston |
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| Bunker Hill |
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| TD Stadium, 2 days after the Boston Bruins lost in the Stanley Cup Playoffs |
We then jumped on the subway and headed out to Sam Adams which is a Boston Brewery.
We did a tour there and some tastings before heading to Doyle’s Irish pub nearby
to try some more of the Sam Adams beers. After Irish Nachos (potato chips
instead of corn chips) for dinner we headed back into town. We then went to
visit the Cheers bar and had another beer there before retiring for the evening.
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| Samual Adams Brewery |
Saturday was our last day in Boston but as we were not
flying out till that night we did some more sightseeing. Firstly we went to the
Fenuil and Quincy Market for look. We then went out to
Harvard and checked out the uni. It was big and had lots of very old buildings.
Even though it was summer holidays there were still a lot of people around.
After walking around the uni and the town of Cambridge we headed back into downtown Boston.
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| Market |
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| Harvard University |
After this we got our luggage and headed to the airport for
the next part of our adventure, Europe.
We had a lot of fun in Toronto, New York and Boston,
although it was very exhausting and we were very excited about the next part of
our trip, starting with Amsterdam.
Cheers, Erin and Marty
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