Canoe – Canada’s Transportation

Canoe-Canada's Transportation

Canoeing in Algonquin Park – an Ontario tradition.

Without the canoe, Canada’s history might have been very different.

Designed by Canada’s First Nations, the canoe allowed early explorers, fur traders, missionaries and colonists to travel across the North American continent, eventually finding a route right to the Pacific Ocean. Continue reading

How to Spend a Great Day in Toronto

Toronto's spectacular skyline seen from the deck of the Oriole.

Toronto’s spectacular skyline seen from the deck of the Oriole.

Ask most locals how to spend a great day in Toronto and you’d probably be directed to the Royal Ontario Museum, or the Ontario Science Centre, or the Art Gallery of Ontario, or the CN Tower – all great options.. But I spent a day almost entirely outdoors doing some really cool things, all in the GTA. Continue reading

This is How Canadians Do Winter!

The lake is frozen but the welcome is warm at Viamede Resort.

The lake is frozen but the welcome is warm at Viamede Resort.

Let’s face it. Winter in Canada is all about the cold. There’s nothing growing in the garden, the lakes are frozen, and the gloves are on. But Canadians know how to make the best of winter. Continue reading

The Call of the Wild – Algonquin Park

It's not hard to see why a lone jack pine like this one inspired Tom Thomson.

It’s not hard to see why a lone jack pine like this one inspired Tom Thomson.

In the pitch dark of an Algonquin Park night, a small light cuts the gloom. A park naturalist is collecting newly hatched turtles to protect them from predators. Further up the path, we had seen the destroyed leathery shells discarded after a hungry raccoon or fox had dug them up. He hopes to save these.

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A glass is a glass is a…..

Three glasses, three wines, how will it end?

Three glasses, three wines, how will it end?

I would have laid odds that this whole exercise was silly. How could the shape of a glass affect the taste of its contents?

At the Toronto Sheraton Hotel‘s Social Hour, I watch, with a certain degree of cynicism, as Stewart Risto of Riedel, The Wine Glass Company, begins to take us through a tasting of three red wines from California: a Pinot Noir, a Syrah and a Cabernet Sauvignon.

Riedel makes 236 different shaped glassware. Surely this is simply an exercise in marketing? Continue reading