Canada - East Coast

[Dancergirl]

We are planning a trip to Eastern Canada this summer.

We plan to fly in to Washington first to spend a few days with family, then fly from there to either Toronto or Montreal.

Please can you share with me what's worth doing/visiting? Obviously Toronto is a must. I've heard Montreal and Ottawa are not worth seeing. What about Quebec?

Grateful for any tips please!

I would go to Newfoundland or Nova Scotia. More to see and good driving around very pretty seaside areas.

It depends what you are looking to do. Most people prefer Montreal to Toronto although if you are planning to go to Niagara then Toronto makes sense.

If you are looking for stunning coastal areas then Newfoundland or Nova Scotia as per Bubbles suggestion. Note, aside from St John's and Halifax these are very rural.

Quebec City is another popular place with history. From there you could go up the north side of St Lawrence river.

Alternatively you could explore a great lake.

We loved Quebec City, and Toronto. Thought Montreal was only 'nice'!

Think we want to stick to the cities rather than lots of rural areas.

not how did you get from Quebec City to Toronto?

We drove!! Via a few nights in Montreal and one night in a weird little town called Kingston. Was good fun 😊

I've heard about Kingston, isn't that where you can do the 1000 island boat tour?

We visited both Toronto and Montreal last summer - both for 3 nights. We loved both cities, in different ways.. They felt very different.

We drove between the two - long drive, but was easy driving.

We also did a night at Niagara Falls before flying out from Toronto for a week in the US.

We're looking at almost the same holiday (without Washington). I've got as far as thinking we should fly into Montreal, a few days there, then train to Quebec City for a couple of days and then explore by car. But not sure where! I think we will fly back from Quebec, but you can't fly direct to anywhere in the UK, so will have to go via Montreal again I think.

Watching with interest to see what people suggest!

We really enjoyed Montreal although this is quite a few years ago. Arty and foodie, lots of street theatre, open air cafes etc.

Algonquin National Park beautiful if you are going that way.

We've decided to ditch Washington unfortunately - it'll be too expensive with internal flights and dh thinks we'll be packing too much in.

So will plan for Canada only.

Depending on tune you could fly into Toronto, see Niagara and then take the train to Ottawa (which I recommend - it’s a lovely city but smaller than Toronto and Montreal), then take the train to Montreal and fly out from there.

Wow- as a Canadian, it's been interesting reading this thread. Especially when someone called Kingston 'weird' LOL. If you want to stick to cities OP, I'd go Toronto (lots of decent things to do for families or grown ups), niagara, a day in Ottawa or so, and then Quebec City. It's a five hour drive from Toronto to Ottawa, and a further three hours to QC. I wouldn't discount Ottawa- it is a lovely city, with Great scenery and the river divides English and French speaking Canada. Ottawa has great whitewater rafting just north of the city if you're into that.

As a fellow Canadian, I agree babyboots!

As an Anne Shirley fan, definitely Prince Edward Island!

We just got a trip priced up from Trailfinders - £13,000 with no meals included

We've left it very late to book so flights are obviously very expensive now. We need 2 rooms in each hotel (3 dc) so that bumps the price up.

Might need to rethink completely.

That’s a ridiculous amount. To be honest you can do much better if you organise yourself. I’m going to Vancouver with 6 adults for 12 nights and the cost of a house and flights worked out to be under £5k.

Have you looked at Air BnB?

Toronto is a bit bland IMHO.

Montreal has more to offer - more diverse, cool neighborhoods, fantastic food.

Try Air Transat for flights.

Which airport are you flying from in the UK?

As a Canadian I would skip Niagara - tacky except for the actual falls and to be brutal I think TO is a tad dull as well.

I would do QC and maybe Thousand Island area and the east coast provinces.

Other option is hiring a cottage on a lake , kids can swim and canoe etc. Canada is so big it takes ages to get anywhere so needs careful planning especially with kids.

Thank you.

Don't want to do Air BnB or a cottage - we hate self-catering!

As we've left it so late we might just do something in Europe instead and maybe plan this trip for next year.

Why cities only? The country, especially the coast, is stunning!

@BIWI - Any specific 'country' recommendations? We're planning to fly into Montreal, a few days there, then train up to Quebec. From there it's all a big mystery - I guess we explore one or other banks of the river - but any hints or tips for 'country' (from a start point of Quebec) would be very welcome.
(We've been to Toronto before, which is why that's not on our list at all, and have discounted Ottawa purely because the 3 cities of Ottowa, Montreal, Quebec are too far apart from each other to do all 3 in the same trip and Quebec appeals more than Ottowa).

New Brunswick coastline is lovely - St Andrews is a great little town to stop at. Prince Edward Island (although it's rather overrun with tourists these days, especially the Japanese who are obsessed with Anne of Green Gables! Nova Scotia, if you can get that far.

Sorry to hi-jack the thread Dancergirl, We're looking at East canada for next year, hopefully a few nights in Toronto followed by 10 days in a motorhome. I'd love some suggestions of places to visit, great scenery is a must!