PING: Anyone been to Toronto?
 

I booked my flight for London for my summer job and it looks like I have an 9 hour layover in Toronto on the way over. I'm seriously thinking about renting a car and going out for a few hours since the layover is during the day.

Niagara Falls is great, but it seems a bit daunting to do it in my time frame.

Hamilton is close and has two places I found online that might be interesting, the Canadian Football Hall of Fame and the Canadian Air Museum. Anyone been to either? Any good?

Or are there other places that would be a fun diversion for 4-5 hours?

In the Toronto downtown area, there is the Hockey Hall of Fame and the CN Tower. Hitting up both of those would take up a big chunk of your layover time.

It has been about 10 years since I was last in Toronto, and it was for a conference, so we pretty much stayed in the downtown area.

Not one much for heights, but the hockey hall of fame would be cool. How on Earth that didn't come up in my search is beyond me. Kept getting things about a brewery...which was probably a bad idea before a long flight!

Niagara falls is out...for sure...go to the hockey hall of fame...that will kill your time plus there are some pretty good restaurants close by.

Taco Bell isn't a good idea either before a long flight :D

Yeah, getting thrown off the plane in Iceland or something doesn't sound like my idea of fun! :)

Speaking at a conference in Toronto at the end of July. Not sure how much time I'll have to do fun stuff, but I'd also love some pointers.

I enjoyed spending 60-90 mins at The Distillery District when I was in Toronto for a weekend 2 years back. Boutiquey shops, art galleries, etc in what used to be a uhhh distillery. Not far at all from center of downtown.

The Distillery Historic District

Distillery district is cool. Hockey HoF is a must. If it's nice out, just walking around the shore around the CN Tower / SkyDome can be a nice way to spend an hour or two. Lots of great restaurants.

We (the rest of Canada) like to crap on The Big Smoke but, frankly, it's a pretty awesome city.

Thanks. Looks like a day at the Hockey HOF and Downtown is in order. Car rental prices are insanely low, so that looks to be a better option than cab rides in and out of town, and I prefer the freedom of having a car anyway.

What he said...can't go wrong with a day like that.

Here's another idea, Canada's Wonderland is about 20 minutes from the airport if you are into amusement parks.

Canada's Premier Amusement Park | Canada's Wonderland

Toronto has a pretty good Chinatown if you're into that sort of thing. Also just west of Chinatown is Kensington Market, which is a bit of a bohemian market with all sorts of food and bohemian/earthy type shopping at reasonable prices.

That's exactly what I did before my flight to London last year.

(just substitute "airport bar watching college football" for "brewery")

Another nice destination is High Park and the Bloor West Village. A friend of mine lived right by there and when I visited him I would get up early each morning and go for a run through the park and along the shoreline. Beautiful area, lots of people.

I did see some stuff on Kensington Market. It looked pretty interesting. Apparently I need to schedule more layovers in Toronto. Sadly, my return trip goes straight into O'Hare.

Hockey Hall of Fame followed by some Canadian Ballet......

The Kerry Fraser Walk of Fame

Oh Snap...you are playin with ML's rath

lol
9 hour layover in toronto might not be enough time to do a whole lot. Toronto traffic is silly and though it seems feasible to drive downtown and bounce around, it might not work.
what time and when is your layover

It's from about 11:30 in the morning till about 9 that night.

Hamilton and Niagara would be out for sure.

Yonge Street is always vibrant during the day for shopping and attractive women

You could go up the CN Tower, shop at the Eaton Centre (don't get shot though!), check out the bar & entertainment district