Yesterday we went back into downtown Toronto, leaving our car, bikes and possessions in a multi-storey car park (we’d checked out of one motel and were waiting to check into a new one). We made a beeline for the CN Tower and took the elevator up to the viewing platform at 330m above the ground, where we walked across the glass floor and took in the views. Neil, Andy and Leo then joined the queue for the elevator to the Skypod at 447m. Me, Alex and Ed meanwhile went for a wander around Toronto.

Toronto is a nice city, with its safety and cleanliness standing in contrast to the US cities we’ve visited, but it’s just a bit… well… dull. The CN Tower is cool, and there’s a lot of impressive buildings and a great harbour front, but it just doesn’t have that simmering excitement that we found in Chicago.

Anyway, after wandering through Toronto University’s campus and then through Chinatown, we headed to our new motel for the night. The Knights Inn in Richmond Hill is wonderful. We booked it as it was the cheapest one that the website we use could find, but the rooms are nicer than any we’ve seen elsewhere, one of them featuring a sofa. Last night we ate takeaway pizza and Chinese and drank a few bottles of beer. Ed, wasted after sniffing the beer, went to collect the Chinese and returned with a woman who wanted to meet the ‘mad English guys who are cycling across America’. She left after a few minutes and then her friend turned up: a man who also wanted to meet the cyclists so that he could tell his friends when we were famous. I took his advice (and that of the Chicago moteliers) and sent details of our trip to the local and national media over here.

In the next hour we leave for Niagara Falls, with the cyclists beginning to face the reality of what they have ahead of them. Tomorrow morning we get up early and cross the border into the States, and then the challenge begins at last.