Trip Report: May 12 - June 2, 2002
by Ted & Sylvia Blishak
SPRING JOURNEY ACROSS THE CONTINENT AND RETURN
May 27, 2002
THE ROYAL YORK
Arriving at Toronto's elegant Royal York Hotel is always an event. Previously, we've arrived by train, but this time, it's by rental car. The attentive doorman and front desk clerk get us checked in swiftly and with great style. Ted has an upgrade coupon that Fairmont Hotels has mailed him because he is a member of the Fairmont President's Club. We are upgraded from the queen room that we paid for to a king mini-suite on the 17th floor with a view of Union Station and Lake Ontario.
http://www.fairmont.com/FA/en/CDA/Home/Hotels/
AboutHotel/CDHotelHomePage/0,2993,property%25255Fseq%253D
100102,00.html
After the bellman delivers our luggage, Ted drives across the street to the Hertz facility at Toronto Union Station. This takes 45 minutes as the Royal York's carriage entrance is clogged with automobiles dropping off people for a black-tie affair. After the doorman untangles the gridlock, Ted makes a right turn, a U-turn, three right turns around Union Station, then a right into the basement under the railroad station to the Hertz car return area.
The Hertz attendant, with a French accent so thick he is difficult to understand, insists that he inspect the car before giving a receipt. When he returns several minutes later, he accuses Ted of damaging the car, claiming the rear bumper has a paint scrape. Ted assures him that if the car is damaged, it was not done by him. Then the agent claims that since Hertz in the USA and Hertz in Canada do not have their computers linked, he cannot give a receipt after all. He will have to mail the contract to Pittsburgh, (where we picked up the car) then the Hertz agent in the USA will compute the bill and then mail a copy. We can see a set-up here to charge our credit card for some alleged damage. Ted demands to talk to the manager, who it turns out is at a different location. She orders her agent to fax a copy to Pittsburgh and then request that Pittsburgh fax me a completed receipt, which I can receive on my laptop no later than tomorrow. She assures me that the Canadian office has no interest in charging me for any damage, as it is a USA car. We never do receive the fax.
There seems to be no limit to the variety of hurdles car rental companies can present, but I expected better treatment from Hertz as one of their #1 Club Gold customers. We have Collision Damage insurance on the Travel Guard policy that we always purchase when traveling, so we did not purchase the very expensive Collision Damage Waiver offered by the car rental company. Will we be charged for damage and have to file a claim? We won't know until we see our credit card bill! Arriving by train has its advantages.
Back home, I contacted Hertz and finally received a faxed statement on June 15, twenty one days after I returned the car. Hertz did not charge for any alleged damage, but as I could not find an open service station in downtown Toronto on Sunday evening, Hertz did charge me for a tank of gas, $67.37 US dollars, the most expensive tank of gas I have ever purchased. For the 388 miles that I drove, I ended up paying nearly 18 cents per mile, this on a rental with unlimited "free" mileage.
Travel Tip: When you rent a car, keep the tank topped off, as you may not find a filling station any where near where you are going to drop the car off, and Hertz writes their contracts in such a way that you will pay through the nose if you don't return a car with a full tank. They will not explain this when you reserve a car or even when you pick up your car, they just hit you with it when you return the car, or in my case, 21 days later. They say it is in the fine print of the contract, though as yet I have been unable to get a copy of this contract.
Walking back to the hotel through the pedestrian tunnel takes two minutes. The Royal York dining room has been replaced with the trendy new Epic Restaurant and Lounge. We enjoy an excellent dinner there tonight, the best we have had on our trip thus far. The other restaurant is Benihana's, if you prefer the Japanese touch. The hotel's third restaurant is the York Kitchen, however, it is now open only for breakfast and lunch. If you are seeking lighter fare, the hotel is connected to both Union Station and the Royal Bank Mall, both of which have a choice of restaurants and food courts. (Downtown Toronto has a vast network of interconnected buildings and underground malls. You can walk for blocks without venturing outside, important during Ontario winters.)
Many of our clients ask us to request a track-view room when staying here. But we are able to see little activity, as the trainshed obscures much of the view. The Via Rail trains and the GO Transit trains don't toot their horns before departing, so unless you happen to be looking out the window at the right moment, you miss the action. Ted spots a Genesis engine in VIA colors pulling one of the Corridor trains arriving from Montreal, as well as a GO Commuter train. But when our train, the streamlined stainless-steel "Canadian" arrives at the station the night before our departure, its gleaming 22-car consist protrudes out each end of the train shed, with the round-end dome/lounge/sleeper Park Car at the end.
Bob V., a client who's been booking with us by phone for 11 years, lives and works in Toronto, and he joins us in the Epic Lounge for cocktails. Since we've never met face-to-face, it is good to visit with him in person.
Getting from the Royal York to the station can be done without going outside, but requires negotiating an escalator and a series of short stairways. This is next to impossible if you're wheeling luggage. You cannot just roll your luggage outside the Royal York, as for some reason there is no floor at street level. However, there is a hard-to-find accessible elevator in the northeast corner of the hotel lobby area which will take you down from the lobby level to street level, and then you can walk across the street to the station. Be careful, as there is no marked crosswalk at this location, even though throngs of commuters cross the street here every day.
Tonight we take our luggage to the basement baggage room and check our biggest bags through to Vancouver. It is handled quickly and efficiently. We will just take our overnight case and laptops onto the train, as storage space in the bedroom is limited.
For more info on Union Station, click on this hyper link:
http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/union_station/
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