My feet hate me right now.

A week ago, during a little get-together at my friend's house, we all decided to tackle the challenge of walking down to 1 Yonge St on Toronto from the library in Richmond Hill. According to Google Maps, the route we were going to take (which was just straight down Yonge) is a total of 26.2 km with an estimated travel time of 5 hours and 32 minutes.


Little did we know, when we made those plans last week, that the weather was going to be as shitty was it turned out to be. Sigh.

Our meet time was 9:10 a.m. but I, being the professional sleeper that I am, slept through my alarms and woke up late. Luckily I wasn't the only one, as the friend I hitched a ride with to the library woke up only when I sent her a text asking her for a ride! We made a stop for breakfast before going too far, and while we were stopped, it started to rain a little bit. It didn't seem like it would be a huge problem, so we continued our walk for a little while longer; but as we walked, the rain gradually started pouring more heavily and before we could get to our first "checkpoint"(Finch station), we were drenched. So we took a break at a Starbucks, trying to dry ourselves off with napkins and advanced manual fanning techniques, before another one of our friends picked us up and drove us to Finch. And it just so happened that once we arrived, the rain had stopped.

Another friend met us at the terminal and took us to lunch where we had Korean food!

Salmon terriyaki with tempura!

I don't remember the name of the place, but I do remember that I had salmon terriyaki with tempura. The salmon tasted very fishy (not "fishy" as in "weird", but "fishy" as in "fish-y"), which I didn't not quite like, but it was manageable. The tempura was awesome because who doesn't like deep-fried stuff. We were also served several plates of appetizers too. My favourite was this rice pancake-ish thing... partly because it was not as spicy as all the other appetizers (yeah, I'm a wuss)!

After lunch, we made another stop at my friend's apartment to get everyone some warmer clothing (because we all thought the weather was going to warm up). And then we walked...

I felt tall here.

I don't remember where this is, but it's after Sheppard, where the sidewalk goes up and over whatever road that is as a bridge! On a less cloudy day, I believe the CN tower would have been small, but visible from here.

After or around Lawrence, we stumbled upon a very pretty park - the Alexander Muir Memorial Park, so we stopped there to marvel its beauty. Pictures do not do it justice. You have to walk along Yonge past Lawrence, actually stumble upon it (because it's gated! I just saw a cool little archway and peeked in, otherwise we wouldn't have seen it), and walk inside it to fully appreciate how lovely it was.

Alexander Muir, btw, was the guy who composed "Maple Leaf Forever", which I understand was the original Canadian anthem before O Canada.

Around this time, the sun started shining, and the temperature rose a bit, making us sweat a little in our hoodies and windbreakers. And then, after we stopped at another Starbucks for happy hour, it got all cloudy, windy, and rainy again (Canadian weather, eh?), and this time, it stayed rainy. We called off our trek at around 7 p.m. at the Eaton Center because we were all soaked and tired, but I think if it was sunny, we would have continued!

My mom picked me up from the Eaton Center and everyone else went back home. My plan for the end of our trek had been to go to the ACC to experience the playoff atmosphere before it was gone (because, you know, Leafs were on the verge of elimination tonight). I had wanted to go alone because I didn't know anyone else who would have been as gung ho as I was to go. My mom had said no (she said I was pretty crazy for wanting to a) be downtown alone and b) be at an outdoor event in this weather; I told her a) I wasn't a baby, and b) "I ain't afraid of no rain"), but in the end we swooped by Maple Leafs Square just as Bozak put the Leafs up 1-0 and the crowd was cheering and celebrating, and I thought to myself "okay no, I HAVE to be over there", opened the car door, and somersaulted out.

I kid. We found a parking space, and ended up staying for the last two periods.

REIMERRRRRRRR WE ARE NOT WORTHY!

I'm kind of upset that I forgot to take pictures of when everyone was celebrating, but I had recorded a video of the last minute of play and a bit of the aftermath (after theY WON!!MY FEEEELS I CAN'T EVEN!!), featuring some dude walking up to my camera, screaming "FUCK THE  BRUINS!", and a couple who decided to stop in front of my camera's field of view to make out a bit (I hadn't noticed this until I re-watched the video when I got home); and I think it captured the atmosphere a lot better than my piece-of-junk camera would have. Besides, MLSQ's confetti cannon didn't even reach where we were standing, so I wouldn't have gotten any nice confetti pictures anyway.

All in all, I was so relieved when I got home because my feet could FINALLY be dry (my socks and shoes were never completely dry throughout the entire day) and be relieved of their weight-bearing duties (they currently hurt like hell, and I think there's something abnormal with my left foot looking a bit swollen and hurting more than the right); but having an adventure with friends was pretty awesome (though the weather really could have been better), and THE LEAFS WON AND THEIR PLAYOFF HOPES ARE STILL ALIVE AND I CAN'T EVEN

So it was all worth it.

Thanks for reading! Peace out, and #RUINTHEBRUINS.