It’s the first game of the new hockey season this Thursday (Oct. 6, 2011) and my beloved Habs (Montreal Canadiens) are in town to face their rival, the Toronto Maple Leafs. A perfect time to talk about a new hockey hang out.

“Dave’s Organic Burger” at Shakey’s in Toronto

Shakey’s is west of Runnymede Avenue on the south side of Bloor, in Toronto’s Bloor West Village, a ‘hood’ with deep European roots. More bistro than sports bar, what drew my attention to Shakey’s is its Toronto Maple Leafs history, decent food, bounty of flat-screen TVs, and its owners’ family connection to Toronto’s hospitality industry. All a good fit for a Roadstories post about people, places and things.

Shakey was Mike Walton’s nickname. Walton played centre for the Toronto Maple Leafs when the team won its last Stanley Cup (way back in 1967). When Walton retired from hockey he opened Shakey’s Original Bar & Grill, one of the first bars in the village, which for many years, ran dry.

Rob Lundy owns present-day Shakey’s with his brother Chris, Shakey’s chef. Their maternal grandfather once owned one of Toronto’s most famous clubs, the Silver Dollar. He also turned the Stardust Hotel and Lounge into the original Drake Hotel back in 1949.

The Lundy brothers have not forgotten Shakey’s hockey roots. Lots of Leaf memorabilia here. Black and white photos of early Leaf glory days hang on the walls. There’s the 1967 Maple Leaf Stanley Cup winners parading down Yonge Street and Walton squaring off with Gordie Howe at the old Maple Leaf Gardens. Even a couple of Habs photos hang by the entrance, a nod to Hab fans in Toronto, I guess.

Then there’s the food. The Lundy brothers have created a place that attracts its fair share of sports fans but not exclusively. Last week, more women than men were having lunch when I was there and when I went back for pictures, a dad and his two daughters and a young couple with an infant were among those ordering dinner. Chris, who trained at Vancouver’s Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts and worked at Toronto’s Crush Wine Bar, the former Lemon Meringue and Montreal’s Garçon and Club 357c , told me his biggest challenge was getting to know his customer base. Initially, he wanted a finer dining menu but he quickly realized that his best plan was still offer pub fare. The big difference is that just about everything here is now made from scratch or sourced from the village, including what you see on the kids’ menu. We tried Dave’s Organic Burger washed down with a Mill Street draft. Made with Rowe Farms organic ground beef, It came highly recommended and didn’t disapppoint. Other big sellers include Chris’s homemade fried chicken, fish and chips, nachos, and his soups which are mostly vegan. Fish for the fish and chips comes from a local Bloor West Village supplier and outside of the Polish pickles supplied by a Polish shop on Bloor West, most condiments, including the mayonnaise, are made in-house.

Thursday’s game will be televised. The puck drops at 7pm. The beer is sure to be flowing and the burgers flying off the grill at Shakey’s.

Got a favourite place in your part of the country to watch Canada’s national game? We’d love to hear from you. Go Habs Go!

It’s time for the 133rd CNE! Canada’s largest annual community event takes place along Toronto’s waterfront for 18 days leading up to and including Labor Day. There’s live entertainment, a wide variety of events, a working farm, parades and sports, lots of international food, a Kids World, an airshow and best of all, a huge midway.

Aerial acrobats have teamed up with Olympic skaters for a dazzling acrobatic/ ice-skating show this year. The human cannonball is back. A strong man will bend and lift things you didn’t think possible. There’s a Master of the Unusual ( inventor, acrobat, comedian and musican rolled into one) and the Flowrider Boarders with their dazzling board tricks. Got some horse fans in your household? Meet a mare and her foal. Learn the life of a race horse and how to groom and shoe a horse at the HorseCapades and a crowd favourite, the Super Dogs are back.

My favourite place of all is the CNE midway. I first visited it back in 1964. The Beatles had just appeared on Ed Sullivan and I remember being so excited at winning a Beatles hat at one of the Midway booths. I rode my first Ferris Wheel ride then too.  My friend Deb and I and  two 10 year olds had a blast at last year’s midway. I enjoyed my annual CNE treat –  a waffle ice-cream sandwich, and then soaked up the scene with the Nikon. The colors were incredible especially against the overcast sky.

This year’s CNE runs August 19-September 5, 2011. Tickets are $16 general admission. $12 for kids 13 yrs and under and a family pass is $48 (2 kids, 2 adults or 1 adult and 3 kids). 4 years and under are free. The midway rides take 3-6 tickets per ride. Today’s  opening day special is 10 rides for $20 or opt for the Kids’  Toonie Mondays (August 22 & 29) when 30 tickets are $22.

In the Canadian Badlands between Cypress Hills and Etzikom, Alberta

Even though we’re big travelers of Canada, there’s still plenty to see. Canada is so big and the average vacation so short ( 2 weeks) that it’s difficult to cover a lot of ground. One way to do it is a fly-drive.

Hoodoos and beehive hills near Drumheller, Alberta

A 4-hour flight west from Toronto will put you in Calgary. A car rental and an hour later and you’re in southeastern Alberta, a landscape so foreign from central Canada that a travel writer from Toronto described it as reaching out and slapping her. 63 municipalities have coined it the Canadian Badlands and aim to make it Canada’s next iconic travel destination (just like the Canadian Rockies, an hour west of Calgary).  From a road trip perspective, we think it’s already there.

The massive prairie landscape is intersected by river valleys with hills that look like giant beehives. The valleys are part of a prehistoric sea that once occupied a good portion of North America. Wind and water have stripped away the sandstone and they’ve revealed something else. Dinosaur fossils. Millions of them. Two places to learn about the biggest finds are Dinosaur Provincial Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the Royal Tyrrell Museum, the world’s largest devoted to palaeontology.

If you love driving but hate traffic, this is the place. Armed with an Alberta road map and GPS, we crisscrossed the region by paved and gravel road, sometimes not seeing another car for the better part of two hours.  Gas stations are scarce though. So are corner stores and other things that we take for granted in the city. Topping off the gas tank and having lots of drinking water in the car quickly became necessities.

Streetcar in downtown Toronto, Ontario

On the Trans-Canada Highway west of Brooks, Alberta

When I first met Kelly and she expressed an interest in doing a couple of posts for roadstories.ca, I didn’t realize she was such a Lady About Town. We talked about traveling in Canada and swapped stories about all the great places we had been. I don’t know what I was thinking. Perhaps that she would write about leisurely drives through pastoral Canadian landscapes, or antique shops, or maple syrup. But no. Kelly’s into the bright lights and culture of the big city. Big time. She’s out, like, every night! So until I can rein her in, here are a couple of her latest adventures…

kd lang on stage at Luminato in Toronto

I was thrilled to watch kd lang as dusk descended in David Pecaut square in Toronto last week. The once cow-punk grrl from the prairies and now, at 48, a crooner of extraordinary range and style, dazzled during the city’s Luminato Festival, Toronto’s annual artistically-inspired week of concerts, theatre and art happenings.

In front of an adoring crowd Lang held nothing back, entertaining with a mix of humor, appreciation of her fans and full-on vocal power. At one point, before a song in which she plays banjo, she warned the audience not to be concerned at how much they would be drawn to the stage for the next song – it happens all the time! As a newcomer to kd lang‘s music, I was blown away by her powerful voice, enchanting melodic range and charismatic stage presence.

But even as someone who has never really paid much heed to kd and her music, I was surprised by the amount of songs I did know! Now, armed with an arsenal of tunes to download (Read: ‘Summer Fling‘ and ‘Constant Cravings‘), I have difficulty expressing my wonderment watching (and discreetly videotaping) her chilling rendition of Leonard Cohen‘s ‘Hallelujah‘. Many strong responses were evoked by her emotional delivery of Cohen’s haunting classic and I found myself watching and re-watching the video. kd continued the Canadian leg of the tour the next night in London, Ontario and will be performing sets in Montreal and Ottawa later this month.

Editor’s note: kd lang hails from Consort, Alberta. It’s a long way from L.A. where she lives now.

Main street, Consort, Alberta, 2008. Birthplace of kd lang.

Wow! What an event in downtown Toronto! The Much Music Video Awards were held on June 19th, 2011 at the City TV “legendary home of Much Music” building, and surprisingly enough, I got a ticket in!!

Lurking around backstage at the Much Music Video Awards in Toronto, 2011

Amazingly I managed to get right into the back stage pre-party where we walked in and immediately spotted The Black Keys . I am 99.9% certain that’s who it was, though I must admit I am not terribly ‘down’ with what the bands kids are listening to look like in person. They were sprawled across a semi-circle white leather couch next to the sushi bar and it was my date that advised me not to lean over (as I was in the process of doing, to ask where the open-bar was, to get a glass of wine) as I could clearly see they were enjoying the cold white themselves. We spent some time in this pre-party room gazing out at all the kids on Queen Street West, who were frantically trying to peer in across the red carpet.

While strolling through our exit maze to leave the backstage area, my date decided to grab my hand and casually walk up the back steps onto the backstage of the MMVAs. In a classic situation of “don’t ask permission just beg forgiveness”, coupled with a dash of “if you look like you should be there no one will stop you”, I found myself backstage. Literally. So moments later we were standing behind the huge light screen that screaming fans were facing, with Justin Bieber steps away, calling down to guys standing right next to us about who was on his shirt (from what I could tell it was a pic of his gf Selena Gomez). A great hooting and hollering erupted as we all watched Biebs saunter onto the stage. All we could hear backstage was the waving swell of screaming fans (they had lined up for days), the octaves rising and dissipating as various celebs entered and exited.

After that we waited around backstage, (me waiting for someone to tell us to scram, my date using Lady Gaga’s stage prop as a stepping stool) when Justin swished by us again with gf on arm to their next appointed position. In the meantime we spotted Snoop Dogg and Fefe Dobson heading onto stage in a red and white classic car of some sort and I grabbed a pic of someone clearly important (as I wasn’t the only one taking her pic) can anyone help out on this?

Please leave a comment if you can identify this mystery celeb at the Much Music Video Awards in Toronto, 2011

Everybody in Toronto calls it “Dundas Square”, but its proper name, although a bit more cumbersome, is “Yonge-Dundas Square“. This is Toronto’s take on the more famous and much older Times Square in New York City. Like its venerable American cousin, Dundas Square is ablaze with animated neon and television-style signage. It’s a busy place. People in Toronto have adopted it as a mecca for public concerts, events and promotions of all sorts.

It’s a perfect spot for the kick off of Tourism Week in Ontario, which runs June 6-12, 2011. On Friday, June 3, Dundas Square wil turn into a one-stop shop for Ontario summer vacation ideas. The folks at Ontario Tourism want to get a little buzz going about all the great stuff to do in the province – and there’s lots of it – so they’re pulling out a few stops and throwing a party. As you find out about vacation resorts, Ontario Parks, boating stuff, outdoor adventure, culinary destinations, historic sites and that sort of thing, you can hang out with the crowd and listen to the music.

Here’s the agenda… Starting at noon, the main stage entertainment will feature an Elvis tribute, courtesy of the Collingwood Elvis Festival. There will be Greek music and dancing supplied by Taste of the Danforth and a nod to the Fab Four from the Orillia Beatles Celebration. They’ll pick it up again at 5:30 with musicians and dancers from the Mirvish production of Billy Elliot, Toronto Caribbean Carnival (formerly Caribana), Salsa on St. Clair and the Toronto Jazz Festival. Don’t miss Shania Twin and her tribute to Canada’s favourite diva. The whole thing will wrap about 7:3o. That leaves at least an hour of sunlight, during which time you can watch the lights start to come on as the day recedes and the night takes over Dundas Square.

This little piggy went to St. Lawrence Market

If you’re planning a visit to Hollywood North (aka Toronto), you’ll likely end up on a former movie set. X-Men, Chicago, Incredible Hulk, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Rules of Engagement, Goodwill Hunting, Hairspray, and Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen are  just a few of the films that have been shot in Toronto in the last decade.

James spending a sunny afternoon at the Distillery District

The Distillery District

A film company favourite and a  funky place to hang out on a weekend. In the 1990s it was the hottest film location in Canada. Against the Ropes, X-Men, Chicago and others have used it for a set. Gooderham and Worts once produced Canadian whiskey here. Today, walk the cobblest0ne streets, stop for a pint at the Mill Street Brewery or head to one of the distillery ‘s restaurants , cafés or artist studios.

Looking east towards St. Lawrence Market

St. Lawrence Market

A Toronto meeting place for over 200 years. Fever Pitch and Rules of Engagement filmed here. Hundreds of Torontonians shop here every week for their fresh seafood, meats and veggies. Peameal bacon (back bacon) sandwiches are a Saturday breakfast tradition. A good walking tour starts in the market and then swings through Toronto’s oldest neighborhood. The Sunday Antique Market here is also a weekend find. I haggled for a better price on a primitive Rankin Inlet soapstone walrus head here just last week.

Fairmont Royal York Hotel, Toronto

Staying at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel?

You’re in good company. This historic property has been the scene of many films including Cinderella Man, Serendipity and the television movie, RFK. G20 Summit leaders stayed here in 2010 and the Royal Suite has been HRH Queen Elizabeth’s home away from home.

Yonge Street, Toronto

Yonge Street

I’ve never been a huge fan of Toronto’s main street but its gritty feel is obviously a film company’s dream. Cinderella Man, The Incredible Hulk and Confessions of Teenage Drama Queen filmed here. Dundas Square, a take-off on NYC’s Time Square is a big improvement, especially for people-watching.

Bride at the University of Toronto

University of Toronto

A favourite walking route of mine is through the university’s downtown campus bordering College to the south, Bloor West, University and Avenue Road and Bay Street with Queen’s Park in between. The University’s Philosopher’s Walk is a good bet too. It links Harbord Street to Bloor West. Expect big trees and lots of green set against a backdrop of university buildings, some dating back to the 1850s. Mean Girls, Capote and Chicago among others were filmed on its grounds.

Canada’s wildlife often makes news headlines.

In the past year,  a grey whale wandered into Burrard Inlet in downtown Vancouver. A moose was  videotaped trotting down a footpath beside Calgary’s busy Memorial Drive. A cougar chased two girls down a street in an Alberta town. A coyote ate a small dog in Toronto’s Beaches and a deer was spotted outside of Toronto’s Union Station, the busiest transportation hub in Canada. As urban sprawl grows so do the number of unusual wildlife sightings in Canada’s urban areas.

One place that doesn’t make the news for wildlife sightings is the local dump. You won’t see pix of it in local tourism brochures but there’s a saying that if you want to see a bear, head to the local dump. That’s exactly where I was last summer when I spotted this motley crew of black bears which included a rare cinnamon gal. Double click the pic and you’ll see six bears. The guy at the dump told me Cinnamon Girl is an old gal that they had not seen in awhile.

Some of Canada’s wildlife are often seen in cities. Raccoons climb our back porch and skunks dig for grubs in our yard. Hawks and occasionally osprey hunt pigeons and black squirrels in downtown parks and on the local par 3 where I occasionally get out for a round, I’ve had fox run after my ball. Last year, I saw a weird animal I couldn’t identify. It had  a pink snout, spiky-looking fur and a long rat-like tail. My neighbours told me it was a possum. I didn’t grow up in this part of Canada but apparently, these critters are common in southern Ontario. Talk to anyone in my ‘hood though and they’ll tell you the ‘Toronto’ possum is a recent transplant that first arrived here on fruit trucks from the southern US. The trucks are destined for Ontario Food Terminal, a massive distribution point for fruit and vegetables in Toronto’s west end.

Buried loot at the Haunted Stirling Mansion

Halloween is big business in Canada. Just ask Statistics Canada. Every year, it releases Halloween stats that include the latest demographics on trick or treaters, the number of Canadian farms with pumpkin patches, the amount of money Canadians spend on Halloween candy and even a list of places in Canada that may give you the creeps.

Based on recent travels across the country, we came up with our own list of creepy places:

All Hallows Eve at Kings Landing Historical Settlement

Bone-chilling tales including a famous cold case…

“Lizzie Borden took an axe, Gave her mother 40 whacks, When she saw what she had done, She gave her father 41″  Lizzie was later acquitted of the 1892 double-ax murder which over a century later remains unsolved. Expect this kind of bone chilling tale and more as the “dead” gather October 29 and 30 to celebrate the ancient ritual of All Hallows Eve at Kings Landing Historical Settlement near Fredericton, New Brunswick. A mysterious soul and a headless horseman will greet you at the Kings Landing gate and escort you down a lonely gravel road to the King’s Head Inn. There you’ll join others for dnner and a night of murder and mayhem.

Haunted Stirling Mansion, Stirling, Alberta

Canada’s best haunted house:

Last June on a road trip near Lethbridge, Alberta, we stumbled across what we think is THE best haunted house in Canada. It was broad daylight when the owner gave us a tour of the Haunted Stirling Mansion. It didn’t matter. I still  jumped out of my skin when I saw a strange “dude” peeking out from a door slightly ajar. The set design in this place is so well done, my imagination ran wild. Fright Nights run October 28-31.

Haunted Atlas Coal Mine near Drumheller, Alberta

The Atlas Coal Mine:

With all the miner news of late we couldn’t resist including the Haunted Atlas Coal Mine.  It stands next to the ghost town of East Coulee, south of Drumheller, in the Canadian Badlands of Alberta. The mine’s grey-timbered tipple is creepy enough in daylight let alone at night when Hallowe’en guests are invited to explore it armed with only a flashlight. A former bathhouse has big meat hooks attached to ropes on pulleys hanging from the ceiling. Miners once used these to hang their street clothes on, above the coal dust. The Drumheller Paranormal Group thinks this national historic site is haunted. You can judge for yourself. Special Big Boo and Little Boo tours are offered October 30.

Canada’s coolest post-halloween event

Best post-Halloween event:

The Pumpkin Parade in west end Toronto’s Sorauren Park is a feast for the eyes. Every year hundreds of families bring their carved pumpkins to the park at dusk the day after Halloween. The pumpkins are then lit along a path that runs the perimeter of the park.

Final destination: Sudbury, Ontario and the Big Nickel (the world's largest)

Everyone arrives, unaware of what’s to come as we start loading the bus with everything we need, all the moms asking if we have our toothbrush and hockey equipment. Everyone answers with the same loud sigh and “yes, mum,” answer. Once everything was packed and we all got seated, the doors closed and the coolers opened and we were off.

Loading the bus

At first it felt like the longest bus ride ever, but as the parents got louder and louder, the trip felt shorter and shorter with the movie also helping. With just one stop in Nobel on the way, we were there, at last!

We thought the wait was over, expecting to start our never-finished, N.H.L., 10-video game tournament right away, all forgetting about the dreaded wait that feels longer than the bus ride to get to our rooms. I hop off the bus, heading for my bags before I realize I packed my bag on the bus first, meaning I will get my bag off the bus last, making for even more of a wait.

Into our rooms we all went, excited about the rest of the weekend but all thinking about the low rating of the motel without a pool or anything, but right to ideas, we went outside for a game of tag and football. The team all ate out at Buzzy Brown’s and had a curfew so we were off to bed. The Super 8 motel was quickly growing on us, as we all liked the location, being next to a grocery store, Dollarama, Subway, Timmies and anything else Canadian you can think of…  specifically the arenas, and since we were here for a tournament, those were most important.

The next day was the beginning of the hockey part of the tournament, playing against the home team, the Sudbury Bulldogs. You could tell they were the home team as the refs were clearly biased on their side but we still won 5-1 with an easy win for the gang. With a while before our next game, we hung out around the motel starting our fun off with some lunch and a trip to the field where we played tag for another half hour. The days felt long so it was great. Then, there was the next game, against West Ferris Blades, a team from North Bay. Once again, easy, as we won 5-0 with not much of a challenge.

Time for another dinner. This time, most of the team ate at a sushi restaurant near the motel. The sushi was great with some of the team trying raw seafood for the first time. Everyone enjoyed it and talked about it for the rest of the night. We still had some time so a few of us from the team took a short walk to see what was around. After a few snowball fights and a stop at Tim Horton’s, we had gone in a circle and headed to our rooms to sleep before the morning game.

The next day, we had a game at 8:50 in the morning. We ate breakfast in the motel’s lobby with cereal, muffins, tea, juice and coffee for a quick “to-go” breakfast. Meeting at the bus at 6:45, we were not yet awake and it affected us, as we only won with a 3-2 score. It still put us in an easy win of first place in our division and a bye into the semifinals to play the Humber Valley Sharks. 9:30 that night, we played them and had yet another big win, but this one not quite as easy though still ending with a 5-0 score, and off to the finals. We were set.

The game was the next day so we had some time to hang around at the motel. Most of us ate at Buzzy Brown’s again since we loved it the first time. Others decided to eat at the motel or other places nearby.

Set to play the #1 ranked team in all of Ontario as ranked on myhockeyrankings.com. Despite their great record and #1 ranking, we were not worried and knew we could compete as we had tied them earlier 1-1 in another tournament. The day of the Finals against the Kenata Blazers, we were all pumped up to play the game of our lives with the chance to win it all and go to the international tournaments in Port Huron, Michigan in early January.

We all get checked out of our rooms and met in the lobby at around 12:00 for our 1:30 game. Once everyone was loaded up on the bus, we were all thinking, barely any talking had gone on. When we started heading off the bus at the arena, the parents all started clapping and cheering. We were pumped, ready to go on the ice right away, only to find out our game was two and a half hours behind. We lost our grittiness watching a few of the other finals but after warmup and dressing for 30 minutes, we got the talk. Coach Lewis, talking about his 25 years as head coach, and a great one he is, and yet he only has had the chance to go to the international tournament once, this being his second time in the finals. Talking about how you will throw away most of your trophies when you get older, but this one, we would keep. That was what got us pumped added with sprinting on the ice, we were all screaming, ready to knock the Blazers off their #1 throne. It was a great game played by everyone on the team. We got a 1-0 lead then later in the second period, we scored to make it 2-0. We went into the room between the 2nd and 3rd and once all rested, we ran on the ice to fight to victory to win it all! This one sending us to the international tournament in Port Huron, Michigan, with lots up for grabs.

We celebrated loudly with Kenata packing up and heading home. A feeling that once you get it, you can remember it clearly. Lots of pictures, hugs and high fives later, we were changed and ready for the trip back, knowing it would be great since we had won and not lost. We stopped at the same place in Nobel, the Wendy’s and Tim Horton’s. We were all loud on the ride back and every so often one player, most of the time me, would yell something to do with our big win. We are all ready for the next tournament on January 7th and we can’t wait to get there. See you in Michigan! For an update on the team’s Michigan record, check out the latest comments below.

The Scarborough Young Bruins, Sudbury Regional Silver Stick Champions

This is a bit of a different type of road story today but one I think is worth telling…

is this a Brant heritage grape vine?

A couple of years ago I paid five bucks for this amazing heritage grape vine at Parkdale Horticultural Society‘s annual Plant Fair. People line up for it every year. Our vine is growing like a weed along our fence and this year, there must be a bushel’s worth of grapes on it. I am pretty sure the guy I bought it from told me it was a Brant heritage vine first cultivated in the Niagara region of Ontario circa 1860. I thought this would be easy to research but have had difficulty finding any information on the vine so, if you read this and can enlighten me, please do. I am also wondering if the grape is connected to the family of Joseph Brant.

Joseph Brant played an important role in Canadian history. Originally from what is now northeastern Ohio, the celebrated Mohawk chief fought in the American Revolution for the British. Following the war, he and his Mohawk followers were awarded land along the Grand River in the Niagara region of Ontario for their war service (although wouldn’t it have been Mohawk land to begin with?). After the war, Brant continued to be an influential force with politicians, including President George Washington. What many don’t know is the role that Joseph Brant played in Niagara Falls becoming a honeymoon destination. Niagara historian Sherman Zavitz, in his book, It happened at Niagara, wrote that the first honeymooners to visit Niagara Falls were invited by Brant.  Theodosia Burr, the daughter of United States Vice President, Aaron Burr, and her new husband, Joseph Alston traveled to Niagara Falls following their wedding in 1801. They later visited Brant who lived on the Grand River.

But the real reason I am writing about our Brant heritage grape vine is to tell you about the effect it has had on our neighbours. Toronto can be reserved at the best of times so our neighbours’ reaction to the vine has been a pleasant surprise. Katarina is an elderly Hungarian woman who passes our yard every morning on her way to her daughter’s place. One day I found her pinching new sprouts. “Do this every week and you’ll get more grapes”, she told me. And we have. Then there’s the old Portuguese guy who gently scolded us for not tying our vine to the fence to give it better support. The next day I noticed he had done it for us. Last fall, when our grapes were at their sweetest, our Vietnamese neighbour who lives down the alley from us stopped every morning on his way to work to grab a handful. Now when I walk to the corner store and he’s out in his garage, he stops whatever he’s doing to say hi. And just this week, I met another neighbour, a Portuguese grandmother who has taken to walking her dog by our place and stopping to search for the ripest grapes. I told her today to keep coming back.