Is Portland further north than Toronto?

Asked whether Portland or Toronto lies further north, the usual instinct is Toronto, because it is in Canada and Canada sits on top of the United States on every map. That shortcut is how memory stores maps: we remember which country or region a city belongs to and then place the whole region above or below another, instead of remembering each city’s own position. Here it fails. Portland, Oregon, lies at 45.5° N, almost exactly level with Montreal and Ottawa, while Toronto sits at 43.7° N, about 210 km further south. Toronto is on a peninsula that reaches deep into the United States, and it is level with Nice and Florence. Psychologists have used this kind of question to show that our mental maps are tidied up: regions get lined up with each other more neatly than they are on a globe.