This is part three of my Nuit Blanche 2007 write-up, be sure to see Act One and Act Two. You can follow along with my travelogue on Google Maps.
So the cab dumped Ken, Justin and I at Queen at Simcoe, at the WHAT WILL YOU DO TO COOL THE EARTH? The idea was to inspire people to think of ways of reducing global warming… by sending text-messages to be displayed on the screen…
Of course, this didn’t completely work: “I will hold my farts”, “I will only eat once a week”, “I will not work for Disney”, “Stop wasting Electricity on a screen showing texts on queen street”… Ken and Justin were enthralled, and probably responsible for most of those 😉
Right next door, was Ghosts @ Campbell House, which I couldn’t find in the official Nuit Blanche program, but was just a fun exhibit: glow-screens with timed-flashbulbs… painfully blinding, but entirely amusing 🙂
Justin declared he was heading home, and Ken was preparing to take off too… but I couldn’t do that. It was about 0555, my feet had blisters like I’d never experienced before, I couldn’t walk very well at all – but I wasn’t done: I had to visit Lower Bay / The Ghost Station. And I’m sure glad I did.
So, imagine you just spent the past 12 hours touring a city you only know a little, having some very unique experiences… then you go through an unremarkable steel door in the middle of a semi-busy subway platform… and you end up in a different world:
Lower Bay was amazing.
It was dark, sparsely lit by 40W incandescents in the corners, a train on each side of the platform, a massive sub-woofer sound system – using the cars as resonance chambers. Words do not describe. You felt the ‘music’ (noise?), you smelled the dust. You knew other people were there, but you could barely see them. You know that in a few minutes, nobody will be here again, except for the ghosts. Tranquil yet unnerving at that same time.
It was the perfect end to an amazing experience. The Night Is Over.
Going topside again, shuffling my way along Bay street, I captured this scene of the city waking up.
Caught a bus downtown – but everything was a total mess/detours because of the 10K run – and I have to give the driver directions!
Made it back to 151, changed my clothes, sat and sorta just vegged while chatting with the few people awake on #SPORKS… caught the train and went home.
Next year, I’ll have to pick and plan my journey, just showing up and wandering was fun, but I think we wasted more time getting across the city than actually looking at things. But I have no regrets, and I can’t wait till next year. Highly recommended. Will you come with me?