What's up y'all?
Thanks for joining the Travel Tales and Talk podcast with Derek and Makayla.
I'm Derek.
I'm Makayla.
Thanks for listening and enjoy the show.
What's up y'all?
We are back.
We're going to talk about our trip to Toronto, our Toronto tidbits.
And we always start off like this.
Honey, why are we in Toronto?
Because our youngest daughter saw the movie Turning Red and saw that it was based in Toronto's
Chinatown and she wanted to go.
I got to watch that movie.
I've never seen Turning Red.
I'm a poor parent.
Oh my gosh.
Well, Turning Red is about a 13 year old Mae Lee who lives with her parents and hides the
fact that she likes the boy band Four Town.
What's the name of it?
Four Town.
That's the name of that band.
That's right.
I did a Google search on this one.
I'm so silly.
All right.
So she had a nightmare involving red pandas.
So Mae transforms into a red panda.
Every time she's happy.
So whenever she's happy, she transforms into this giant red panda.
Isn't it any state of high emotion?
Yeah.
That's usually when you're happy, right?
You can be angry sometimes, scared, a lot of emotions.
Like me, when you turn the lights off in this complete darkness.
You turn into a red panda.
And then on top of that, you guys have been there before.
I haven't been to Toronto.
So London Rose shot a commercial there, right?
I didn't get a chance to go.
So I wanted to go.
Yeah.
So London Rose and I went to Canada.
That's what he was referring to.
Yeah.
I was so disappointed I couldn't go.
I was looking forward to that trip and then work got in the way.
Yeah.
And the funny thing about this trip, it's not that far from our front door here in Kentucky.
No.
It's an easy road trip for us.
Think about all the driving we do and think about all the driving that I do.
I mean, from Lexington to Memphis, that's six hours.
To Atlanta, that's five.
Chicago, I think for us, it's like five and a half hours.
So it's another four hours to us, nothing.
So we just jumped in the car and we drove up through the night.
I think I drove all the way this time.
Usually we kind of break it up.
So from our front door to Toronto, what was it, like eight hours?
Yeah, because we made a stop.
Yeah.
So it's like eight, almost nine either way.
Yeah.
It actually takes us faster to drive to Toronto than to drive to New York City.
Yes.
It's almost the same distance of us driving to DC.
Yeah.
So New York is what, 12 hours from our house?
About 11.
Yeah, we made that trip too, that crazy trip.
More than once actually.
One time we made it, you guys made it from Georgia.
Yeah, from Atlanta.
We drove from Atlanta.
It was 11 hours from there as well.
Yeah.
And then DC is eight, nine hours, just like going to Toronto.
And oh, we did a trip to Orlando.
That's 12 hours.
Oh my goodness.
We are nuts.
I still can't believe we did that.
And I think we drove straight through.
We made a stop in Atlanta to pick up some friends.
Some friends, yeah.
And then we finished the rest of the trip the next day.
But yeah, it's a 12 hour drive from our house to Orlando.
So nine hours to Toronto, easy work, easy work.
Yep.
However, we made a pit stop.
We made a pit stop to Niagara Falls.
I wanted to go.
I think you guys had already been once.
Yeah, we've been once.
Yeah, so this was my first time doing all of this.
So I was a spectator.
You guys were like, oh, we've done this before.
But I enjoyed myself in Niagara Falls, the Canadian side.
Yes, yes.
I know you've probably heard about the US side versus the Canadian side.
And by far, the views from the Canadian side is spectacular.
We did both.
We were not impressed with the US side.
And the reason why is because of the curve of the falls.
Location.
Yeah.
The US side is kind of blocked.
The way that the water curves.
The Canadian side has the horseshoe.
Yeah, so the Canadian side has an unobstructed view of the Horseshoe Falls.
Which makes it so beautiful.
Beautiful, powerful.
Yeah, so when we went to Niagara Falls, there are many ways to see the falls.
Give them the game play.
There is a tower you can pay to go all the way up.
It shoots up over the falls.
So you're looking down on the falls.
There are helicopter rides you can charter to fly you over the falls.
There are boats in the falls.
I know that was the maid of the sea.
Maid of the mist.
So what's interesting, which is interesting, if you do not have a US passport, you can
still enjoy the falls.
But you have, like the boat rides are either red or blue.
They're red for the Canadian side, they're blue for the US side.
So they are very particular about making sure you don't cross over the line into Canada.
They are very particular.
And so you could also venture under the falls.
And that was the route that we did.
I decided to surprise my husband.
No, we did too.
We did too?
We did underneath the falls and we also did the observation deck.
Well, that was included.
That was included out of those two separate tools.
No, no.
So I look subscribed.
I surprised Derek with tickets to venture underneath the falls.
I think it's called Behind the Falls.
That was the official name of it.
Journey behind the falls.
Yeah, Journey Behind the Falls.
But it literally takes you underneath it.
So it wasn't very expensive.
And no.
Was it like 22 bucks?
At the time it was 22 bucks.
And so with your ticket, with your entry fee, you are given raincoats.
You're going to need them.
You will get wet.
Wear boots.
Wear rain boots.
We all wore rain boots, but depending on your time of year, you might just want to wear
flip flops.
Yeah, that's true.
Summertime.
You will get wet.
I cannot stress enough.
You will get wet.
So when I say you're walking underneath the falls, it's not like you see on TV.
People are climbing on rocks.
It's not that.
There are actual tunnels built underneath the grounds where the falls go over.
And you just walk through the tunnels, and they have exit points where you can see the
water coming down.
And then also in your ticket is included a view from the observation deck.
So this observation deck is one, it comes out of one of those tunnels, but there's a
platform, an observation deck, that is literally right next to the falls.
That's why you need your raincoat.
You will get wet.
Yes.
And so the falls are falling in front of your face, but you're viewing it from the side.
And this is only in the Canadian side.
They don't have it in the USA.
And that's where you will feel the power of that water.
You would smell it.
You would touch it.
You can stick your hand out a little bit and feel the mist.
Yes.
But yeah, you're very close on the observation deck.
Yes, very much so.
And those tunnels were built to transport employees.
I didn't know this.
But Niagara Falls is like a power station.
It's a hydro plant.
I did not know that.
Also Niagara Falls, people, it is an actual city.
People think, oh, Niagara Falls, oh, it's just the waterfall.
No, Niagara Falls is a city.
It's an actual city.
But that just so happens to have the falls there.
They use that to their advantage to bring people in.
Because at one point in time, it was the honeymoon capital
of the world.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
So everyone would say, I'm going to Niagara Falls for my honeymoon.
And then it began to decline.
So they had to figure out another way to drive tourism.
They build up the riverfront, I guess.
They got the casinos.
They got four or five casinos.
And then London Rose and I did the roller coaster on top of the buildings.
So it's sort of kind of like, is it Gatlinburg?
Like with the tourist attractions?
So like Branson, et cetera?
For me, it felt like Hollywood Boulevard.
It really did.
They had wax museums.
They had all sorts of stores, attractions.
They had the elevated racetrack.
Right, racetrack.
They had a zombie attack game, like interactive game you could do.
And then they had a roller coaster built on top of a building.
It was like a funhouse underneath.
And then you go all the way up and then you have this roller coaster system up there.
And it was kind of awkward being on top of a building.
Then the coaster goes on the edge of the building.
I felt kind of nervous because it wasn't very strong.
It wobbled when it went around that curve.
I was like, is this thing going to tip over?
It was very rickety.
It was different.
But the arcade system, not arcade system.
The zombie attack.
We missed out on that one.
It's the largest XD ride in North America.
So XD ride is you're sort of like a digital roller coaster.
You're sitting with like 36 other people.
In this one, you have these lasers where you're shooting zombies.
And we missed out because we love zombies.
We love The Walking Dead.
So that would have been a great opportunity to pretend like we're part of Rick's clan.
Yes.
And back to the falls.
Another thing I forgot to mention.
It's nice to see the falls during the day, but you can also see it at night because they
turn the lights on.
So the falls are different colors.
It's very beautiful.
So really we missed out on an opportunity to explore Niagara Falls, the city, before
we went on to Toronto.
But we did.
We did.
We did go into the city to find the smallest church in the world.
Oh, I forgot about that.
We found the smallest church in the world.
It was about the size of a large doghouse.
Or like a shed.
Like a little shed for your riding lawnmower.
I mean, there was a pool.
There's pews in there.
There was a podium for the preacher.
And it was, you know, when we pulled up, I thought, oh, no one cares about this.
It's just going to be us.
No, there was people lining up to take pictures of this place.
I forgot about that.
I thought it was like, this can't be real.
They had pews.
It's a real church.
Yeah.
It was literally the size of a doghouse for a Great Dane.
Yeah.
Real talk.
A little larger than that.
Just a tad bit.
Not that much.
It was interesting.
It was.
It's a must see.
And people have church there.
Yeah.
I wonder how many weddings they had in there.
Hey.
That'd be a good idea.
You can invite six people.
It said six people.
You had the world's smallest wedding in the world's smallest church.
That's cool.
But from Niagara, we head off to, we finally head off to Toronto.
And on the way into Toronto, I totally forgot that Toronto was on Lake Ontario.
And when you come in, you take the highway, you're going around Lake Ontario.
Didn't realize how large that lake is.
Yes.
It took forever to get around that lake.
It did.
I don't know if you pay attention to that.
I did.
I wanted to call it out.
I noticed it from the GPS.
You know how your GPS be showing you pictures.
Yeah.
I was like, whoa, that's a lot of blue.
Yeah.
A lot of blue on this screen.
I was like, are we by the ocean?
Then I had to Google while we were driving.
I'm like, oh, we're on Lake Ontario, which means that's why the province is Ontario.
Yeah.
Duh, Derek.
Now I get it.
Oh, goodness.
But then here's another call out we talked about in Europe.
You get gas in liters in Canada, too.
It's not gallons.
So that's something.
I was like, wow, they do liters here, too?
Because I think we're the only country that does gallons.
Yeah.
Everyone else is on the metric system.
We march to the beat of our own drum.
We do our own thing.
And then signs again, street signs.
So they have signs in English and French because they speak French in Canada as well.
So I don't know how you feel about this, but I was like, Canada, pick a language, Canada.
Come on.
What you going to do, English or French?
Oh, wow.
Pick a language.
Spoken like a true American, really.
Pick a language, man.
English or French.
Wow.
Which one are we doing?
I had to like, OK, English, French.
I don't need to see all of them on my street signs.
Pick one.
Oh, my gosh.
I'm just saying.
And as we toured the city, I don't know if you felt this way, but it reminded me of Chicago.
The architecture reminded me of Chicago.
Just the vibe of the city.
OK.
No, no?
No thoughts?
Um.
It didn't remind you of anything?
Some places, yes, I can see that.
Because for some reason for me, Chicago makes me think of New York City.
It just makes me think of it.
Like with the buildings and things, some of the buildings.
Yeah.
Chicago just reminds me of something different.
New York City is an animal of itself.
Yeah.
So for me, Toronto kind of reminded me of Chicago.
Being on the lake, just like Chicago's on Lake Michigan, now Ontario, it kind of had
the same feel to me.
I don't know.
I just really liked it there.
Yeah.
Toronto's cool.
Toronto was very cool.
And then so what's the plan, baby?
You have all these plans every time we go somewhere.
The first stop was their version of Times Square.
How did you find that?
Pinterest.
Pinterest?
Instagram.
Because it did pop up on things.
It was a Yondondes?
Yeah, it did pop up on things to do in Toronto, but I'm like, why would you want to go there?
I just wanted to see it.
I was researching Toronto and I went on Pinterest looking for things to do in Toronto, things
to see.
And this one person had put up an article and she had taken these pictures there.
And I was like, I want to do that.
Because like I said, I love to take pictures where we are and put it on our travel gallery
wall in our home.
And I was just like, man, that would make a really great memory.
And so that's how we ended up there.
Gotcha.
And we took these amazing pictures.
Took a lot of pictures.
And also I didn't know they had this, but Samsung has a store like Apple has a store.
You know I'm an Android guy.
So I finally went to my first Samsung store.
It was right there at the corner of Yondondes in that Times Square type place.
He keeps saying Times Square.
I'm telling you the reason why it really does feel like you're in Times Square, New York.
It's big billboards.
Lights and all these shops.
You got all these major Fortune 500 companies got their billboards up, some of their stores
down there.
Yes.
It is the busiest intersection in Canada with a hundred thousand people crossing daily.
Yes.
While we were there, I was like, where are all these people coming from?
Should they be at work?
You always want people to be at work.
They should be.
We were there on a Tuesday or something.
Why weren't you at work?
Because I was off.
I was on PTO.
Oh my goodness.
But yeah, yeah.
I had fun though.
And also doing some further research, they have like, we got there, they were having
a parade.
Yes, they were.
It was an Irish parade.
Those guys were playing their bagpipes in their kelps.
I was like, what's going on here?
But they have those all the time.
They just might pop up on a Monday, Saturday.
It doesn't matter.
They just have something there all the time.
So I thought that was pretty neat.
So then from there, I think we go to, in my opinion, the coolest spot during this trip,
Graffiti Alley.
It was Queen Street West.
Queen Street West.
That place was fire.
It was dope, as the kids say.
It's not gang graffiti.
It's like real graffiti artists.
Yes, the artists.
Man, it is fire.
So graffiti in Toronto is illegal.
So the only place you can do your graffiti is in Graffiti Alley.
And it's blocks, I think it's three blocks.
And there was a mural of Biggie Smalls.
I saw one of SpongeBob, Jabberjaw, and my favorite was this crab DJ.
So there was a DJ.
There was a crab being a DJ at a party.
That was fire.
For me, it was the decorative telephone.
So imagine a phone booth, like an old school phone booth.
The actual booth part is removed, and you just have the phone dialed.
But it's decorated.
The phone might be bedazzled or spray painted gold.
It was really cool.
It was cool.
The Graffiti Alley is a must do.
If you go to Toronto, you gotta do Graffiti Alley.
I do want to have y'all keep in mind, it is filthy now.
You out in the elements.
It's an alley.
You on the street.
It's an alley.
So you might see a little trash over here, a crushed bottle can over there, some broken
glass.
But it's safe.
But just ignore the ground, look at the walls.
It's safe.
It's safe and fun.
Take your camera because you're gonna see some fantastic graffiti work.
I know you don't like graffiti on the wall because you talk about in Madrid.
That was fine.
That was awesome.
I like organized graffiti.
I don't like folks spray painting 3,000 year old buildings, just scribble scrabble.
I like organized graffiti.
That's exactly what it was.
So from there we venture off to the Kingston Market.
Is that correct?
Mm-hmm.
Okay.
So-
Kensington Market, sorry.
Kensington Market.
I'm sorry.
It's an open air market where you'll find bars, restaurants, coffee shops.
You'll find fresh produce, meat, cheese, bread, flowers, whatever you want.
Vintage clothing and art, music.
You'll find everything.
So while we were there, I think it was one of those, it was a Saturday, one of those
Saturdays where they block the streets off and you can walk.
So you can walk and shop, eat.
We had a meal at a, was it a Spanish or Mexican restaurant?
It was one of those, yeah.
We ate in the street.
They pulled out tables in the middle of the street and we ate.
Yep.
This is a cool little market.
It has just about everything that you could want.
And a lot of these people are independently small businesses.
There are some big box places there, but most of these guys are just small businesses.
So check this market out if you're in Toronto.
It is cool.
It is a must do as well.
And it was also on one of those top 10 lists to do in Toronto.
Yep.
So you had any thoughts about Kingston Market?
No, you've named them all.
Vintage clothing, art, music, bikes, skate shops.
I didn't mention the skate shops.
Yeah, they did have a lot of those.
I'm sorry.
I forgot about that because there's so much there.
Yeah, skate shops.
And it was food from all over the world, literally.
Yeah.
Desserts from all over the world.
Yes.
Anything on planet earth you probably could have found there as far as food related.
But it was kind of overwhelming.
We didn't know what to do, what to eat.
We just picked one because you had options, all kinds of options.
Yeah.
I feel a little bad because this whole trip was supposed to be for our daughter to be
able to go to Chinatown.
And at this point we hadn't even made it to Chinatown yet.
But that's our next stop.
So from there we are going to Chinatown.
Well, after we saw the needle.
Oh, we did go to CN Tower.
I forgot about that.
We had to go to the CN.
We did all this stuff, had our child take the bus.
Baby, we also forgot we did a harbor tour.
We took this boat ride.
We sure did.
That's the way you get, we put her on the back burner.
I'm sorry, London Rose.
And London Rose, she was a trooper.
She was just alone for the ride.
She didn't complain much.
Yeah.
So from CN Tower, what is the CN Tower?
I forgot what it was.
I know it's a tower, but what did they do in there?
You recall?
Oh, you put me on a spot, baby.
I don't remember when we looked it up.
Yeah, look it up.
But the CN Tower, you can see that pretty much from anywhere in Toronto.
Yes.
It could be the tallest structure in Canada.
I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't, or if it was the tallest structure in Canada.
What could be one point, the tallest structure in the world?
North America or something like that?
It had to be, because it was still one of the tallest structures in Toronto.
So it's up there.
So we took the train.
I wanted to walk on the CN.
They have walks on the CN Tower.
Yeah, but we took the train down to downtown.
No, I mean on it.
You can stand off of it.
Gotcha, gotcha.
You know, because I love to do things like, they're like, no, you always trying to get
us killed.
No, no, I saw that.
I saw that on the website to where you can lean over the side.
I'm not doing that.
I go up and I watch from my observation.
Why would I want to lean from the side?
You're a chicken.
You're right, but I don't want to do that.
But it seemed fun in the pictures I saw.
I would have, you know, London Rose was too young at the time.
She would have done it.
She only do it if I don't tell her ahead of time.
If she has any chance to back out of it, she would back out of it.
I have no doubt she would have done that because of the view.
Yeah, because she likes to fly planes.
So yeah, she would have.
She would have done that without no hesitation.
None.
Yes, so go ahead.
I thought I had your answer.
It just says the CN Tower is a concrete communications and observation tower in Toronto, Ontario,
Canada.
Completed in 1976, it is located in downtown Toronto.
Built on the former railway lands.
Its name CN referred to Canadian National, the railway company that built the tower.
Following the railway's decision to divest non-corporate railway assets prior to the
company's privatization in 1995.
Okay, for some reason, I thought TV broadcasting was done out of there or something.
It was the world's tallest tower until 2009 when it was surpassed by the Canton Tower.
Yeah.
I figured it was up there because that thing was towering.
It is currently the 10th tallest freestanding structure in the world and remains the tallest
freestanding structure on land in the Western Hemisphere.
Wow, okay.
There you go.
Okay, yeah.
So we went to the CN Tower.
We were in Toronto to go to Chinatown for our youngest and we did everything but that
almost.
Because that boat ride was amazing.
Oh yeah.
I will say this, we're going to get to our boat ride but man they had a pirate ship out
there.
Yeah.
So you know me, I'm like, oh forget these tickets we don't already pay for this regular
shmeggle old boat.
Let's get on the pirate ship.
Derek was like, guess what we not doing waste of money today.
We not.
We going to buy tickets and not use it to buy some more tickets?
You better jump on this other boat.
Man the pirate ship looked like something just straight out of some Jack Sparrow with
the, you know, with Steve.
Pirates of the Caribbean.
Man, it was amazing.
We'll do it next time.
I want to do that and I want to look over the CN Tower.
I want to do that.
We're going to do that too.
Got it.
So we do the CN Tower, then we do the Harbor boat ride.
Yes.
What would you get a spectacular view of downtown Toronto?
And then they tell you about, there are islands out there in the lake.
Yes.
And they, pirates used to come out there.
Man, I'm telling you, could you imagine hearing about the pirates out there while riding on
a pirate ship?
Derek, you dropped the ball on that one.
I missed an opportunity on that one.
You're right.
I was like pirates in Canada?
They don't even sound right.
But yeah, they have Lake Ontario pirates.
Sounds like a baseball team.
Man.
But anyway, we finally make our way to Chinatown.
Yep.
We got us a boat.
We got us some authentic Chinese food, of course.
And we took several Instagram photographs.
And this woman was going crazy when we didn't do our poses correctly.
How are you just so not coordinated?
You are just so uncoordinated.
And then you pass those uncoordinated jeans on down to my child.
You be so angry.
Stand like this.
Hold the camera like this.
Oh baby, take these pictures.
Let's go.
Let's tour this place.
No.
Memories.
Memories are made.
So.
This Chinatown is one of the largest in North America.
And I bet you didn't know this.
There are two Chinatowns in Toronto.
You didn't know that, did you?
You only knew because you did some research.
You were absolutely right.
You didn't know when we were there.
You're right, I didn't.
I was totally shocked.
I'm like, what?
There's two of them?
We missed another opportunity.
Oh.
So we were in Chinatown, of course, Chinatown West or downtown Chinatown, which I don't
know.
I thought it was the only one.
Then you have Chinatown East, which is on the other side of town, of course.
So as you would think this Chinatown, it looks like what we think China looks like.
You have the Chinese restaurants.
And the great part about most Chinatowns, especially this one, is it's a contained neighborhood.
So they have everything with the neighborhood.
They don't have to leave their neighborhood to do anything.
They can go to the hospital there.
They can bank there.
They can grocery shop there.
They can eat there.
They can work there.
They don't have to leave their neighborhood to do anything.
Kind of jealous.
All right, that aside, I love the architecture of Chinatown.
And we have several amazing pictures of these.
Are these dog dragons?
I don't know what they are.
They're little dragons.
What you talking about?
Do you recall what they're called, Rose?
I do not.
They look like dog dragons.
They're beautiful.
They're about the size of a dog, and they look like a dragon.
So we have great photographs of that, the entire family.
I think we have some with you and London Rose.
But we took a lot of awesome pictures in Chinatown.
We finally got London Rose to Chinatown after a long day of doing everything else.
Nothing?
She was just being London Rose.
And we finally get her there, and of course what did she do?
I'm tired.
I'm ready to go.
I'm like, we came all the way up here for you so you can have fun.
So you can enjoy Chinatown from turning red.
And she was ready to go 10 minutes after we got there.
She wanted to get a snack.
She was tired of walking.
But we ain't walk.
We took the trolley.
I mean, it's London Rose.
We went into a couple of shops where we can see some authentic Chinese attire.
She didn't want to try nothing new.
She didn't want to try nothing new, didn't want to try anything on.
She wanted to eat mac and cheese and chicken tenders.
If they didn't have either one of those, she didn't want to eat.
I'm like, we're in a Chinese restaurant.
They're not going to have mac and cheese.
And she didn't care.
Like, well, give me some chicken tenders.
You can get chicken tenders anywhere, baby.
We're in Chinatown.
Do something different.
And she's like, I don't.
I only think she ate.
We had to stop at McDonald's on the way to the hotel, didn't we?
Missed the opportunity on her part.
I don't know.
The more I think about it and the older she gets, I think the more and more I just kind
of want to let her leave her at home.
We can't leave her at home, baby.
She used to be, London Rose was so much fun to travel with when she was younger.
And now it's like, I want to play my video game.
We're trying to go sightseeing.
She tried to haul.
She went to GameStop.
We went to GameStop in Chinatown.
Like, what are we doing?
Yeah.
And she wanted to haul her iPad and Nintendo Switch.
And whenever you see our child in photos with her backpack on, trust.
She got an iPad in there or a Switch and some plushies.
Yep.
And then I think there was a, I don't know if it's called a dojo or something where they
practice their martial arts.
Yes.
We're like, let's look in there.
I don't want to go in there.
I'm like, London Rose.
She's a black belt, a first degree black belt.
Yeah.
And Taekwondo.
And you don't want to go in there and look at them do martial arts?
Martial arts?
Like, what are you doing?
Nope.
I was like, man, like I said, the older she gets.
She didn't want to do nothing.
We finally get to Chinatown and she didn't want to do anything.
So that's when we just took off.
We started doing our own thing.
We started going to shops, got us something to eat.
The meal was awesome.
It was authentic.
It was at that corner store, Chinese food.
So once we finished there, which is one of my regrets that we didn't stay inside Toronto.
We stayed out in the suburbs.
Hey, I told you where I want to stay.
What you want to stay?
It was this hotel that had the view of the CN Tower from their pool.
Oh, they're not part of my Hilton's honors.
Sorry.
And see, there you go.
I'm like, you could have just did one day.
Next time we'll do one day.
See, Derek, one thing that Derek has to get out of the habit of, I get it, save a book.
That's how we're able to go on these trips.
We save a lot.
Save, save, save, save, save.
We use these hotel points.
However, when we go to these places, I expect to experience things that I cannot experience
at home.
All I asked was just one day, one day at this hotel that had a rooftop pool with a view
of the CN Tower.
You don't swim.
And I do swim.
Excuse you.
Hello.
And all that I asked was just one night, one night, one night.
And I think it was, okay, it was probably about 250 a night or 300.
However, that is an experience.
I'm a cheap date.
I'm not going to go anywhere and ask you to ball out on a meal for me.
I'm okay with not spending a whole lot to eat.
I don't mind walking.
It's fun for me to get up my steps.
So I'm a cheap date.
We can cut calls and other things.
I didn't ask you to pay for no excursions while we were in there except that little
boat ride that should have been a power ship ride.
Sound like you bashing me.
I am.
You are.
Okay.
Let me change it.
In the future.
In the future, let's do this.
Let's do at least one night.
Okay.
In the future, this is what I'll do.
So I'll use my points inside the city and not in the suburbs.
I don't mind us... Okay.
Okay.
Let me give you a pat on the back.
You do a really good job choosing the hotels when you find them.
You do a great job.
I didn't mind staying outside of the city because the drive into Toronto was beautiful.
We saw a lot on our ride in.
It was very beautiful.
And I don't take that for granted.
But for me, we should have stayed in the city now.
Looking back on it, we should have stayed in the city.
I think that's one of my regrets that we didn't stay inside the city.
Yes, because where we stayed, we were far.
That's one thing about Derrick.
Derrick don't be taken into account distance sometimes.
So it was like a 45 minute drive to get to the hotel.
So which means if you put that 45 times too, what is that?
An hour and a half?
Two hours.
It's two hours.
Okay.
About two hours.
Basically, it's an hour and a half, y'all.
An hour there, an hour back.
It might say 45.
And it was traffic.
But you got considered traffic.
So we had traffic.
And I thought it was fun looking at my GPS and everything is transferred over.
It's not... What are we in?
Metric.
It's in Metric.
And they're in the Imperial.
No, we're in Imperial.
Imperial and they're in... Metric.
Metric.
So it was interesting to see, ooh, 75 feels like this.
And 75 is about their 120-ish.
120, something like that.
Just doing little convert... Little stuff like that was interesting.
But it would have been nice to be able to use that time towards sightseeing.
Because our Toronto trip was a quick trip.
It was about a weekend.
Just like three days?
Yeah.
Because it was over like Fourth of July weekend or something.
Yeah.
So yeah, I got that regret.
And then I didn't go to the Canadian Football League game.
I wanted to go.
I should have went.
Yeah.
And experience.
It's great to do that for an experience.
I didn't go because you and London Rose didn't want to go.
And I didn't want to go by myself.
Oh my goodness.
What?
I didn't want to go and be in a stadium with a bunch of strangers and y'all at the hotel.
Y'all could have been with me watching the game.
Could have been eating popcorns and hot dogs.
I would have been on a pirate ship.
And then my other regret was that we should have spent the night in Niagara Falls, at
least one night.
Yes.
To experience the actual city of Niagara Falls.
I just wanted to look over the falls and have it turn pink and blue and green.
Yeah.
You have any regrets?
That was it.
That was it?
Yeah.
I didn't get to do the pirate ship.
Okay.
I didn't get to walk on the CN tower.
And I didn't spend the night in Niagara and see the water turn all the different colors.
And I did want to do the helicopter ride over the falls.
Yeah.
I've never been in a helicopter before.
Me neither.
I would do that.
I know you and London Rose do crazy stuff like that all the time.
We flew planes before.
Yeah.
You guys flew on a plane from Lexington to Georgetown, whatever.
Yeah.
I've never done anything like that.
I wouldn't mind trying it once.
Yeah.
So, yeah.
Okay.
All right.
Well, that's Toronto.
And on the way back, we finally make it home from Toronto.
We make that nine hour drive back home.
We didn't make it back all the way.
Why not?
Because we didn't get as held up at passports at the checkpoint.
No, I didn't.
Oh, that's when we were trying to get the dude to stamp our passports.
Yeah.
And he was like, there's a building over there.
And he was like, get out.
You can get a stamp over there.
I'm not getting out.
No.
The building was like eight lanes.
No, we finna go.
We know we been here.
I don't need to stamp.
All right?
I shouldn't have to get out of my car to get a stamp.
You should have it right here in your pocket.
I know everyone liked the experience of going through customs by car.
We're used to doing customs in an airport.
The experience by car.
It was quick.
It is a lot.
But just the way that it looks, it's a lot like what you see on TV.
Normally, when we see customs, it's normally coming from Mexico to the United States.
And there's always somebody trying to jump the border.
But it looks like that.
You know what?
It looks like when you're going through a toll road.
That's what it looks like.
I was expecting for them to make us get out the car, search the car or something.
They didn't do any of that.
They just took our passports.
From Canada.
Yeah, from Canada.
They just took our passports and they take the little mirror and put it underneath your
car.
I didn't even notice that.
And that was it.
And it was like, bye.
So I can imagine.
So I imagine going through customs from Mexico here would be a different experience.
Totally different.
It has to be.
It has to be night and day.
Because it lasted like you said, going through a toll booth.
It was like a five minute process.
If that.
Because I only remember when we entered into Canada, I had slept.
I was surprised.
I drove the entire way and I slept the entire ride and when he had to wake me up because
the officer wanted to see my face to match it with the passport.
And that was it.
I'm like, wow, we're here already?
And that was it.
That was it.
And we just went through and that was maybe three, two, three minutes.
And it only took that long because he wanted to wake you up.
Otherwise, he would just took the passports and go on your way.
And right from the United States into Canada.
It was one dude working the whole booth.
It sure did.
It was just one.
And it was in the middle of the night, wasn't it?
No, we were there in the morning.
So it was probably like.
Right before sunrise.
Seven, something like that.
Because it was still dark.
Yeah.
And they had like six, seven lanes and he was the only person working.
And he just checked our passports and like.
Yeah.
Speaking of passports.
Oh Lord.
What about passports, man?
Man I cannot believe it.
We come back from Toronto, unpack the car.
And I go wash my car because it got filthy.
And a couple of days later, you needed the passports and I could not locate those passports.
Derrick pretty much cost our child a job.
What?
She was being looked at for a role actually in Canada.
Why are you blaming me?
And they needed her passport.
And we had to decline because Derrick.
I lost.
Lost our passports.
All three passports.
I don't know how I did it.
I think I threw them away when I was washing the car because we had a bunch of stuff in
the car.
I just probably pounded in this pile and tossed it.
Yep.
But you had to get new passports.
You and London Rose had to get new passports.
We did.
But that.
I'm still bitter about that one because it was.
You had stamps in there.
We had all our stamps.
And I think Derrick is slick jealous because I have more stamps than him.
No.
Way more pages stamped than him.
Not at all sweetheart.
He's still bitter about the fact that London Rose and I toured Europe without him.
Sort of kind of.
But I wouldn't throw away your passport because of that.
Yeah so the passports are gone.
We had to buy new passports.
And I was really proud of my passport picture.
Y'all when I tell y'all I used Prince passport picture as my template.
I said man I need a smoky eye.
I put on makeup.
I had my hair.
I was cute on my passport picture.
And London Rose too she had a little collared shirt, a little sweater.
Her hair is a little.
You guys look cute on your passport picture.
Adorable.
But your passports were damaged.
You're going to have to replace them anyway.
But I mean I needed to you know Scout had the little nibble on the corner.
Yeah.
But my apologies.
But it would have been helpful to have it at that exact moment that we didn't have to
tell her agent I'm sorry she can't.
We had to decline because she's missing her passport.
I feel very bad about that to this day.
That was an opportunity that I screwed up for my daughter.
But I'm sorry.
However those passports have been replaced.
I just couldn't replicate that smoky eye.
Again try as I might.
This new passport picture just ain't the same.
It ain't the same.
I'm sorry baby.
I'm so sorry.
But I was upset because your passport was older than my passport.
So I still have like six more years on my passport.
So I had to start all the way over.
I'm like oh my goodness.
But anyway we've replaced since then and we've replaced the passports and I won't lose them
anymore.
No because I'm going to keep my passports on me.
He was so anal about holding on to everybody's passport.
I'm like no Derek I have a system.
I like to keep my own passport.
And for some reason his control just.
I need the passports.
Give me them.
No the passports were in the car for some reason.
I don't think I took them in the house.
But you know what's going to happen.
One day we're going to be rearranging some furniture or something.
We're going to be painting the house or something and we're going to find them passports.
You threw them passports away.
I probably did.
But I'm banking on that one day we're going to be remodeling the house and we're going
to find those passports or something.
Okay.
Well that's it for Toronto.
Later.
If you made it this far you are the true champion.
You could have been anywhere doing anything but you instead chose to spend your time with
us and for that we say thank you.
I'm Derek.
I'm Makayla.
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Do good be good.
Until next time.