Yesterday, Michael and I came down to Hamilton because I am cat sitting for my daughter this week. Michael will stay with me for a couple days, but he uses four screens when working at home, so it’s a bit challenging working just on his laptop. Patti will come down and join me for Wednesday to Friday.

We each brought a suitcase, and I brought a cooler with some food for the week, my bike bag, bike, foam rollers, bike pump, single bed mattress for Patti, and I bought an Apple Watch in Burlington on the way here. I’m tired of Fitbits failing in a year or less. I figure why worry about travelling light when driving.

Michael and I went for a walk, and picked up dinner at Meltwich, which I can’t recommend. It was heavy and not very tasty.


There’s a nice view from the balcony of Hess Street and George Street where there are a lot of restaurants and bars.

Ralph started life on the street and took a long time to relax after being adopted, but has clearly been thrown by having someone new looking after him. We only found him last night by looking under things. And only knew that he came out in the night while we were sleeping because I had cleaned the litter boxes before going to bed, and they were both dirty again this morning. Unfortunately, he was too nervous to eat, and his food remained untouched this morning.

He was hiding under the office desk this morning, and when I discovered him and cleared a few things away from him, he did allow me to pet him, but wouldn’t come out.
A few weeks ago, Patti, Cindy, and I were going to drive down to Hamilton to do a group ride, led by Everyone Rides, of street murals of Hamilton, however, thunderstorms were threatening in the morning, and we decided not to go. Fortunately, the group shared their rides on Ride with GPS, and I was able to follow two of them today.
I decided to do the 6km
Mural Map: Beasley, Downtown, Hess Village ride this morning, and then return for lunch with Michael, followed by the 12 km
Concrete Canvas 2023 Route ride this afternoon. There was a lot of overlap between the two rides, but it was too complicated to try to put them together on my iPad, and being a total of only 18 km for the day it was unnecessary.
The first mural I encountered was less than a kilometre from where we are staying.

This one caught my attention. Doug’s head got served up last week over the Greenbelt scandal.

Hamilton has many independent coffee shops. I had an excellent latte at this one.

This quirky business sign caught my eye.

Hamilton is building a lot of protected bi-directional cycle tracks. Montreal has similar infrastructure. Cycling infrastructure can be useful for people with mobility challenges as well as cyclists, because it provides a much more comfortable ride than rolling over a concrete sidewalk with a bump every 1.5 metres.

Beasley Park had a skateboard park, playground, splash pad, murals, and, something I’m seeing much more frequently as I travel around Ontario, a homeless encampment.



Murals provides so much colour and character to a city.


James Street North has quite a few patios on the road and lots of interesting independent businesses.


This is the Hamilton West Harbour GO station.

This is LIUNA Station. From the plaque outside the station: “Hamilton CN station. This building recalls the importance of the railway to the development of Canada’s industrial cities. Completed in 1931, it combines a strong classical design with a fluid circulation plan, making it one of the best urban stations of the interwar years. Its temple facade and the spacious plaza are manifestations of the City Beautiful movement which marked this period. Strategically located, the station served a community whose fortunes relied heavily on the business and service of the railway. After the Second World War, it became an important gateway for immigrants to Canada.” It is now a banquet hall.

In front of the station is Immigration Square. The sculpture is entitled, Courage, Hope and Dreams.

I was running late for getting back to the apartment for the agreed-upon time of noon so I cut the ride short, but it turned out that Michael had a meeting he hadn’t anticipated. So I went out to pick up my lunch over on Locke Street. Hamilton is a city of many neighborhoods. Locke Street has many restaurants and bars on it and has recently had a new residential high-rise built near Main Street.
I used this pedestrian bridge over the railway corridor to get there. Connections like this are really important for Active transportation and can actually make trips much shorter than when a car is used that must use bridges on main streets to get around rail corridors, or other obstructions.

The bike lane is protected in one direction, but not the other here, and as you can see, the one that isn’t protected is blocked.

Hamilton has quite a few public water fountains, that also have water bottle filling stations and bowls for dogs.

King William Street also has quite a few restaurants and beautifully renovated buildings. It also has cobbles and is only one way, which makes cars feel very much like guests, and it felt comfortable riding here, even without any cycling infrastructure.


Gore park reminds me of the centre of University Avenue in Toronto.

In front of this courthouse is a statue dedicated to the Defenders of Upper Canada during the war of 1812. The United Empire Loyalists came to Canada after the American Declaration of Independence. I have ancestors who were Loyalists. My grandmother gave me a plate with this statue depicted on it, and I have given it to my daughter, who has recently become quite interested in genealogy.


The Hamilton GO Centre bus and commuter rail station is Streamline Moderne, a type of Art Deco Architecture that emerged in the 1930s. It opened in 1933 as the head office of the Toronto, Hamilton, and Buffalo Rail. (TH&B).

Hamilton City Hall was designed in the modernist international style by Stanley M Roscoe. It was officially opened in 1960.

When I was taking a picture of this mural entitled Procession, someone walked up to me and asked me if I had any questions about it. It turned out that it was the artist Lester Coloma. He painted the mural on the side of the Salvation Army store for its opening on September 25, 2019. The clock in the image reflects the date. He told me he designed it to “reflect the community’s , rich, historical and cultural importance.” You can read more about it on his website. We had a great conversation about the arts, my bike, and my travels, as well as some of his other work. It was a wonderful encounter, and the first one I’ve had with the artist and all the years that I have been photographing street art.

Nearby were these colourful pieces.


This area has been upgraded with a bike path, separated from the sidewalk since I first went through here.

This is a legal street art wall. And these are the instructions posted on it.


These raised sections of the Victoria Street cycle track means that the bus is not pulling into the cycle track, but that the track rises to the level of the sidewalk and is well marked as a potential conflict area.

This colourful mural is an augmented reality mural. When you scan the QR code, it opens a website on your phone and animates the mural as you watch on your phone screen. It was fascinating. I wish I could have figured out how to make a video of it but I couldn’t, so I did a couple screen caps of what I was seeing on my phone.




With my phone almost out of battery I headed back to the apartment. Ralph hadn’t come out all day long so we put down some fresh food and went out for drinks, hoping that he would come out while we were gone. He did come out and use the litter box, but didn’t touch the dinner we left out. I hope he relaxes soon.


We return to the apartment and cooked ourselves some frozen fish I had brought with me and ate some leftovers that were in the fridge.
I’ll finish with a couple more murals of the huge number I saw today. I highly recommend exploring downtown Hamilton if you enjoy frequenting independent businesses, good cycling infrastructure, and plentiful street art.


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