Our trip was amazing and with the exception of a snow squall between London and Toronto, had clear weather the entire time (thankfully!!) Traffic in and around Toronto was terrible and I never want to do that part of the trip again.
Getting into Canada at the border crossing were some pretty basic questions ~ "where are you going, how long will you be there, what are you doing, have you ever been in Canada before, jobs, is this your vehicle". Getting back into the US we were asked our country of citizenship, where we had been, what we had done, how long were we there, did we bring anything back with us other than souvenirs. The crossing back into the US took much longer, as there were about 20 cars waiting in the multiple lanes to cross (most of them for the Garth Brooks concert that evening in Detroit, the guard said). LOL We were the only car crossing on the way into Canada at that time.
We did discover while waiting in line to get back into the US that our passports weren't signed. Oops. We just renewed them about a month ago and we had forgotten to sign them, so we did it sitting in the car, waiting. I'm surprised nothing was said on the way into Canada.
Hotel X was incredible and everyone we interacted with there was polite and beyond helpful. I realize at this caliber of hotel that is their job, but we appreciated it, nonetheless. The location was great for what we were in town for, but if we would ever go back, we'd probably stay downtown (and fly in without driving!)
I tried to get the 2 for 1 tickets for the CN Tower, but the website wouldn't accept my credit card. I called my credit card issuer to be assured it wasn't my card with the problem, it was the website. I mentioned it when we bought 2 full-price tickets at the tower and all I got was "our website has a pretty high security clearance, sorry". So high it won't accept US credit cards?? That was the only blip in our trip and it wasn't a big deal, we were planning on paying full price, anyway. We skipped the aquarium due to time and the amount of kids. Walked across the street to Steam Whistle Brewing (which is a really cool historic structure next to the train museum) after the tower and DH had a beer and then took a Lyft back to the hotel.
The concert was great, though I didn't really enjoy standing for 6 hours straight.
We stood on the edge of the pit right next to the front of the stage and DH bumped fists with the lead singer of Old Dominion. I stood back from the barricade just to give myself some breathing room. I didn't feel compelled to touch the band members, so I hung back when they were right in front of us...though people behind me were trying to crowd and touch them.
I'll see if I can upload some pictures later.
I found out why DH wanted to stay at Hotel X instead of the DoubleTree downtown. It was part of my Christmas present and he wanted to make it special for me.
We brought home $4 in Canadian money because we were planning on using it at the bridge toll since it was $3 American or $4 Canadian to get into Canada. Well, to get back into the US, it was $3.25 American or $4.25 Canadian and we didn't know if we could use a combination of money, so we paid in American dollars.
We had a great time and so much fun while on this trip.
I had a terrible attitude about it for many reasons when I first found out about it, but as it got closer and I knew the weather was going to be good, I was excited.
Our family obligation (bridal shower) yesterday was fun and it was a nice break from the drive. We got to see some of DH's family we hadn't seen in a few months, so that was nice. We put almost 1500 miles on the car making our big circle trip.
We're trying to plan our next adventure, seeing as I didn't die on this one
but with my Dad's health, our next 6 months or so is up in the air. Maybe some smaller, closer to home trips will happen, instead.
Thank you again to everyone that gave me advice, tips and recommendations for our trip. We truly appreciated all of them and every one of them was discussed with DH.
She did say this time of year they tend to run low on pesos so we should call ahead of that is what we needed. lol That is the only branch that keeps foreign currency on hand, none of the other branches do and it will cost us an additional $8 to order it.
