World City Guide

Key Attractions

CN Tower
At a height of 553m (1815ft), the CN Tower is the world’s tallest building and the defining symbol of this lakefront city. On a clear day, it offers stunning views of up to 120km (75 miles) across the surrounding cityscape and Lake Ontario. A glass-fronted elevator ride leads to the main section – at an equivalent to 114 storeys high – where a terrifying glass floor enables visitors to stare 342m (1122ft) straight down. A more leisurely view can be had from the revolving 360 Restaurant on the floor above. Another set of elevators leads to the SkyPod, 33 storeys further up. There is also a group of entertainment venues at the base of the tower, including two motion-simulator rides.

301 Front Street West
Tel: (416) 868 6937. Fax: (416) 601 4722.
Website: www.cntower.ca
Transport: Subway Union.
Opening hours: Sun–Thurs 1000–2200; Fri–Sat 1000–2300.
Admission: C$16.99; C$23.99 (including SkyPod); concessions available.

Casa Loma
Toronto seems an unlikely location for a castle but, since 1911, the soaring battlements of Casa Loma have lent an element of magic to the city. The 98-room castle was completed in 1914 by Sir Henry Pellatt, a charismatic financier, industrialist and philanthropist, to be his home. Financial ruin forced its sale years later and the castle eventually became the popular tourist attraction it is today. The castle is a bizarre hybrid of a medieval-style stonework exterior – replete with turrets and battlements – and an early 20th-century interior. Highlights include the splendidly carved Oak Room, secret passageways and pseudo-Gothic Great Hall, which has 18m-high (60ft) ceilings. The two-hectare (five-acre) gardens are open between May and October.

1 Austin Terrace
Tel: (416) 923 1171. Fax: (416) 923 5734.
E-mail: info@casaloma.org
Website: www.casaloma.org
Transport: Subway Dupont.
Opening hours: Daily 0930–1700 (last admission 1600).
Admission: C$10 (includes self-guided audio tour); concessions available.

Art Gallery of Ontario
Canada’s premier art gallery, the AGO, contains 50 galleries displaying temporary exhibitions and a large permanent collection of international art. The ground floor houses a European collection covering the Italian Renaissance, Flemish Masters, 17th-century French painting and the Impressionists, right through to 20th-century works by Chagall and Picasso and beyond. The gallery’s greatest attraction, however, is the Canadian section on the first floor, featuring a cross-section of work from the Group of Seven, a group of early 20th-century painters whose work embodies the sublime beauty of Canada’s boreal wilderness. The gallery is also home to the world’s largest collection of Inuit art, as well as of works by Henry Moore, in the Henry Moore Sculpture Gallery. It is worth allowing extra time to visit The Grange, a restored 19th-century house, situated adjacent to the gallery.

317 Dundas Street West
Tel: (416) 979 6648. Fax: (416) 204 2711.
E-mail: information@ago.net
Website: www.ago.net
Transport: Subway St Patrick.
Opening hours: Tues, Thurs and Fri 1100–1800, Wed 1100–2030, Sat and Sun 1000–1730.
Admission: C$12 (special exhibitions might cost extra); free Wed evenings; concessions available.

Bata Shoe Museum
The Bata Shoe Museum is the only museum of its kind in the world. Housed in an equally unique building shaped, appropriately enough, like a shoebox, the museum owns some 10,000 items of footwear, dating as far back as 4500 years. Pieces range from Elvis Presley’s loafers and Queen Victoria’s ballroom slippers to 19th-century beaded Native American shoes and leather broad-toed Tudor shoes.

327 Bloor Street West
Tel: (416) 979 7799. Fax: (416) 979 0078.
Website: www.batashoemuseum.ca
Transport: Subway St George.
Opening hours: Tues, Wed, Fri and Sat 1000–1700, Thurs 1000–2000, Sun 1200–1700.
Admission: C$6; concessions available; free first Tues of month (winter only).

Royal Ontario Museum
The entrance hall alone is reason enough for one to visit the ROM – two massive Native Canadian totem poles from British Columbia flank the stairs, underneath a beautiful golden mosaic ceiling. Deeper within, the museum offers a seeming mishmash of different collections. The exhibits representing East Asia include a renowned collection of Chinese art, with wall paintings, snuff bottles and ceramic head cushions, as well as the only complete example of a Ming tomb in the west. Other levels handle the life sciences, the ancient Mediterranean and a Canadian heritage collection. Some galleries might be unavailable during the ongoing C$200-million expansion (designed by Daniel Libeskind).

100 Queen’s Park (Bloor Street West at Avenue Road)
Tel: (416) 586 5549 or 8000 (recorded info). Fax: (416) 586 5863.
E-mail: info@rom.on.ca
Website: www.rom.on.ca
Transport: Subway Museum.
Opening hours: Mon–Thurs and Sat 1000–1800, Fri 1000–2130, Sun 1100–1800.
Admission: C$10–16.50 (depending on whether or not there is a special exhibition); free Fri 1630–2130; concessions available.

Ontario Science Centre
The Ontario Science Centre was opened in 1969, with a mission to ‘open minds to science by creating environments that excite curiosity, inspire insights and motivate learning in science and technology’. This difficult task is successfully accomplished with over 800 fascinating exhibits. Themes explored in depth include the ‘Human Body’ and the ‘Information Highway’. Interactive exhibits include piloting a spacecraft or touching a Van der Graaf generator to make one’s hair stand up on end. An Omnimax Cinema offers a 24m (79ft) domed screen.

770 Don Mills Road
Tel: (416) 696 1000 or 3127 (recorded info). Fax: (416) 696 3166.
E-mail: webmaster@osc.on.ca
Website: www.ontariosciencecentre.ca
Transport: Subway Eglinton, then bus 34; subway Pape, then bus 25.
Opening hours: Daily 1000–1700.
Admission: C$13 (exhibitions); C$10 (Omnimax Cinema); C$18 (both); concessions available; on-site parking costs C$7.

Toronto Zoo
Situated on a sprawling 287-hectare (710-acre) forested piece of land next to the Rouge Valley, in the suburb of Scarborough, the Toronto Zoo is the fourth largest zoo in the world. The collection of over 5000 animals is truly international, since the zoo features pavilions named Africa, the Americas, IndoMalaya, Australasia and the Malayan Woods. Underwater exhibits showcase polar bears, South African fur seals, beavers in their dens and otters swimming at eye level.

Meadowvale Road, two kilometres (one mile) north of Highway 401
Tel: (416) 392 5900. Fax: (416) 392 5863.
E-mail: torontozoo@zoo.metrotor.on.ca
Website: www.torontozoo.com
Transport: Subway Kennedy, then bus 86A; subway Sheppard-Yonge, then bus 85B or 85D; bus routes vary at the weekend.
Opening hours: Daily 0900–1930 (mid May–early Sep); daily 0930–1630 (early Oct–early Mar); daily 0900–1800 (early Mar–mid May and early Sep–early Oct); last admission one hour before closing.
Admission: C$18; concessions available; on-site parking costs C$8; extra charges apply for some activities.

Fort York
Fort York harks back to the days when Toronto, then as British as afternoon tea, was named York. As a colony, the city occasionally had to deal with revolutionaries to the south, so Fort York was founded in 1793 to ensure British control of Lake Ontario. Most of the buildings, however, date from 1814 because, during the War of 1812, the evacuating British blew up the gunpowder magazine – an explosion so unexpectedly large that it killed ten of their own men, 250 advancing Americans and destroyed a good deal of the fort. Highlights of Fort York include blockhouses, barracks, officers’ quarters, costumed staff and period demonstrations.

100 Garrison Road, off Fleet Street
Tel: (416) 392 6907. Fax: (416) 392 6917.
E-mail: fortyork@toronto.ca
Website: www.toronto.ca/culture/fort_york.htm
Transport: Subway Bathurst, then tram 511.
Opening hours: Daily 1000–1700 (late May–early Sep); Mon–Fri 1000–1600, Sat and Sun 1000–1700 (early Sep–late May).
Admission: C$5 (concessions available).