So this past week I was up in Toronto for work. This was my 5th or 6th visit up there in the past couple of years, all work related trips, but the first real chance I had to see some of the sites. I'm usually there in February when it's cold and snowy and my time is limited to more or less a repetition of the following sequence - hotel to cab to studio to cab to dinner to cab back to hotel - mainly because of the long days of shooting commercials and the fact that it's just too cold to be outside very long. This past week the pendulum swung the other direction as it was over 100° most of the week, so we still did a bit of the usual routine but this time to avoid the heat.
However, since it was sunny rather than snowy it meant blue skies rather than white, and sail boats out on Lake Ontario instead of ice. So on Sunday before our shoot got started I did manage to put in a few hours in the heat trekking around the city as a tourist. The highlight was the
CN Tower, which looks a little like Seattle's space needle but is much taller. In fact, according to the Guinness Book of World Records the CN Tower is the world's tallest building at 1,815 feet.
From the base of the tower you take a glass elevator up the side of the building to the
Look Out which is 1,136 feet up. On this level, which is the first series of large ringlets around the tower, are both outdoor and indoor observation decks, as well as some restaurants. From here you get some great
360° views of the city below, as well as out onto Lake Ontario.
Also on this first level is the
Glass Floor, which is a popular attraction. Once you get your nerve up to step out onto the glass, and navigate your way around the many people lying down on the glass for photo ops, it's pretty cool. The glass is only 2.5 inches thick but supposedly can hold the weight equivalent of 14 hippos. If they ever decide to test this theory I may opt to give the hippos a wide berth.
From the Look Out level you can then also take a second elevator up to the
Sky Pod which is the second smaller ringlet around the tower 1,465 feet up, or 147 stories. I snapped the first photo above (top of the post) from the portal windows that look out when you first exit the elevator, but you then also can go into a smaller observation deck that has 360° views. This is the world's highest man-made observatory, so as you would expect you get some of the best views from here. On a clear day you apparently can see as far as Niagara Falls. It was fairly clear the day I was up there but I couldn't see that far, though I'm willing to chalk that up to my deteriorating eye sight. Unfortunately my camera's battery decided this would be a good time to die, so I didn't get any pics from here other than the one from the portal window. But the views were great.
Labels: canada, toronto
