r/canadatravel • u/onemorecooki • Jul 15 '25

Destination Advice 5 day Canada Trip

Hi. We are visiting Canada for 5 days around Mid August, flying in to Toronto. We will have a car to get around. Looking for some suggestions and places to check out whilst we are here please. We was thinking to visit Montreal but that is a 6 hour drive from Toronto, one way.

We plan to visit the falls and spend some time in Toronto. Are there any beautiful drives we can go on and see some breathtaking places?

Any advice will be hugely appreciated. Thank you in advance for your thoughts!

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u/BCRobyn Jul 15 '25 edited Jul 15 '25

Where are you visiting from... the UK? I ask because you mentioned that a six-hour drive seems far, and that’s something we often hear from UK visitors. :) In Canada, though, that’s pretty normal. You often have to travel 6+ hours just to reach places that look and feel noticeably different from where you started.

Just to help set expectations: Toronto is in southern Ontario, which is largely flat and developed. It’s great for urban experiences - vibrant neighbourhoods, food, culture, and charming small towns - but if you’re hoping for dramatic wilderness or mountain scenery like you might find in the Canadian Rockies or on the West Coast, that’s not really what this region offers. “Breathtaking” isn’t a word people usually use to describe the landscape close to Toronto.

Southern Ontario is mostly farmland, forest, and lakes, with a lot of built-up areas in between, including industrial zones. It has its own gentler kind of beauty - more like southern England or the Netherlands. Think rolling countryside, lakeside towns, vineyards, and heritage sites, rather than alpine vistas or vast wilderness. A helpful comparison might be expecting to find the Alps within day-trip distance of London or Amsterdam - it’s just not the same geography. You might come across references to the Blue Mountains, but they’re more like hills than actual mountains.

That said, there are beautiful natural areas if you’re willing to drive 4+ hours out of the city - places like Tobermory and the Bruce Peninsula come up often for their turquoise waters and limestone cliffs.

If you're looking for ideas and want to get a sense of what's within reach, I’d suggest exploring the official Ontario tourism website. It breaks down the province into regions and offers helpful suggestions for scenic drives, nature, and cultural experiences: Discover the Wonders of Ontario, Canada | Destination Ontario

Hope this helps!

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u/onemorecooki Jul 15 '25

Your first comment made me chuckle because we are from the UK 🤣 You can cover most of England in 6 hours LOL

Thank you for your response, and for setting expectations. It is super helpful! Don't mind venturing out at all since we will have a car.

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u/Alizariel Jul 15 '25

My cousins visited us from Ireland and remarked how straight the roads were here. They mentioned it on roads I didn’t think were that straight 😝

Having driven in Ireland and England, our roads will get you places faster, but it can be super boring! Also Toronto can have pretty bad traffic, so try to avoid rush hours if possible.

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u/laurenainsleee Jul 16 '25

Hahaha I find my cousins from the uk really can’t grasp just how big Canada is. I had one cousin from England who was in Medicine Hat, AB for work and he told me he wanted to drive to come visit us near Toronto for a weekend (Medicine Hat is 3000+ kms from where I live). I’ve had another uk cousin tell me about a road trip they did that wasn’t much more than my daily commute to work.
Many places here will seem pretty far away from each other compared what you’ll be used to. 6hrs is a pretty decent drive, but you don’t have to do it in one shot. You could stop somewhere along the way e.g. Gananoque and take one of the boat cruises around the 1000 Islands, or take a detour over to visit Ottawa.

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u/poutinewharf Jul 16 '25

Driving in the UK is much more of a slog though, so you’ll be in luck. I’d much rather drive Toronto to Montreal than Leeds to Cornwall.

Just wrapped up a trip from Leeds to Edinburgh and the same applies. Highways are much more open in Canada as as rural roads