This week, I got the amazing opportunity to visit Niagara Falls and Toronto, Canada with my mom and sister. What I expected to be a fun trip turned out to be a life-changing experience that fueled my desire for travel-above-all-else. Toronto is a beautiful place similar to New York City in ways like a Times Square-type area in the heart of the city, giant skyscrapers, a gorgeous skyline, an underground subway system, and a vibrant culture.

(Above: A view of the heart of Toronto from the top of a double-decker tour bus.)

(Above: A city street in Toronto, with the CN Tower in the distance.)

(Above: The beginning of Chinatown.)

(Above: The Toronto skyline in the afternoon.)

Toronto is also different from New York in many ways. For instance, whereas New York City can be dirty, overpopulated, and downright scary sometimes, Toronto is clean, the subways are air-conditioned, and the homeless population is more well cared for. The smell of urine is absent and the citizens are nicer in Toronto, more willing to be friendly to tourists and newcomers.

(Above: A totem pole in the subway underneath Toronto.)

Toronto is also a great canvas for artists to display their work, both in mural form and in sculpture.

(Above: A mural tucked away in the streets of Toronto.)

(Above: A sculpture close to the pier.)

There is also an island called Centreville you can travel to by boat where you can visit a small amusement park or nude beach!

On the streets isn't the only place to see art though; there are fantastic art museums (and other kinds of museums) all over the city, including the Royal Ontario Museum, the Textile Museum of Canada, the Gardiner Museum, the Spadina Museum, and the Art Galley of Ontario.

(Below: The Royal Ontario Museum featuring atattoo exhibit and other art.)

(Below: Pieces from the Textile Museum.)

(Below: The Spadina Museum and surrounding gardens.)

(Below: Toronto's Botanical Gardens.)

If I have not convinced you of Toronto's amazingness yet, the food culture in the city is fabulous. Before I visited, I had never been to a Hungarian-Thai restaurant where I could order schnitzel, pad thai, and a margarita at the same time, but now I have.

Yes, I ordered a margarita. "How, at your age?", you wonder? The drinking age in Toronto is 19 years old (18 years old in Niagara Falls) and the age for buying weed at one of the many dispensaries in the great city of Toronto is also 19. Usually, to buy pot at one of these places you need a prescription for medical marijuana from a doctor, but some of them will sell to you as long as you create a membership with them. Not that I advise you to buy some or anything. Don't do drugs, kids.

(Above: Signs Restaurant, a place that hires an all-deaf wait staff and teaches sign language to patrons for ordering food.)

(Above: Green Panda Cannabis Apothecary, one of the dispensaries that requires a medical marijuana card.)

Another must-visit place in Toronto is Kensington Market, a little bohemian area with lots of little shops, restaurants, tattoo parlors, bars, and street vendors selling cheap but beautiful knick-knacks and fresh produce.

(Below: Kensington Market.)

Some more famous places in Toronto include The Second City, a comedy club with a hilarious improv show that had me falling out of my chair laughing, and the Medieval Times Experience, where you enjoy a medieval-themed dinner with your hands and a jousting tournament as if you were a spectator in the stands, complete with crowns for everyone, a "serving wench" to bring you your food, cheering for your assigned knight-in-shining-armor, and a king and princess who enjoy the tournament along with you.

(Below: A knight bowing to hishorse at the Medieval Times Experience before preparing to compete in the jousting tournament.)

About an hour outside of Toronto is Niagara Falls, where the falls are located right in the center of the busy city. From rooftop restaurants, you can see right down into the water.

(Below: The town around Niagara Falls.

If you ever have the time and opportunity to visit Canada, I definitely recommend Toronto and Niagara Falls as places you have to include in your itinerary. They are truly amazing places and though Canada sometimes seems identical to America, I can assure you that Toronto seems like another planet when you're there. Bright, colorful, eclectic, and fast-paced, visiting Toronto is definitely something you need to add to your travel bucket list.