CITY SPOTLIGHT
Toronto:
Deliciously diverse
BY BOB ROUSE
To get additional details
about Toronto, contact
Tourism Toronto’s
Maxine Morrell-West at
[email protected]
or visit seetorontonow.com.
30
January 2018
PHOTOS: As part of Team NTA
attending Tourism Cares for
Toronto (with Mary Catherine
Dorsett [center] and Catherine
Prather), I explor ed the city at
street level with a graffiti tour
showcasing Toronto’s prolific
street artists, and I enjoyed a
bird’s eye view—and dinner—
atop the CN Tower.
NTA members are in bold type.
Last May, when Tourism Cares announced Toronto as
one of its “cares-for” cities, I elbowed out my NTA col-
leagues to claim a spot. It was scheduled for late October,
see, and that’s World Series time. I’m a big fan of the
Toronto Blue Jays, and I was certain they’d be playing in
the Series.
The fact that the Blue Jays finished well shy of the
playoffs nearly dampened my enthusiasm for my visit
(from, like, 100 percent to about 98). But after spending a
few days exploring the city, I didn’t give the World Series a
second thought.
I would venture to guess that a visit to Toronto is what
every traveler needs. There is so much variety, in so many
ways: attractions, activities, cultures, neighborhoods, sports,
food, people, hangouts … and on and on. I had visited the
city several years before, but it just feels different now.
“The city is constantly changing, which makes our job
easier. We can always tell new stories,” Vanessa Somarriba
told me during lunch at a downtown pizzeria (where even
the pizza seemed new and different—see page 32 for
evidence). Somarriba is the media relations manager for
Tourism Toronto, and she said that in a city of neighbor-
hoods, even the streets change. “As you walk down Queen
Street, for example, it can go from grainy to Saks.”
DORSETT
I FORGOT ALL ABOUT BASEBALL.