Summary of USA and Canada Tour 2012

Our Tour commenced on 30th August 2012 for 49 days taking in the West Coast of USA, The Canyons, East Coast USA and Canada back to New York.

The Tour was put together for us by our Travel Agent David Grant of Happy Holidays at Ettalong NSW Australia.  We selected three tours by bus and David filled in the rest for us to complete a balanced tour of organised tours and time out for our self to choose what we wanted to do. David selected our accommodation outside of the organised tours and he made some good selections for us. 

In hind sight there is very little I would change as we got to see the main highlights we had asked for and found some bonus highlights along the way.   

Our holiday photos have been posted so that they all read in the order that we travelled so you can continue reading down through the older posts right through to the end of our holiday in New York City.

We started our Tour at San Francisco and ended in New York City.

San Francisco

We had three nights in San Francisco staying at the Stanford Court Renaissance Hotel in California Street at Nob Hill which is the high point above the city where the cable cars run from.

Our main highlight from San Francisco was our tour of Alcatraz Island.

 Sonoma, Napa Valley Vineyards

Our first organised bus tour took us out to Sonoma Valley where we spent some time fine dining and wine tasting on the Napa Valley Wine Train.  We stayed the night at The Fairmont Sonoma Mission Inn & Spa.

Yosemite National Park

Our next overnight stay was at Yosemite National Park where we spent the night at Hotel Yosemite at the Falls which is inside the National Park.  

Pebble Beach Golf Course

Our organised tour took us to one of our desired destinations which was Pebble Beach Golf Course which was on the way to our next destination of Monterey.

Monterey Bay

Monterey was our next stop over where we stayed at The Intercontinental the Clement at Monterey.  Our highlight here was the massive aquarium at Monterey Bay. 

Hearst Castle, San Simeon

As part of our organised tour we were taken to see Hearst Castle at San Simeon which was on the way to Santa Barbara

  

Another overnight stay was at Santa Barbara where we stayed at Hotel Fess Parker's Doubletree Resort.  We were taken on a tour of the Santa Barbara Mission which is part of a chain of 21 Missions on the California Coast.

Los Angeles

We spent two nights at Los Angeles which was the finish of our first organised bus tour which was with the Insight Bus Tour Company.  The bus was comfortable - with less passengers and more leg room than normal buses which met with our approval.   We stayed at the JW Marriott Hotel Los Angeles at LA Live.   We saw some good highlights of the West Coast of California and overall we were pleased with what we saw and the tour in general.  

Santa Monica

After a week of heavy touring of the West Coast we were ready to chill out for a few days at Santa Monica which is on the beach not far from Los Angeles.  We stayed for two nights at the Doubletree Suites by Hilton Hotel at Santa Monica which was walking distance to the pier and beach.  Our accommodation was great and we could catch up with all our washing etc before moving on.

San Diego

David had organised a private transfer from Santa Monica to San Diego which was a few hours drive.  We stayed at San Diego for 3 nights staying at the San Diego Marriott Gaslamp Quarter.

Our hotel was right across the road from the Baseball Stadium so we had a bonus highlight of attending a baseball game.  We organised ourselves for the days we were there and found a good company that would give us private transfers to wherever we wanted to go to see the many highlights of San Diego including Torrey Pines Golf Club.

Scottsdale, Phoenix Arizona

We flew from San Diego to Scottsdale in Phoenix to pick up our next organised bus tour of the canyon country.  We flew in one day early so we could have a game of golf at Scottsdale.  We stayed at the Millennium Scottsdale Resort and Village for two nights and it was right next door to the McCormack Ranch Golf Club.  Our next tour was with the Globus Bus Company for a seven day Canyon tour finishing in Las Vegas.    

 Sedona

We travelled from Scottsdale to Sedona on the way to the Grand Canyon.  We had the opportunity to do a jeep ride to the top of the Mongolian Rim.  

The Grand Canyon

This was another of our requested highlights.  We stayed for two nights at Maswik North - Grand Canyon National Park Lodge which was walking distance to the North Rim where we could catch buses between the various viewing areas.  We had free time to choose which walks we wanted to do. 

Lake Powell

We travelled from the Grand Canyon to Lake Powell where we stayed two nights. We stayed at the Lake Powell Resort which was right on the Lake edge.  We had a boat cruise around the huge lake and also a day trip to Monument Valley before travelling on to Zion National Park via Bryce Canyon.

Monument Valley

As part of the Globus Tour we took a day trip from Lake Powell to Monument Valley which was a good highlight.

Bryce Canyon

Bryce Canyon was also a good highlight - not as big as the Grand Canyon but more colourful with interesting rock formations.

Zion National Park

Zion National Park was different again and we saw it from a different aspect - ie bottom up rather than top down.  We stayed one night at The Best Western Zion Park Inn which was a short bus ride from the park walks.  

Las Vegas

On the last day of our bus tour we arrived at Las Vegas - staying at the Treasure Island Casino for one night.  Treasure Island is in the heart of the Las Vegas Strip so there was plenty to see when we got there.  We had a good tour with the Globus Tour company and saw some excellent highlights of the Canyon Country.  The bus seating arrangements were not as comfortable as the insight bus with more people on board - but other than that it was on a par with the food and accommodation. 

Mandalay Bay, Las Vegas

We had four more nights at Las Vegas staying at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino which was right down the airport end of the Strip - away from the maddening crowds.  The Resort had a nice beach area with assorted pools to have some time out which we appreciated.  We did our own thing  managing to get around most of the main attractions and shows either by walking or catching the train service along the strip. 

   Boston

We flew from Las Vegas to Boston City (about a 5 hour trip) and stayed for three nights at the Boston Park Plaza Hotel.  We had two days to visit the many highlights of Boston before meeting up with our tour group for our third bus tour taking in the East Coast of America and Canada and return to New York City.  

Boston to Quebec

This was another one of our highlight requests - the Autumn Fall through Canada was spectacular to the point that we got leafed out.  It was a very long road trip - leaving early and arriving late in Quebec having to pass through the border to Canada.  

Quebec City

We arrived in Quebec City very late and the weather was not too good.  We had showers on and off through the day and the temperature had dropped.   During our two night stopover we stayed at the Hilton Quebec which was walking distance to Old Quebec City. We visited the Mont Morencey Falls which was a good experience and had dinner at at old Water Mill that is now a quaint restaurant.

Montreal

From Quebec we travelled to Montreal and were unlucky enough to have bad weather for the most of it.  We were able to visit the Note Dame Basilica which was a good experience but the bad weather restricted our visibility of the city which was a shame as I feel we did not see the best side of Montreal.  We stayed at the Delta Centre-Ville for one night.  The shopping centres are underground because of the cold winters so unless you knew where to go they were hard to find. 

Quebec

 

 

 

 

Ottawa

 

We travelled from Montreal to Ottawa and stayed one night in the Lord Elgin Hotel which was walking distance to the park & riverfront.   We had cold showery weather but managed to get our tours of the City done without getting wet.  We saw as much as we could in our short stay.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Toronto

 

We travelled from Ottawa to Toronto where we stayed two nights at the Delta Chelsea Hotel.

 

We had a good look around Toronto and had dinner on top of the CN Tower.  It was a very foggy night which gradually cleared and we had a good view of Toronto at night.

 

 

 

Niagara Falls

 

We travelled from Toronto to Niagara Falls staying one night at the Doubletree Fallsview Resort & Spa.  We had time to have a good look at the Falls including a helicopter ride over the falls and a ride on the "Maid of the Mist" to the base of the falls and we also had time to walk underneath the falls.  That night we had dinner at a restaurant overlooking the falls and had an opportunity to change the colour of the lights that lit up the falls.  We were fortunate to have good weather which allowed us to see the rainbows formed over the water at the falls.

 

 

 

Lancaster

 

We travelled from Niagara Falls to Lancaster where we stayed one night at Marriott At Penn Square.  From there we were able to travel to the Amish Farms and experience their lifestyle by having dinner with an Amish Family and visiting their farm.

 

 

 

Washington

 

We travelled from Lancaster to Washington where we stayed at the Capitol Hilton where we stayed two nights.  We were able to see the famous parts of Washington as well as being able to view a few of the magnificent museums in the city.  We had good weather which meant that we could view the monuments at night.

 

 

 

 

Lancaster

 

We travelled from Washing to Lancaster in time to stop there for lunch and a view of the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. 

 

 

 

New York

 

We travelled to New York from Lancaster where we spent two nights at 7th Avenue at the New York Hotel and Towers where the Globus Tour finished.  We then moved to the Staybridge Suites in Times Square for another four nights which gave us six nights in New York to have a good look around.

 

 

We were away for 49 days which was a long tour but it would have been hard to leave out any of the places that we visited.  Our bus tours were good.  The tour of the East Coast was a very long tour with many hours being spent on the road.  It was good to have a rest between bus tours when we could have a break and do our own thing. 

 

Overall it was a top holiday which has left me wanting to return to see more of America.  It is a huge place and it would take a long time to cover it all ( a bit like visiting Australia and trying to take it all in one visit)

 

Read on through the "older posts" if you are interested in viewing our holiday in detail.  It has been posted in the order that we travelled from San Francisco to New York.