Welcome to the fifth day of my Furnal Equinox 2023 summary, told through submissions! Over the past long weekend, I've been doing my usual post-convention summary by sharing a photo a day from my time away, while recounting the events of the day on which the photo was taken, exactly two weeks ago:

Today's start was a relatively early one, for the benefit of allowing Ursus to get on the road early. After a breakfast at the Mizzen, I helped get his belongings down to his car, and after a final bear hug, he was on his way. I returned to the room, where I made some tea, finished my own packing, and waited to gift my bottle of Welsh whisky to a friend on staff.

- sidebar: I had promised to reveal why I bought that whisky in Gatwick airport duty free in the first place! My plan was to have it at my panel, both to wet my whistle as I spoke and to have a nice prop for a Welsh panel. As it turns out, no alcohol in the con space, so I offered it to the first staff member who wanted it. Silly me. :P -

With my flight departing quite late in the evening, I had an entire day left in Toronto, and so I decided to take things easy. After vacating my room, I headed down to hang out in the lobby for a bit, both to observe the scene of a large con winding down and to bid a fond farewell to good friends. A couple of fursuiters wandered merrily around the lobby, no doubt subscribing to the mantra of 'The con isn't over if we say it isn't!'. I enjoyed a light lunch in the hotel restaurant, again looking out on the lobby and watching people filter out, and the queues for check-out and valet parking grow shorter and shorter.

Knowing that hanging around would likely just hasten the onset of PCD, and committed to doing something productive with the remainder of my time in Canada, I set out on foot for a new attraction in the downtown Toronto area: Little Canada. Ursus visited it on Sunday and seemed to have a grand old time, and recalling fondly the joys of Hamburg's Miniatur Wunderland attraction, I set off in search of the Great North made small. I have to say, I spent a good couple of hours wandering through its halls, and enjoyed every moment! The level of detail in the miniature cities was extraordinary, and it was obvious to see that the builders had a lot of fun bringing the numerous dioramas to life. One feature that particularly interested me was a so-called shrinking device, which visitors can pay to enter, have pictures taken from all angles, and a scale model of themselves made! While I didn't do so this time, I'd be tempted to invest in such a model in future, if I ever get around to setting up a model rail set. ^__^

I headed back to the hotel, and returned to see... this! Of course, the colour scheme of these lights can be changed to correspond to the colour scheme of organisations that are hosting conventions at the Westin, but to go from a nice calming blue-green to a bright red was a bit... jarring. Part of me wondered whether the hotel was angry that the convention had stopped. :P Curious, I moseyed over to the convention space to see what event was being hosted next, and wondered how they could ever hope to have more fun than had been had over the past few days. After a couple more hours - during which I bumped into a British furry whom I hadn't seen in years, and spent some time chatting with a lingering staff member - I bade farewell to the Westin for the last time this year, and made my way to Union Station.

Walking straight through Union Station, I made my way to what has become an end-of-FE tradition for me, albeit a rather expensive one - dinner in the CN Tower. I specifically save to eat there and enjoy the views from above; it triggers the same happy feelings in my strange brain as visiting somewhere like Little Canada. It seemed rather appropriate, then, that I should see Canada in miniature twice in one day, from different perspectives. Plus, it meant that I could go straight to sleep on the flight, and not have to worry about what microwaved mush was coming down the isle in the trolley on the flight. I started with a salmon and ended with a nut cake with apple sorbet, all washed down with a pint of local cider, and it was abso-lute-ly de-lic-ious. The views, as ever, were spectacular. :)

Descending the elevator back down to the ground, I made my way to Union Station properly this time, and caught the UP Express back to Pearson. I made it to the gate in plenty of time, and so picked up some drinks for the flight home (those bottle of iced tea, specifically. The only bottled iced tea I can get here is Lipton, and it's just not the same... :< ). Boarding was rather speedy, and when I sat down in my seat, which just so happened to be the same seat in which I'd sat on the flight over on the same type of aircraft, I realise two strange things - first, the 5 rows in front of me were completely empty, and second, the guy sitting in the isle was the same guy as was sat there on my flight over. As we waited at the gate, we chatted for a bit, both amused by the coincidence. He eventually moved to the row in front to get a row to himself, which consequently left me with a row to myself. Yay! ^^

What was not so yay was that, owing to an engine system malfunction, the flight was an hour delayed departing from Pearson. Even so, after we eventually departed back for the Old World, with plenty of legroom to enjoy, I took out my trustee woolly hat and scarf, and settled down to sleep.

Hope you enjoy!