Michelle's Travel Adventures

Toronto July 23 – 25, 2023

Day 1, Sunday July 23

P!NK Here we come!  Toronto is her first stop in her North American Summer Carnival 2023 Tour, and we are so pumped to see her perform!  

We arrive in Toronto and head to the Westin Harbourfront Hotel around 2pm to check in and walked down to Sugar Beach. (The hotel is quite drab and dated and definitely feel ripped off for what we are paying a night). We had a late lunch at Irene – Corus Quay. It’s a cool, upscale spot along the waterfront. We got a table outside, but fortunately under an overhang so we were sheltered from a downpour that happened a few minutes after ordering our meal.

I had a Pineapple Chai Delight which consisted of vodka, St Germaine, chai tea, pineapple juice and lime juice. It was a very odd combo….not sure if I can say it was good or not…but I did finish it soooo….good enough to finish but not order a second. We ordered a mediterranean hummus which had za’atar spice, crispy chickpeas, fennel and coriander oil with lots of pita slices to share. I had the Salmon Poke Bowl which had cucumber, avocado, mango, cashews, seaweed salad, rice and crispy wonton chips. Stephen ordered Jerk Fish Tacos and fries. The food was delicious and we left with very full bellies.

We decided we needed to walk to work off the full bellies, so we just continued to walk along the waterfront until it started to rain again so we returned to the hotel to get ready for dinner. Gerry and Tracy were joining us to see Pink and Tracy managed to get us all a reservation for 7pm at Aloette.

Aloette is a diner concept from the folks at Alo, where gourmet tastes “meets cravings for cheeseburgers and lemon meringue pie”.  

What we ordered:

Nduja Stuffed Olives ~ with grilled halloumi and chimichurri

Grilled Beet Salad ~ with burrata

Scallop ceviche ~ with a plum sorbet

Stuffed Chicken Wings

And to share  for the table we got:

Fries ~ with aioli

Tempura Long Green Beans

And the best bread ever served with a roasted yeast compound butter

And for dessert we had the Strawberry Parfait

 Day 2, Monday July 24

Today is PINK Day!!! We did the regular morning routine…Stephen went for a run and I went to the hotel gym. We ordered breakfast and coffee to the room and then Stephen headed to work while I met up with Gerry and Tracy to head to the Eaton Center for a bit of shopping. Aritzia just happened to be having a major sale so we had some fun snagging some deals. Then a quick pit stop back at the hotel to get ready for the concert! I’m wearing my metallic pink pants, a lilac corset top and clear heels. Stephen did not feel like going with a P!NK theme 😀

We met up with Marianne and Marc and the 6 of us went to E11even for pre show drinks and snacks. Since we didn’t have reservations, we sat at the bar, which again worked in our favour because it started to downpour again! P!NK was being blasted on the speakers and the vibe was fun at the bar, lots of people decked out in pink and sequins!

We got to the Rogers Center around 6 PM, the excitement in and around the arena was palpable!  The show was sold out and I heard there were about 50,000 in attendance.  The line up for merch was soooo long we decided against it.  So we grabbed some drinks and headed to our seats for the opening acts.  Group Love was on first and they were an eclectic mix of Daisy Jones meets Nirvana. Then DJ Kid Cut Up who was amazing!  And then finally Brandi Carlile who is insanely talented and I loved her versions of Space Oddity and Creep.  I’d never heard of Brandi Carlile before and she reminded me a lot of KD Lang whose music I love.

P!NK hit the stage, or should I say dropped down from the rafters to the stage on a giant pair of lips with the song Get The Party Started. She was amazing! Her energy was high, her costumes were pink and sparkly and she was such a total badass all night!!! She had lots of interactions with fans, she was chatty and she seemed to be having fun and enjoying herself. We LOVED every second of it! We had high expectations and her performance exceeded them!

Day 3, Tuesday July 25

Time to head home today but our flight doesn’t depart until 6pm. Since Stephen had some meetings at his head office we decided to check out and take our luggage with us and he could get his stuff done and I would hang around the cafe and work on the blog. We took a quick lunch break at Irene (again) and along the way we saw FeFe Dobson performing live at Sugar Beach! That was a fun surprise!

Anyways we got to the airport and lucky for us there were no major lineups at security and no delays so we flew home on time!  Great way to end a quick trip to Toronto!