I can’t believe autumn is almost here and I’ve not posted any of the fun things I’ve done over the summer but it’s been a manic summer!
Late June my OH was approached to join a new company and they seemed keen to entice him to Canada, so we had a whirlwind 4 day trip for him to do final interviews and a couple of days for Little Miss and I to get a feel for Toronto, so I bought us a CityPass and we enjoyed being real tourists…
We got to check out the CN Tower from the bottom and also went to the top, where we were able to get a great view over the city and Lake Ontario, it’s so vast it’s easy to forget it is a lake and not an ocean.
Talking of oceans the next stop was Ripley’s Aquarium as requested by Little Miss. As aquariums go it was well done, the tanks were decent sizes and for the kids there are lots of interactive displays, a small play area by the cafe and opportunities to touch some of the sea life.
As always when it comes to food the three of us were keen to see what Toronto had to offer in the way of Japanese food and we were happy with our choice, Yamato, they offer really good sushi and the full teppenyaki dining experience which is always fun…especially the volcanic onion.
Feeling a bit jaded with the travel we didn’t stray too far the day before we were due to fly back and went to the Royal Ontario Museum to look at the dinosaurs, it’s not quite London’s Natural History museum but it is family friendly with things for the children to do/touch and the exterior is cool…
Anyway, as usual I digress, we had a full 2 days of fun and over eating but we saw enough to know that Toronto was a place we could call home, so an offer was made and accepted then we just had to wait to hear if our visa application had been accepted.
In the meantime, we were put in touch with a lady that helps expats relocate in GTA (Greater Toronto Area) and decided on a town we would base ourselves, then it was time for me to panic as schools were already closed for the summer and we needed to secure a place for Little Miss to start in September assuming our visas were issued.
We did our research and found an independent school that ticked all of the boxes on our wishlist and had a place for the 2019/20 school year, phew!
While waiting to hear about our visas we kept ourselves busy with play dates, a trip to Verona (will blog about that at some point) and days out in the beautiful English countryside.
Finally, late August we were given the the thumbs up and it was all stations go! Little Miss and I were already scheduled for a 5 day trip back to Toronto, so we arranged to join the new starters orientation morning at school and Little Miss joined Grade 1 for the first day of term, all rather confusing as in the UK she would’ve been going into Year 2.
On our return to the UK while my OH was busy working his notice we had approximately two weeks to pack up our house, arrange flights for the three of us plus our pooch, tie up as many loose ends as possible and spend as much time with our family and friends before leaving the UK for another new adventure.
Luckily as Mizu has his pet passport he could fly with us and no need for any quarantine, unfortunately he wasnt too keen on his flight crate…
With the movers busy packing up the house, in between errands I managed to pack as much as I could into our luggage allowance; six cases, three carry-ons, a dog crate and child’s car seat later we were set to go and before unloading everything into our hotel room that would be home for 5 nights the first thing required was a large G&T!
Categories: Expat Life, Family Life, Lifestyle, Travel
Tanoshimi 