Wednesday, September 9, 2015

Wanderlust Wednesday ~ Kingston, Ontario

 

Kingston, Ontario is one of my favourite cities. It's a beautiful city with rich history and many gorgeous buildings, on the St. Lawrence River. It's nicknamed the 'limestone city' because of its many limestone buildings. 



I've spent a lot of time in Kingston over the years, and I fall more in love with it every time I visit. I spent part of Labour Day weekend there with a friend who's lived there since University. She works downtown, and we spent most of Saturday downtown, playing tourists. She showed me where part of Guillermo del Toro's upcoming movie Crimson Peak (starring Tom Hiddleston) was filmed. You can watch the Crimson Peak trailer here - there's a quick shot at 0:18 of the street in Kingston right outside Krista's office building (she was able to watch some of the filming from her office window - how cool is that?). 



We were comparing my city with Kingston and how even though I live in a decent-sized city that's constantly growing, it doesn't have half of what Kingston does. We don't have many restaurants here, and most of them are chains, but Kingston has dozens of restaurants. Whatever you feel like eating, you'll be sure to find at least one place, if not multiple places, that suit your needs. Plus, many places downtown have lovely outdoor eating areas, and the Jack Astor's has an incredible roof-top patio with a view of downtown and the river. We ate at Wooden Heads Gourmet Pizza and then had gelato at Mio Gelato - both amazing! Having just been to Rome together in June, it felt like we were transported back there, between the food and the atmosphere.


There are also tons of really cool shops downtown, plus a couple malls at the other end of the city. Downtown, you can find independently-owned stores with handmade, local goods. We found some beautiful stuff that made me wish I had more money. I hope to get back to Kingston in the next couple months, because I know where I'll be doing my Christmas shopping! There are also several bakeries downtown; I've been searching for macarons ever since we got back from Paris, and I found them at Pan Chancho!


After that, we drove through the Queens University campus...if there's such a thing as an architecturegasm I had several. In much of Kingston it's easy to imagine you're in Europe, but I honestly felt like I'd been transported to Europe when we were driving by the Queens buildings. They're absolutely stunning.

Besides shopping, eating, and simply wandering, Kingston is a great place for history buffs or people interested in Canada's military, past and present. There's Fort Henry, and there are also small museums all over the city. A couple years ago when my family and I went to visit Krista, we took the kids to Murney Tower, and they loved it. You can read my post about that and see pics here.

For the supernaturally-inclined, there are super fun Haunted Walk of Kingston Tours. I did one a few years ago and it was so much fun. I enjoyed it so much, I'd do it again if the opportunity ever arose.

 

So, that's Kingston at a glance. If you're ever near the city (it's about 3 hours east of Toronto, or 2 hours west of Ottawa, just to give you an idea), make sure you spend at least a few hours in the limestone city! 



Have you been to Kingston? What did you think? What's your favourite thing to do? Place to eat? If you haven't been, do you hope to go someday? Let's talk here or on Twitter!
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1 comment:

  1. Beautiful city! I would love to see more of the world. In the mean time, keep these posts coming.

    ReplyDelete

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~Marie

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