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Trip to TORONTO.
DasUberEdward
Registered User regular
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So a few of my colleagues (see: 20 year old students) and I from the states plan on making the trip up north to visit our good friends in Canada. By good friends I mean locals who have no idea who we are but would be more than willing to spend our lowly american dollar. We intend on staying in a hotel for probably about two or three nights. We'll see the falls, visit a casino, maybe have a few (many) drinks. Does anyone have any tips or advice when barely heading abroad? Could someone share trip insights or suggest definite places to visit and places to stay away from?
DasUberEdward on
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That'd be a good start.
Which do you want to go?
I should have clarified. We just plan on stopping to see them briefly with most of our time spent and accommodations being in Windsor.
Niagara Falls has a tourist area called "Clifton Hill". Some of the stuff is really tourist-trappy, others are genuinely cool. I'm sure there are numerous websites that will describe these for you.
Windsor, other than the Casinos, is a pretty boring city. I'd advise spending more time in Niagara Falls, given a choice between the two.
Would it even be boring to people who have been stuck in Ohio for their entire lives? One of my friends has never even left the state let alone stay in a hotel room. Our original plan was NY but the expense kind of put the option on the back burner and we opted for the much closer and cheaper option.
"Hey, guess what? I won the grand prize in a contest, and got a week-long trip to Windsor!"
"Yeah? What was the second-place prize?"
"Two weeks in Windsor."
Windsor has improved somewhat over the years, but it's still not really the sort of place people take vacations to. There's a casino or two, a couple of titty bars, and the legal drinking age here is 19, but Windsor isn't an especially pretty town, and there's very little else to do there: the population is just over 200,000, so it simply doesn't have the base to support anything really different or exciting. Windsor is a place you drive through and get a coffee.
Go to Niagara Falls. Or better yet, go the extra couple of hours up the QEW and stay in Toronto. It's a big city, almost Chicago-sized, and there's a *ton* of stuff to do there. Theatre, awesome restaurants, hockey games, tourist stuff like the CN Tower, great shopping, bookstores, arcades. Spend a day in Niagara, either on the way up or going back down, but if you spend most of your time in Toronto you won't be disappointed. It's like an affordable minature version of New York, we even have our own tiny little Times Square these days. And I think there are quite a few forumers from the TO area who can give you tips on good places to eat or visit.
I do see how the logistics were totally fubar'd with the idea of Niagara falls. The way we see it at the moment is "hey. . .we're in ohio. What's near and moderately different?"
I mean
Looks pretty impressive to us.
It's a bit upscale and pricey, but worth the trip for a dinner out.
Other than that there is a billiard hall/bar that had some pretty decent live hardcore; this was also a great time, I wish I could remember the name of it.
If you're looking to get some Absinthe there is a little cafe called "Milk," which has a great atmosphere. If you just want a good place to hang out during the day and drink coffee it works for that as well. One of the highlights of my trip was setting at a table with a few of my mates and smoking my churchwarden and sipping on an absinthe (because I'm pretentious like that).
Well, have fun.
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Any other thoughts?
My vote is go to Niagara -- it's only probably an hour more away (although I guess you'd have to pay a toll in NY) -- and there you can stare at the falls for a while, toodle around the casinos, and you also have the option of driving up to Toronto (2 hours) to see museums, gawk at big buildings, shop, etc etc.
Niagara Falls/Toronto is your best bet, even though it'll take you slightly longer to get there, and you'll have to pay tolls on the I-90. Well worth it, given the alternative.
This is true... Check weather reports before you go, guys. The first big snowstorm of the year here in Montreal dropped as much snow as most places in Ohio will see in an entire year. Southern Ontario doesn't differ a heck of a lot from Ohio in its overall weather, though.
It's not that Windsor is bad per se, it's just very, very not great.
It doesn't hold a candle to this:
You're correct. And yeah we're all 19/20 so actually having viable options for a night life is a drastic change for us. I'll run the idea of heading to toronto by everyone but I think at this point everyone is looking for a quick fix and a brief taste.
I'll try to convince them that the extra two hours is worth it.
Just to clear it up - Toronto is actually 4 hours away from Windsor.
However, if you guys decide that an extra 2 hours is worth it, one option would be to go London, Ontario. It's not a big town (in fact it's a little bit of a party university town), but for 19-20 range, you'd have much more fun hanging out in London then you would in Windsor.
Edit - but if 4 hours is ok and you think Windsor is more fun then where you're at, Toronto will blow your mind.
If you're going by plane then you need a passport as of last year.
Shopping:
Sears Centre
Yorkdale Mall
Siteseeing stuff:
Hockey Hall of Fame (even if you don't really follow hockey, it's pretty cool)
CN Tower
Casa Loma (Castle in the Toronto area)
Museums:
ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) is very good
Ontario Science Centre
Food:
I personally recommend Baton Rouge. There's a new one right on Front street near the SkyDome.. err... RogersCentre/CN Tower, and another on Yonge Street.
Otherwise just wander around Yonge street, you'll find quite a variety of things to try.
As a start.
I don't really know what there is to do in Toronto. Like most people, I'm too busy working to bother seeing my own city. The CN tower is pretty nice though.
But yeah, walk down Yonge St. There's tons of stuff to see and do. Dundas Square is pretty awesome also, but I can't really think of a reason why. I've never actually done anything there, I just like it a lot.
Nightlife
If you want to hit some clubs, there is a large collection of them in the clubbing district (I feel like Hank Scorpio), which is located on and around Richmond Street. (Also downtown) If you would prefer a regular bar or pub type atmosphere, there are plenty of those too. Off the top of my head:
Madison (located at Bloor and Spadina, downtown) - this is a pub that is actually several converted old houses and is pretty popular with the university of toronto students. Thursday nights and weekends are usually packed. Nice laid-back atmosphere.
Bier Markt (located on The Esplanade, downtown) - this is a bar that specializes in beer. Massive beer menu and usually good music. Added bonus: a couple of other large bars right next door.
Schmooze (located near John St, south of Adelaide, downtown) - This bar has a lot of yuppies, but the real payoff is Friday nights, when drinks are $2.50. Bartenders with flair and fancy young folk are other draws here (if that's your thing). I tried to confirm that they are still doing the Friday cheap drinks, but couldn't find much. I know they're still doing cheap drinks, but can't guarantee $2.50.
Sightseeing
The CN Tower is popular amongst tourists. Could be something you'd want to see, although not really my thing.
Eaton Centre - big ass mall that doubles as a tourist attraction.
Restaurants
This is where Toronto really shines. Cultural foods abound, and mostly authentic to boot! Chinatown, Koreatown, Little Italy, Greektown are all places you should check out if you guys are into food. And if you're not digging the cultural food scene, there are tons of regular restaurants that are delicious as well. If you have specific questions in this area (or any other really), I can do my best to answer them.
1) Start at Union, walk east 2 blocks to Front Street/Younge Street. Walk north on Younge stoping where ever you feel until you Hit about.... Bloor. This would take most of the day but there is a bunch of cool stuff. Bloor/Younge is the second main Subway 'hub'.
1) Start at Union, walk North 4 blocks to Bay Street and Queen Street. Walk West on Queen stoping where ever you feel until you Hit about.... Spadina. This would take most of the day but there is a bunch of cool stuff. (Queen West is more interesting than Younge, its the Fasion/Hipster district) You can then take the Street Car east back to where you started.
Good advice all around, though.
Its where everyone that is underage in the Detroit Metro area go to drink.
Would you go to Detroit on vacation?
Thanks.
Good stuff. Expensive but quite good.
Yeah we went all through there. Futureshop was interesting, so was Tim Hortons (why do you have so many?) It was mostly window shopping as this was a spur of the moment trip. Unfortunately we never made it to This Is London, I heard that was a good spot.
They act as backup power generators. A dozen donuts will get you about 6 hours of power on the carbs alone.
The town I grew up in has maybe 30,000 people, tops, and it was more like 25,000 when I was growing up there. When I last looked, they had something like 5 Tim Hortons, and maybe another 8 Tim Hortons lookalikes (a few Dunkin Donuts, maybe one or two others from different chains, a few independent joints). I'm pretty sure Canada as a whole holds the international crown of most donut shops per capita, and Tim Hortons is one of the most successful chains.