Things to do in Toronto May 27-29, 2011

The end of May and beginning of June is a magical time when the birds sing and the people smile as we fast approach summer (at least I hope so because the wet spring does not want to leave) and the return of the annual Toronto Honda Indy weekend in July. But before the cars return to the streets of Exhibition place we need to get through a few weekends, and yes, one is just a stones throw away. Celebrate the May 27 to 29 weekend (I threw in Friday for a bonus) because you want to make the past Victoria Day holiday weekend jealous. Luckily Toronto always has fun and exciting things to see and do – especially on weekends.

One of my favourite things to watch is the Toronto Roller Derby (TORD) which will soon be done for the 2010/2011 season. Talk about beautiful things that go bump in the night! Saturday May 28, 2011 will be the last regular season game which will go down between the Death Track Dolls and Chicks Ahoy. A semi-final is scheduled for June 11 and the Championship bout (Battle for the Boot) will take place on Saturday June 25.

Doors Open Toronto returns with some of the old and some of the new on Saturday and Sunday (28-29) with some of the buildings not open on certain days so check the schedule before you head out for the day. I would like to see the CAMH historic walls (former Asylum for the Insane), the Citytv & OMNI Television – Rogers Studios, the Design Exchange, the Elgin & Winter Garden Theatre Centre and maybe the RC Harris Water Treatment Plant. Possibly to be followed by a bars open and get drinking event, Saturday may even be sunny and warm enough to enjoy a cold beer on a patio.

The Wings and Wheels Heritage Festival is May 28-29 at Downsview Park (see my pictures of the Festival here). Cars and planes – just perfect. And if you time your visit right you can go watch roller derby action on Saturday night. Then it would be cars, planes and stunning ladies in lace and on wheels – just perfector, or bestest, whichever you prefer.

There is the Clothing Show at Exhibiton Place May 27-29. The Take Off Your Clothes (clothing swap) event – damn, I had my clothes off before I found out it was a charity event and not a nudist event – my bad.

Speaking of clothes you should be getting your superhero, action or cosplay costumes ready for this weekend’s Anime North 2011 event (see my pictures of the convention here) at the Toronto Congress Centre, or if you need more time, the August FanExpo event.

Yonge-Dundas Square has a full weekend calendar starting Friday with Bollywood in the Square, Saturday with Desifest and finally on Sunday they have a Square Party.

Toronto Caribbean Carnival

The August long weekend will continue to have the Grand Parade of beautiful costumes and music of the islands as Caribana becomes the Scotiabank Toronto Caribbean Carnival. The three week festival starts in mid July and explores Caribbean music and food as well as being a great time to have fun and enjoy the sights.

The Festival Management Committee says "The Scotiabank Toronto Caribbean Carnival (STCC) will be back in July with the same line up of events featuring the Toronto Mas Band Association (TMBA), the Organization of Calypso Performing Artistes and the Pannists, as well as an array of new programming leading up to the Parade on July 31^st.

"This is the 44^th year for the Parade, and all of the participants are preparing for another major turnout of attendees this summer," said Denise HererraJackson, CEO of the FMC.  "Rebranding ourselves as the Scotiabank Toronto Caribbean Carnival allows us to move forward with an exciting program that will appeal to members of the community of all ages."

Here is the schedule of events for 2011.

Junior Carnival Official Media Launch - July 5 at Yorkgate Mall. 

Festival Official Launch - July 12 at Metro Toronto City Hall's Pecaut Square (Noon).  The kickoff featuring costumes and entertainment.

GTAA Launch - July 15 at Pearson Airport.

Citizenship Ceremony - July 27 at the North York Civic Centre.

Carnival Art - July 14 to July 31 - Costume displays and photography.

Junior Carnival - July 16 Marquee parade at Yorkgate Plaza.  

CTV/CP24 BBQ - July 21 a lunchtime BBQ at 299 Queen St West. 

Scotiabank Toronto Caribbean Carnival Gala- July 22 at the Liberty Grand in the CNE Grounds. 

Calypso Monarch - July 23 competition for the crown at the 5183 Sheppard Ave East. 

King and Queen Competition and Show - July 28 at Allan Lamport Stadium.  Masqueraders compete in amazing and incredibly large costumes.

Pan Alive - July 29 at Allan Lamport Stadium. Steel pan performers perform original music.

Scotiabank Toronto Caribbean Carnival Grand Parade - July 30 starting at Exhibition Place from 10am to 6pm.  The parade is 3.5km along Lakeshore Boulevard and is free outside review areas.

Grace Tropical Rhythm Food Festival - Islands Come to the Islands at Ontario Place - July 31 and August 1. All Day Events. 

Peeling Chivas

Paint peels from the Chivas Regal scotch whiskey advertisement as it finely ages on the wall of a building overlooking a parking lot. It still made me thirsty.

When I went to the States I liked how you could get liquor and beer just about everywhere (and it was inexpensive) while here in Ontario you have to go to the Beer Store or the Liquor Control Board of Ontario ( the government must control everything) LCBO. I mean, what kind of crappy name is the LCBO? I always think of it as Lick Bo, where it should be the 'Booze Store'.

The provincial Liberals have announced that they are looking at relaxing some of the rules at festivals that they use to control the imbibing public. They will consider releasing drinkers from a fenced in beer tent area - FREEDOM.

See Stanley with Lanny

Scotiabank is having a promotion where the winner and three friends are sent to watch the Stanley Cup Final with Lanny McDonald (check it out at facebook.com/Scotiahockeyclub). Lanny is, of course, the ex Maple Leaf professional ice hockey player (1973 to 1980) with the memorable and highly bushy mustache. The promotion saw small strips of cardboard handed out in Toronto with the contest entry information and a reasonable facsimile of the hockey hall of famer and Stanley Cup winner’s (with Calgary Flames) glorious red, walrus mustache. So the picture at top is me in all my Lannystache glory.


Update: Scotiabank's peeps contacted me with info on the contest winners. Barry Burkholder from Hornby won and took his family to Boston where they got to meet Lannystache himself and watch game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final. I had to photoshop the picture that was provided (see below) because the Burkholder family was originally hidden behind Lanny's bushy mustache. Scotiabank was extremely nice by letting the family of five (Barry, Kelly, Bradley, Dylan and Chelsea) win the prize instead of the original prize for four. When I heard the news I cried and cried, but I was fortunate because the tears were absorbed by my Lannystache.

The winners got a fabulous adventure which included flight, accommodations and tickets to the hockey game and Scotiabank says "This is exactly the kind of opportunity Scotiabank wants Canadians to have", said Duncan Hannay, Senior Vice President, Head of Marketing, Scotiabank. "As the Official Bank of the NHR and Canada's Hockey Bank, Scotiabank is delighted to be able to provide the Burkholders with this incredible hockey experience. Regardless of the outcome on the ice, we know they will have an unforgettable evening with Lanny."

Circus, Circus

The HarbourKIDS International Circus Festival continued down at the waterfront presented by Harbourfront Centre and Zero Gravity Circus. Yesterday I saw Circa, today I caught Vague de Cirque as they performed on the Westjet Stage. They put on a great show.

See more photos after the jump.

Pirates of Queens Quay

Arrggh matey and shiver me timbers - there were pirates down at Queens Quay Terminal, bloodthirsty, dubloon stealing, sword wielding pirates. I was scared that they would start walking kids off the plank but they seemed to be friendlier than regular pirates maybe it was because of the Victoria Day holiday.

The only one that had to be scared was a large chicken because the lil' pirates seemed to be running out of chicken tenders. This pirate celebration was definitely for the kids!

pirates roaming the streets of Toronto

Punch Buggy

Saturday, May 22, 2011 saw a gathering of VW bugs for the Toronto Volkswagon Beetle Invasion to raise money in support of Sick Kids Hospital. The event is called the Punch Buggy 4 Sick Kids.

For an inexpensive mode of transportation that was manufactured in the thousands it is interesting to see that they really have become individual, traveling art exhibitions.

Posted by Joe Hamilton.

Rain suit doggie

A cute, little dog wears a cute little gold rain suit in PawsWay at Harbourfront and the photo was taken by a cute, little photographer.

Sextet

The rise and fall of the world's economies could be portrayed by Max Streicher's inflatable sculpture called 'Sextet' (1996) at York Quay Centre at Harbourfront. The sculpture is of six completely white human like figures that are each attached to a single air pump by individual tubes which resemble umbilical cords. They gain pressure and stiffen, then they slowly deflate in cycles that only last minutes. My wife thought it was creepy but I thought it was kind of cool.

Toronto International Circus Festival

Children were laughing with delight at all the clowns and entertainment at Harbourfront Centre during the HarbourKIDS: Circus featuring the Toronto International Circus Festival. You can check out Monday's show with Vague de Cirque here.

The site was jam packed with things to do and play including a large room full of Lego blocks and an area where you could dress up as a clown and get your picture taken.

My favourite was the gang from the Australian group Circa which featured 46 circus acts in only 45 minutes. Red nose was an act called 'extreme clown'.

Seeking shelter from the afternoon rain

The clown host

Clowns and stilt walkers wandered the site

See more of Circa after the jump.

FunExpo: Star Wars in Welland

The 501st Canadian Garrison, Rebel Legion, Force United Niagara and the London Rogues Star Wars characters were the highlight of the FunExpo held May 21, 2011 at the Arena in Welland, Ontario. The show helped raise funds for the charity 'Help A Child Smile' while selling plenty of toys and much, much more (and it was free admission).

See lots more photos after the jump.

Back to the Future - DeLorean Time Machine

When Marty McFly cranked up the sleek, burnished stainless steel fusion-powered DeLorean DMC-12 sports car he traveled back in time and got his parents fall in love. That car became a large part of the movie series 'Back to the Future' made with star Michael J Fox as Marty and Christopher Lloyd as the mad scientist and time machine creator Dr Emmett Brown.

To make the trip back in time Marty had to get the car up to 88 MPH, or 141.6 KPH in Canada. Today we followed a time travelling DeLorean (with licence plate OUTATME) as he got on the highway and we waited for him to hit the magic number but we ended up disappointed - even though this model was equipped with the Mr Fusion Home Energy Reactor which replaced the earlier plutonium powered model.

It was really cool to see the famous car driving down the road.

Welland Canal

Boats go up and down. I guess that's why they made the locks on the Welland Canal, also know as the H2O Highway. We were down in the Niagara area watching the large Canadian Steamship Line (CSL) Great Lakes Freighter squeeze tightly into the concrete lock number four.

GIF animations generator gifup.com

See more photos of the Welland Canal and a freighter after the jump.

Trash

Toronto ships it's trash elsewhere and the big city is currently looking at contracting out garbage collection. A lot of our trash is in the streets, taped to poles in every growing diameters. We could save money by just putting up a simple frame for just about everything, later the poster people would glue and tape on the structure, from phone booths to buildings, nothing is to big for the poster people.

It's so hot - I miss winter!

Oh man, so untrue. Welcome summer (at least for one day) because the rain continues, starting tomorrow. Here is an ornamental stair case at Queens Park topped with some of the that white stuff - snow. Enjoy the weather and feel bad for Australia who are going into winter now - suckers.

Skating at Nathan Phillips Square