Sunday 20 August 2006

The Ex, Toronto, ON

Gord and I went to the Canadian National Exhibition (aka the Ex) today ... it not that far from us so we walked down and back. The Ex runs from August 18 to Labour Day and unofficially marks the end of summer here in Toronto. There's something for everyone ... games of chance, rides, casino, food, shopping, livestock, etc. It's situated on 195 acres. There was soo much to see ... though we walked around most of the area, we probably only checked out half of all there was to see.

It wasn't a great day ... it was a cloudy and a bit chilly. It was too windy for the Human Cannonball and the Flying Canucks.  Here are some of the midway and rides ...





Our Armed Forces has a large display. We signed the poster to show our appreciation of their efforts. 
Gord sat in in a fighter plane.

There were butter sculptures in the Automotive Building.


 
There was lots of livestock in the Automotive building (cows, chickens, turkey, sheep, lamb, pigs, etc.). Here are some two week old piglets.


We checked out the casino that is set up during the Ex. We both played Roulette. I was only willing to play with $20 today ... and I lost it. Gord wasn't any luckier.

Then we had a late lunch in the Food Building. Anything you have a craving for is there ... there must be about 100 vendors with everything including burger/fries, Chinese food, Italian food, Thai food, wings, Indian food, Carribean food, etc. We had chicken and fries. The amount of choice was mindblowing!

A fella was balancing rocks in the Direct Energy Centre. Very cool!



We watched a couple sets of a reallly good blues band.



Remember Graham Kerr, the Galloping Gourmet? He did a 45 minute cooking demonstration that was interesting. It was amazing how devoted his fans are.



And like on his show, he brought up members of the audience afterwards to taste what he had made ... steak fried in ketchup and red wine (??!!), microwaved baked potatoes which he then browned, steamed veggies and mango/peach in a cream sauce for dessert.

8 comments:

Dawn said...

cool :)

I'm heading to the EX on friday. Reading this post makes me want to go NOW-i cant wait until friday-lol

Isabel said...

THe butter sculptures looks interesting.

Looks fun though.:)

Anonymous said...

Sounds like our State Fair here in the U.S. Only we carve cheese into sculptures instead of butter. :-)

Teena in Toronto said...

Lisa: it's probably like your state fair. It's huge here in Toronto.

Dawn: have fun on Friday! I'll be out with friends and Gord will be fencing so can you stop in and check on our dog and cats?

Izzy: I've never seen butter sculptures before. It was wacky!

Dawn said...

absolutely! :)

so since you live so close to the EX, does that mean that you get the pleasure of seeing/hearing the snowbirds every year? I'd love that.

Teena in Toronto said...

Better safe: I don't do rides ... I'm a wimp. But there's so much to see and do there. Ya gotta go!

Dawn: The snowbirds fly right over our place and are really really loud. It's really cool, though, cuz we can stand in our parking lot and watch them. And we can hear the Indy when it's going on too. I love our 'hood! We are north of King/south of Queen, just east of Dufferin.

Sarah said...

Looks like fun! I missed a good time!

Teena in Toronto said...

Sister Sarah: It wasn't the same without you this year :(