Travel Question...

[geminigirl]

I realize we've got a while before we book tickets, but with the cost of moving hanging over us, and knowing that September means three paychecks, I'm trying to pre-plan our two known winter trips, to my Mom and Dad for Thanksgiving in November (and since Orlando to New York is a popular flight, I'm not too concerned about that...I can comparison shop for tickets on airlines we like) and to Canada in December. Last year, we flew all the way through-Air Canada from O-town to Toronto, and then Air Canada Jazz from Toronto to Sudbury. Thing is...the Toronto-Sudbury flight cost as much as the Orlando-Toronto tickets. We were thinking that instead of flying striaght through, it might be less expensive for us to rent a car in Toronto and drive up. (The cheapest way to do it would be to fly into Buffalo, but that would add two to three hours onto the drive, and in potentially bad weather, at a holiday, and dealing with a border crossing, I'm not sure that's the best plan, so we've sort of decided that in the time/money equation, the couple of hours we save crossing the border is better for us than the fiscal difference.)

Anyway, onto the question. I've rented cars before, but only in the US, and it's always been when someone else is paying for it, or at the last second with Enterprise, who had a deal with the place I used to get my car repaired in Virginia. I think I know what the requirements are to rent a car in Canada, but I'm not sure what travel sites people like to find the best rental car deals.

Favorite sites for rental car deals when you travel?

(If you're in the Toronto-ish area, we're planning at the moment to spend a night on either end of our trip in Toronto, and might be up for socializing, though we might plan an extra day or two, since I've never seen Niagra Falls and would really like to. And while it might make more sense to do it in the warmer weather, I think our plan is to go via Ottawa in the summer, and see friends there. The drive from Toronto to Sudbury is apparently a better choice in the winter than Ottawa.)

Comments

[pinkfish.livejournal.com]

You are going to think this answer is flippant, but my favorite place to rent cars is Zipcar. Of course, you have to be a member, which probably doesn't make sense unless you travel a lot to their cities or you live in one of their cities.

Toronto is one of their cities.


The daily rates seem exhorbitant (around $75/day), until you realize that insurance, gas, mileage, taxes, and everything is included. Also, I have enjoyed walking past lines of people waiting at Avis for all that paperwork, walking up to my Zipcar, putting my card in the window and "beep!" I'm in and ready to drive.

[geminigirl]

Interesting. I'll have to look into it, since we'd need the rental car for about ten days, I had figured it was out of the question.

[sexykneesocks.livejournal.com]

when i fly into YOW i rent from Avis. it is on my company... but i am able to use the corporate discount personally when i rent on my own.

i would love to see you and i am in that general are there one week of every month. i think in Dec it is the week of solstice... if you are interested in getting together and you are up there, let me know.

hugs you!

[geminigirl]

I will keep that in mind...we're looking at something like 12/21-1/3, depending on the cost of flights, and what else we might want to do. Maybe we'll take a mini-vacation to Toronto, and go do the silly tourist stuff I've never gotten to do, like Niagra Falls and the CN tower, if I can convince Cayne to do that.

Depending on what else is going on, we may do a quick "how many people can we visit" tour in November, when we're up for Thanksgiving, as well...we'll see how that plays out. I'll keep you posted.

[schillerium.livejournal.com]

The drive from Toronto to Sudbury is apparently a better choice in the winter than Ottawa.

While admittedly taking the bus is a slightly different issue from driving, I'm going to disagree with that -- in the six years I lived in Ottawa, I never once had a problem taking the bus home for Christmas, while in the ten years I've lived in Toronto I've ended up caught in weather and/or traffic delays every single year. Highway 69 can be a nightmare if you're on it at the wrong time.

I can't remember if I've asked you what brings you to my benighted hometown before. Surely it's not just the tourist appeal, because there isn't enough of that to warrant a repeat visit.

[geminigirl]

"Benighted" eh?

zedrikcayne is from Sudbury, and after a brief exodus to Whitby, his parents moved back there last summer. His younger sister lives there as well. His mom and dad both taught in the public schools, too.

I've not driven either the route from Ottawa to Sudbury or Toronto to Sudbury myself (though I have been in the car for the Toronto to Sudbury ride) so I have no strong opinion one way or the other-perhaps my husband could elaborate more on why he would rather go Toronto to Sudbury in the winter, and Ottawa to Sudbury in the warmer weather.

[schillerium.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay. Well, it's entirely possible that my experience of Highway 69 in the winter belongs in the category of things that could only ever happen to me; life does tend to throw spitballs at me far more often than most other people. But if he's done both routes, he certainly knows what his preference is and why, and I'm not going to second guess that.

[geminigirl]

I asked last night, because I was curious. (I've only gone from Toronto to Sudbury by car in the summer, on the way to cottage, about a week before the Civic Holiday.) He said the route from Ottawa to Sudbury is mostly two lane roads, whereas 69 is four lanes for much of the journey, so if there is a traffic problem it takes far less time to extract yourself from it.

[schillerium.livejournal.com]

While that's true, most of the problems I've encountered on that route have been on the two-lane segment. I once spent three hours stuck on Woods Road north of Parry Sound, because the highway in both directions and Woods Road itself were all blocked by three simultaneous car accidents; another time I spent two hours stuck because a car accident happened at the precise spot where the four lanes merge down to two; another time I was stuck for an hour because the company working on the next few kilometres of extension north of Parry Sound saw fit to blast a rock cut at 2 o'clock in the afternoon.

But again, I suspect sometimes that the universe has a vested interest in making my life a pain in the ass, and throws problems at me that other people never have to go through.