There is rain in the forecast so we thought we should try to stay indoors. This is another museum day out but we're heading for a more cultured / art history stuff so our first stop was Casa Loma.
Casa Loma (Castle on the Hill) is the residence of then illustrious first man of Toronto - Sir Henry Pellatt. The place is grandiose and only the rich can only truly afford it. It was dubbed the house with (almost) a hundred room. There are 98 rooms in this castle. (Yes, we paid attention to the guy who was giving us the tour!) hahaha There are troops of people who go to the place everyday - it was iconic for sure and despite the age of the place, it was not spooky. It's very well maintained and we are awed at how beautiful the gardens were. :)
A good stone's throw away is the Spadina Museum. The house is built for James Austin and his family who apparently was the architect for Sir Henry's Castle. Lovely house - very modern despite it being built in the late 1800s. Had lunch at Druxy's in Casa Loma. (Note: Druxy's is everywhere in Toronto!!!)
We probably stayed a good 4 hours (yes, that's almost half day!) in the area before we trudged on to see my favorite Food Network TV show - Dish. It was near Spadina so yeah, an old groupie I am, we just had to go see and taste the recipes of Trish Magwood (of Party Dish!) :) We walked and found Dupont St. and right before the rows of establishments was the bakery cum cooking school - Dish! Yay!!! :) As it was past lunchtime, there wasn't much of a lunch treat - but they had desserts!!! B feasted on the chocolate chip cookies that are humungous in size while I choose the peach and fig and oatmeal and bran muffins! They are delectable! Very gourmet but really soft, delicate and delicious! Too bad we can't bring it home as we still have 4 more days in Ontario. I met Sara (the other co-host and one of the Executive chefs) who was working on some corporate food order. She was cordial - wishing us both congratulations after we told her that we're in TO for our honeymoon. The Dish place was exactly where they were shooting the episodes - that's why the place would look totally familiar. I thought that was cool! :)
Immediately after our Dish trip, we went to the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM). We opted for ROM as it's quite strategic although we really wanted to visit the Andy Warhol exhibit at that museum near Chinatown and check out Bata Museum (shoes museum) but B wanted to see a more diverse range of museum than those. So, ROM it was! :) It was a 4 storey place with each floor carrying a different lineages and historical artifacts. Most memorable are the differences in the baroque, neo classical arts, Lalique crystals and jewelries and the various European influences in religion exhibits. The main floor was dedicated to Chinese/Japanese/Korean cultures.
We probably spent max of 2 hours in the museum - and we're quite disappointed really. It's not as impressive as we hoped it would be - maybe, because they were doing a lot of renovations on it too. We strolled the nearby buildings - seeing the UofT buildings, the statue of Winston Churchill, etc.
Dinner was at Subway's. It was a very exhausting day!!!
To view Day3 pictures, go here:
http://community.webshots.com/album/555483620CECykW
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