Toronto Travel Guide

Toronto is an exciting urban centre made up of diverse and colourful neighbourhoods and regions, creating a rich mosaic of cultures and lifestyles. With more than 100 cultures celebrated in Greater Toronto, visitors can enjoy art, ideas and cuisine from around the world, all within easy reach of each other. From tantalizing world cuisine and oodles of shopping to areas teeming with history, Toronto’s neighbourhoods offer the kinds of experiences that unfold when diverse ideas, cultures and lifestyles mix, mingle and thrive.

Financial District and Underground City
Location: The area from University Avenue to Yonge Street between Dundas in the north and Front Street in the south
Soaring architectural marvels fill the horizon in Toronto’s Financial District. This bustling business core, centred on Bay and King Streets, is home to banks, corporate head offices, law firms, Toronto Stock Exchange and stockbrokerages and other big businesses. But under the glass, concrete and steel monoliths reaching skywards, a whole other city thrives below the surface and is known as Toronto’s Underground City. The PATH, or Toronto’s Underground City, is a subterranean shopping concourse that weaves its way for more than 27 kilometres (16 miles) beneath the financial core. With close to 1,200 retail shops, cafés and restaurants, the Underground City connects to 48 office towers, six hotels and five subway stations.

Entertainment District
Location: The area roughly from University to Spadina Avenue between Richmond and Front Streets
The Toronto Entertainment District is not only home to Canada’s most recognizable icon the CN Tower, but it also houses internationally-renowned theatres and performing arts centres, boasts four major-league sports teams at their home venues, and an array of cultural and family attractions. In continuing to represent Toronto’s true artistic and cultural identity, the Entertainment District will bring a new addition to its streets with Bell Lightbox, the soon to be home base for world renowned Toronto International Film Festival. In Bell Lightbox, everything that is remarkable about the moving image art form will be gathered in this permanent location and presented through innovative cross-media exhibitions, lectures and film-related learning opportunities for all ages.

Bloor-Yorkville
Location: On and around Bloor Street between Avenue Road and Yonge Street, including Cumberland and Yorkville Avenues to the north
Yorkville, Toronto's original bohemian enclave in the 1960's, has long given way to designer boutiques, high end hotels, restaurants where locals go to see and be seen and a seemingly never-ending parade of Mazzeratis and Ferraris dotting Cumberland and Yorkville Avenues. The area features small courtyards and alleyways, including the contemporary Yorkville Park. In the very heart of the neighbourhood, therein lies this Yorkville Park where a smooth as marble giant boulder (that was carved out of the Canadian Shield) lies beside a fountain wall, providing visitors with the utmost tranquil setting fit only for the upper crust.

Chinatown
Location: Dundas Street West and Spadina Avenue
The corner of Spadina and Dundas Street West wouldn’t look at all out of place in the middle of Hong Kong. The crowds of people and the buzzing activity add to the captivating atmosphere of Toronto’s downtown Chinatown. Elegantly stroked Chinese characters grace store and street signs. Oriental shops and markets with exotic fruits and vegetables spill onto the sidewalk, where grocers literally sing as they invite street goers to browse their selection.

Old Town Toronto (includes Corktown, St. Lawrence and King East)
Location: Stretching from Lakeshore Boulevard north to Queen Street, bound on either side by Yonge Street and the Don River
Old town Toronto is the site of the city’s first settlement of Old York, and is now one of the most photogenic and charmingly unpretentious neighbourhoods. Past and present merge effortlessly in this historic hub, which contains the original 10 blocks that make up 19th-centrury Toronto. The region has developed into being the vibrant soul of a new city by offering fine dining, a lively nightlife along Front Street and blocks of historical architecture that tell the story of Toronto’s young and vibrant past. Today, three historic buildings remain as the old city’s social centre. The North Farmers’ Market, South Market and Gallery and the beautifully restored St. Lawrence Hall, one of the most prominent landmarks of the neighbourhood, can all be explored in Old Town.

Cabbagetown & Leslieville
Location: Cabbagetown is set east of Parliament Street between Wellesley Avenue and Dundas Street East and Leslieville is bounded by Gerrard Street to the north, Empire Avenue to the west, Eastern Avenue to south, and Coxwell Avenue to the east
This historical Toronto neighbourhood is not only well known for its unusual name (originated in the mid-19th century when Irish settlers planted cabbage patches in their front yards), but is also notorious for having one of the largest concentration of Victorian houses on the continent, most of which have been beautifully restored. As one of the most attractive neighbourhoods in the city, residents take great pride in their historic community and a stroll down the main street is a must when in Toronto. The area charms visitors with its hodgepodge of restaurants, cafes and one-of-a-kind shops. Cabbagetown is quite literally a calm village within a bustling metropolis.

Little Italy
Location: College Street from Bathurst to Shaw Streets
In the years following World War II, Little Italy became the heart and soul of Toronto’s Italian Community and is one of the original distinct neighbourhoods the city is now known for world-wide. Although Little Italy is now demographically more Portuguese, the atmosphere is still very much Italian.

Source : Seetorontonow.com