I took a walk yesterday, into the sprawl. An exercise in clearing my head. A chance to relish autumn’s fleeting colours, and feel the crunch of leaves under my shoes. A recent assessment of what I like to do when I travel left me realizing that I don’t take enough day hikes when I’m at home, and it’s something I’m trying to change. A few years ago in Montreal, I hung out a bit with the Montreal Psychogeographic Society and had a lot of fun.
The Don River is a slow moving river that marks the edge of Toronto’s original boundaries, and separates the inner city neighbourhoods from the inner suburbs. When I first came to visit apartments, we rode the subway, and it rattled across the tracks as we crossed high above the Don Valley, the subway briefly emerging from the subterranean tunnels. The 20th century brought heavy pollution to this waterway, as 31 separate sewage treatment facilities were built along the river. Over 20 places in the valley and adjacent ravines were used as landfills for garbage and industrial refuse.
Sounds like a lovely place, doesn’t it? Continue reading
I thought that relocating to a new city would have me posting a lot more. It’s sort of like travelling, only it’s not a foreign country, I speak the language, I’ve been here before, and I don’t have rose-coloured glasses. OK, so it’s not really like travelling, except that I was getting lost on my way to work for the first few days, and there are a lot of restaurants for me to slowly discover. Continue reading
