The Amazing Race! Canada/USA Road Trip July-Aug 2016 - Day 12 (Toronto and home)

[neilhd]

Last day today

We were up at 8ish today (a lie in!)

Ele was still not feeling well, so Joe and I left her to sleep for a bit and we went to the pool. The pool was really nice here, and we spent a good hour splashing around having fun.

We went back up and finished our final packing, attempting to dry our wet costumes with a hair dryer! Weighing the suitcases and a bit of redistribution saw us under the limit and ready to go. In the middle of all this I went over the road to Tim Hortons and got some coffee and cookies for us all.

We checked out and went to leave our suitcases at left luggage. The guy suggested we leave it with the valet, but unlike yesterday where they just did that for us, he wanted me to go outside, get the valet to bring the car, wait for him to do so, then load it up and then put the car back. That sounded like a waste of my time so eventually I persuaded him to do his actual job and store our bags!

As soon as we'd done that, Ele realised she'd left her hat in the room so we had to get a key of reception and go back and get it.

Our activity this morning was an island boat cruise that came free with the bus tour we'd done at the start of the holiday. I knew roughly where it was so we walked over there and a bus load of people was just getting off to go and do it, so we followed the crowd to the dock. We had to wait about 30 minutes I think before the boat came back and we could board. The tour was pretty good - the best bit was the views of the Toronto skyline:





If I attempted this I would be in the water in about 3 seconds flat. I have the balance of a drunk, one-legged man with no arms:



I'm a lucky guy - what a lovely lady:





The ridiculously good zoom on our camera let us capture these guys doing the Edge Walk on the CN Tower whilst we were out on the water:



It was nice and relaxing doing the cruise, and once off we went to the Amsterdam Brewhouse for lunch which was basically next door. This place is huge! And very popular - it was really busy in there. I had a chicken and brie pizza. Ele had a pulled pork bun and Joe had a pepperoni pizza. We had some desserts too - a chocolate tort and an ice-cream sorbet thing that had chocolate ice-cream with a raspberry sorbet inside. With the brown on the outside and the pink in the middle it was exactly the colour of a perfectly cooked steak. I forget what the bill was, but the food was delicious. Definitely one to recommend. They sell all sorts of their own beers as well, and will pair them with dish you order. Sadly I was driving so couldn't sample any.

We strolled slowly back to our hotel along the waterfront, and I went into a pharmacy to buy Ele some medicine. Of course I bought the wrong thing so we went back in and changed it. If she'd just come in the first time it would have been a lot easier!

Back to the hotel, we got our luggage and our car. The valet desk guy looked and sounded exactly like the Indian shop-owner guy from Stella.

Obviously we still needed gas rather urgently so I looked up the closest gas station and we went straight there. It was a bit of a faff as Mrs Google took us an odd way, and we got there with less than 10km remaining on the readout and all sorts of alarms and warning lights telling me to put some damn fuel in, like NOW.

It drank about 70 litres of the finest (ok, cheapest) fuel. My challenge now was to get to the airport without the needle dropping even a fraction below "full" so as to avoid any Hertz refuelling charges. The drive to the airport was uneventful and we returned the car with no problems. Up into the terminal, we printed our luggage tags (had checked in online) and dropped our bags. The queue for normal check in was very long but that didn't concern us!

With our bags dropped I spied a Starbucks and made everyone go there because I needed a coffee and there might not be one airside - that's not a risk worth taking. With that drunk we went off to go through security. We had boarding passes on our phones (even Joe - who thought it was quite cool that he had his on his own phone). I showed the woman at the security line who asked where we were going. I said London. She looked at my phone/pass and said "No, you're going to New York".

? I'm pretty sure I know where I live.

"Er, no. I'm going to London."
"But your boarding pass says New York"
I looked at it. "No, it says London!"
"It says LGW. That's LaGuardia Airport in New York."
"No, LGW is London Gatwick."
"No it isn't, it's LaGuardia"
"No, it really is London Gatwick. LaGuardia is LGA"
"No, LGW is La Guardia".

At this point I was getting rather annoyed and felt like shouting "For god's sake woman just accept you are wrong! I write software that searches airline flight systems for living and I know with 100% certainty that LGW is Gatwick and LGA is LaGuardia! "
Instead I calmly said, "No, LGW really is Gatwick. In fact, if you read the rest of it, it even says we are going to London on the pass".
"Oh, they must have the same code then."
I gave up at that point. There was no queue luckily, even with this lengthy exchange, and we were through quickly.

We found a place to sit. Toronto airport has hundreds of iPads dotted around that you can use, and they also connect to the nearby restaurants so you can order food and drinks to your table. Joe obviously thought this the coolest thing ever. Whilst Ele went off to look in the shops, I ordered myself a beer and Joe an apple juice. Ele had taken my credit card so I tried to use my Travelex Supercard for the first time. It told me the pin was wrong. Twice. I was pretty sure I had it correct, and tried to open the Supercard app. The app decided it HAD to update before I could use it. I gave up at this point and used my normal CC, paying the exchange fee. Eventually the app updated and I looked at the pin to find out that I had indeed put the right one in. From this I conclude the Supercard is useless! Our drinks never came and in the end I had to go and ask at the bar because they had forgotten about them. Joe was quite happy and worked out how to get on YouTube on the iPad on his table so he could catch up on DanTDM videos.

We had a long wait because we were early. We investigated the food options and decided on True Burger. We had to wait a while for it, but it was pretty good actually. We saw some noise-cancelling headphones in a vending machine and Ele wanted them as her head was killing her. I have some Bose ones and anyone that tries them on a plane immediately wants some because they are just amazing. They had Bose ones in the vending machine but they were very expensive unsurprisingly. They had a different pair by another brand for about £45 so we got those. They are ok actually. Not as good as mine, but very good for the price. Except they have a weird button that does the opposite of noise cancelling and amplifies everything around you. I think it's so that if the stewardess on the plane comes around you can just press that and not take the headphones off. So kind of a good idea, but of course Joe thought it funny to press it all the time whilst Ele was wearing them. And it's too easy to press by accident (it's on the side of the actual headphone), especially if you lean your head onto something. Joe was now upset because we both had noise cancelling headphones and he didn't. It was the last pair though - if there'd been another set there I'd have bought them for him. We promised to share with him and get him his own one day.

Finally it was time to board so we joined the small queue at the gate and got straight on. We had the same seats as on the way out. I didn't bother with the meal as we'd eaten. Ele and Joe had it but didn't eat it. I watched Cloverfield Lane on my iPad, and then we all tried to sleep for a bit. Joe dozed off quickly - it was late for him (the flight took off at about 10:30pm I think) but I can never sleep really. I did doze for a couple of hours. One very selfish woman kept her cabin blind open - illuminating the entire cabin - so she could read her book by it, rather than just using the overhead light. Why the cabin crew didn't make her shut it I don't know.

Eventually they served "breakfast" which was just a piece of banana bread, and eventually we landed, perfectly on time. Off the plane, and of course Joe needed the loo before immigration. I watched as hundreds of people walked by us, and just before he came out another plane-load joined from another direction. That plane was from Orlando, funnily enough, as was evident by everyone wearing Disney and Orlando clothing!

The queue for immigration was therefore very long and took us about 30 minutes to reach the front. We made up for this at the baggage carousel because for probably the first time in my entire life all our bags appeared at the precise moment we got to the carousel!

We went through customs, found my mum who had come to pick us up, and went home. We gave Joe his final clue - he had won the Amazing Race!


POST-TRIP and Highs and Lows

This was a really great holiday. We loved every minute of it! It went smoothly (mainly due to my obsessive planning). We saw loads, did loads and basically had an awesome time. Two Canadian provinces, Seven US states, 7 Cities stayed in. We saw Niagara Falls, the CN Tower, Times Square, went up the Empire State Building, walked over Brooklyn Bridge, rode bikes around Central Park, toured Boston and Toronto, drove through some amazing scenery and saw friends I hadn't seen in years. All accomplished within 12 days! I think we drove around 1,500 miles. The driving was easy and by sticking to a max of 4-5 hours per day it wasn't a chore. Joe was super-well behaved throughout and helped out with suitcases and didn't complain at all.

Considering we booked the flights on a whim - purely because we spotted a good deal and didn't really know what we wanted to do or where we wanted to do - it worked out rather blooming well!

Within 2 weeks of coming back - we've booked another one for next year! We will fly into Montreal and out of Toronto on similar dates to this year, this time with Air Transat. We hope to visit Washington DC and Long Island. Apart from that, no plans yet. We had considered Orlando for Xmas 2017 but decided we'd rather do this instead. It will be a full 14 days though this time.

Making the trip into The Amazing Race was a great way to engage Joe. We might have to do that again next year, too.

HIGHS:
Our suitcases: Sounds daft, but our new Tripp 4-wheeled cases made getting around much easier. A doddle to wheel around, roomy and tough enough. And easy to spot due to being bright colours.
Packing cubes: How have I never had these before? They are INCREDIBLE! On a trip like this they made all the difference. Our clothes would have got creased and scrunched into an unwearable mess within a couple of days with the amount of different places we went to. The packing cubes kept everything neat, crease-free and organised. We had a set each in different colours, so every day just pulled them out the case, unzipped and extracted a T-Shirt or a pair of shorts or whatever, zipped it back up and chucked it back in the case. If you are doing a road-trip, then GET SOME. It'll be the best money you ever spend, I guarantee it.
Hotels - all apart from the Holiday Inn in Plattsburgh and the Scranton Hilton were amazing. The Hilton was ok I suppose. Nothing special. The Holiday Inn was a cesspit.
Niagara Falls - Wonderful place. Our hotel room view there was breathtaking.
Our car - A Dodge Journey would never have been my first choice, but it was actually great. Super-comfy and ate up the miles.
Walking over Brooklyn Bridge - a long-held desire!


LOWS:
The stupid stewardess who made us wait 20 minutes by the loos rather than moving her trolley back 6 inches deserves her own special place in hell.
Air Canada Rouge in general. It wasn't so bad that I'd never use them again, but the staff were surly, the food was terrible and the seats not very comfortable. If I'd not bought the extra legroom it would have been a nightmare. They were a bargain however! I looked for next year and they were over £900pp. Nope!
Holiday Inn Plattsburgh - awful place.

So that's that - roll on next year's road trip!

Next up though is Ele and I returning to New York for 5 nights in January for her 40th birthday! Bonus 1 - it's just the 2 of us, no kids! Bonus 2 - Business class on the way out!

[Mortimer Mouse]

What a great trip. You've been on a real adventure.
What a stupid woman in Toronto airport. Some people will never admit when they're wrong.

Glad you've done some highs and lows as I love reading them.

We fancy stopping at Washington for a few days on our next trip to Orlando, so will be interested to see what you think of it.

A great read. Thanks for posting.

[Cutiepie]

A super trip! thanks for sharing and I have some tips for our trip to Toronto next summer

[disney owl]

great holiday

[jocat]

Really enjoyed reading along.

How did you find the short stays in each place? Did you find yourself wishing you'd spent longer anywhere? We're doing a West Coast road trip next year, and our current planning is for 6 different hotels in a range of places. I'm struggling with it a bit, as I'm not sure I'm going to cope very well with the constant packing and unpacking. There's so many places we want to see though, that I'm going to have to just accept it!

[neilhd]

Originally Posted by Mortimer Mouse

What a great trip. You've been on a real adventure.
What a stupid woman in Toronto airport. Some people will never admit when they're wrong.

Glad you've done some highs and lows as I love reading them.

We fancy stopping at Washington for a few days on our next trip to Orlando, so will be interested to see what you think of it.

A great read. Thanks for posting.

See more...

Me neither, to be fair!

[neilhd]

Originally Posted by jocat

Really enjoyed reading along.

How did you find the short stays in each place? Did you find yourself wishing you'd spent longer anywhere? We're doing a West Coast road trip next year, and our current planning is for 6 different hotels in a range of places. I'm struggling with it a bit, as I'm not sure I'm going to cope very well with the constant packing and unpacking. There's so many places we want to see though, that I'm going to have to just accept it!

See more...

To be honest, I wish we'd had longer in every place we went to (apart from Scranton and Plattsburgh, obviously). There's always so much to see and do that we only scratched the surface of everywhere really.

The packing and unpacking was made into a non-problem with the packing cubes, and by designating a suitcase for dirty clothes (we put all dirty clothes into a carrier bag each day and that bag went into the designated suitcase). I really cannot recommend packing cubes highly enough.

I'm jealous of a west-coast trip! We booked our flights for next year really early, and a few weeks later there were some amazing flydrive deals with BA to the west coast, and I would have loved to have done that instead. Oh well, there's always next time!

[stecee]

What a great holiday, you've done so much, visited some beautiful places and really whetted my appetite for this type of holiday.
Another fantastic TR, I've really enjoyed reading it.
Thanks for sharing your experience.

[neilhd]

Originally Posted by stecee

What a great holiday, you've done so much, visited some beautiful places and really whetted my appetite for this type of holiday.
Another fantastic TR, I've really enjoyed reading it.
Thanks for sharing your experience.

See more...

Thanks for reading!

[Glee Fan]

I've really enjoyed reading this report. lots of ideas, pictures and humour - just how a good trippie should be!

Hope you both have an amazing trip to NY in January