In my very first job post-college, I worked as a management consultant. This involved working onsite at clients around the US, and for one project, in Toronto Canada. I spent March/ April 1995 in Toronto, and while I was working too long hours to enjoy the city, I remember liking Toronto very much. Fast forward 27 years later, and we were back in Toronto for a quick overnight.
The trip was really for a family obligation, not a weekend away for us, so it was short and efficient. Most of the trip was spent on the road with just under 24 hours in Toronto proper. However, we passed through idyllic towns in the drive from New York City to Canada, including a drive-by of the always impressive Niagara Falls. We ate some delicious comfort food and squeezed in, not just one, but TWO fun sites in Toronto.
Member rewards helped us travel on a budget
We’re Marriott rewards members, and I have the Chase Marriott card, which comes with a certificate good for a free night each year that you renew. Currently, there is a welcome offer good for five free nights if you don’t already have the card! We used one of our certificates for the Westin Harbour Castle and were upgraded to a beautiful lakeview room.
Given our penchant for road trips (to see the 2021 lunar eclipse or just to buy a shirt), we rack up enough Marriott reward credits to achieve Titanium Elite status. This gave us a free breakfast offer at the Westin, which saved us $72 on the cost of two breakfast buffets. I think I got my 36-dollars’ worth: I had a made-to-order omelet, potatoes, bacon, a mini chicken Wellington (puff pastry), fresh pineapple and strawberries, mini pancakes with real maple syrup, mini croissant, mini banana muffin and what looked like a Danish but tasted more like a Chinese egg tart, plus fresh orange juice and a carafe of hot coffee. I even got a banana and pear for later. I was too stuffed for the smoked salmon unfortunately, but I mention it to cover the wide selection.
I definitely would return to this hotel. We did have to pay $40 for parking, but with a $300 room comped, we still felt like we had a grand time away for very little.
Don’t forget about reciprocal museum membership benefits
Our membership to one of the local art museums in Jacksonville, FL includes reciprocal benefits at museums and gardens in North America, including Toronto. Scott found the Bata Shoe Museum, which is housed in an award-winning, shoebox style building. It features over 1,000 shoes (though the full collection of objects tops 14,000!).
We got free admission (a savings of $28) and saw some really interesting exhibits on sneakers, toys and the history of shoes around the world. The small gift shop includes some practical items to help you clean shoes, boots, sneakers and even sandals.
Another free stop was the Toronto Botanical Garden. This small, but full garden includes a variety of flowers and plants in all stages of blooming. Walking paths all around the garden also provide variety and are very accessible, with lots of benches for resting. There is even an arched footbridge that takes you over rocks and running water.
Road tripping with a hybrid car helps keep costs low
No, gas isn’t over $200. This picture is a gas pump in Canada, which shows gas prices in cents per liter! That said, with gas nearing $5 per gallon at most stops, it helped that we had a hybrid car which gave us well over 50 miles per gallon.
Comfort food saves on food costs
It also helps that we prefer food that isn’t fancy and like to stop at local places. In Toronto, we ate in the Greektown area, which had small cafes featuring many international cuisines, not just Greek. We picked a small Thai restaurant, where they serve the pineapple fried rice in a pineapple.
We also tried an Egyptian café, where we had ful (like hummus with tomato and onion chunks mixed in, tameya (flat, extra crispy falafel covered in sesame seeds) and hawawshi (burger rolled into fried Egyptian bread).
Next stop Los Angeles
After we return from New York to Florida, our next trip will be a bleisure (business + leisure) trip to Los Angeles. As work would have it, we actually have two trips to Los Angeles this summer. Where are you traveling?
We are Scott and Caroline, 50-somethings who spent the first 20+ years of our adult lives in New York City, working traditional careers and raising 2 kids. We left full-time work in our mid-40’s for location-independent, part-time consulting projects and real estate investing, in order to create a more flexible and travel-centric lifestyle. 
Financial independence and early retirement is not something we originally focused on, but over time realized it was possible. Our free report, 
We visited Toronto for a few days back in 2019 and enjoyed it. Since you drove up to Canada, were the border crossings easier than flying (no testing requirements, etc.)? In August we will be doing a road trip to visit family in Colorado. We did a similar trip last summer and added some National Parks. But this summer we are just doing a shorter trip and just visiting family. (Not really looking to be traveling when everyone else wants to travel if we can avoid it!)
We did a lot of travel this spring — Spain in March/early April, and Germany and Iceland in May. Those were our first international trips since the pandemic. And in the middle of our two trips to Europe we got COVID after we visited some family. It was definitely nice to travel internationally again.
Safe travels to the West Coast!
So jealous of your international travels. Spain, Germany and Iceland sounds AMAZING! We’ll do Costa Rica this year, but everything else on the deck is domestic.