The view from Mimico

If you get on the westbound 501 Queen streetcar downtown, and you stay on it, past the Cameron House and the psychiatric hospital, past the Drake Hotel and Stones Place and all the small Parkdale galleries, presently you'll find you're not on Queen St. anymore, you're on Lakeshore Blvd. If you sit on the left-hand side of the streetcar, you'll be able to see the lake between the buildings. You'll pass a strip of well-preserved 60s-style motels, and then a strip of posh houses and consulates, the cars parked in front of them bearing red diplomatic plates. On and on the streetcar goes. Get off at Islington, and you can have a coffee at Rocket Fuel, the far-west sibling of Cabbagetown's beloved Jet Fuel Cafe. In the women's washroom at Rocket Fuel there's a large, heavy wooden desk and a wooden school chair; you could sit down there & work on your novel, I guess, if you really wanted peace and quiet, until someone else had to pee.

On Thursday evening, a group of psychogeographers congregated at Rocket Fuel and then walked down to Cliff Lumsden Park. This area, at the edge of Etobicoke, is called New Toronto. From the shore, there's an amazing view of downtown. We were there right at dusk, and the sky over the lake was a soft shade of pink.

We were joined by another streetcar-load of people, so there were about 24 of us, and we trooped off to explore New Toronto and adjacent Mimico. We walked through a lot of housing co-op complexes, past some factories, and back along that consulate row, to the motel strip and Casa Mendoza, the Piano Bar at the End of the Universe. You'd really never guess you were a streetcar ride away from downtown Toronto; it's like an off-season, low-end resort somewhere far, far away.


Piano man Tomanel kept the room entertained with a smooth selection of classic-rock hits from the 60s and 70s. At one point he took a break, and as he wandered back to the piano I observed to the person next to me, "Aha, time for more Van Morrison covers," and he sat down & launched into "Brown-Eyed Girl." Casa Mendoza is at 2161 Lakeshore and is the perfect place to enjoy a highball or a manhattan while wearing a vintage Hawaiian shirt, or carrying a clutch-purse. There's a big patio that's open when it's warmer, and I'm told that in the summer a crowd of raccoons hangs out there, adding to the overall amusement value. And did I mention there's a steak'n'lobster restaurant downstairs? Of course there is.

A whole lot more photos here.

And speaking of getting around on Toronto's public transit system, check out the TTC Rider Efficiency Guide. Some lovely transit enthusiasts have gone to each subway station and figured out where on the train you'd have to be to minimize the length of platform you'll have to walk along when you get out. They've compiled the results in a PDF which you can download, print and make into a handy-dandy little booklet. Keep it in your purse or backpack for quick reference and shave seconds, even minutes, off your next subway journey. Progress!

Update (June 22): I haven't been back to the Mendoza since writing this, but have heard disturbing things. It was apparently closed for awhile for renovations, then it reopened, and people who have visited since have informed me that it is, um, no longer charming. I was worried that after the makeover it would just be kind of bland, but from what I've heard it's not so much bland as scary. I just thought I should make a note of this, in case anyone who read this post was thinking of going! If you visit, do leave a comment and let me know how it went.