Early in the morning I got ready, checked out, had a quick
breakfast and headed to the Union station, the main ‘via rail’ train station,
from which all regional trains are leaving from. The whole station was under
construction like a lot of other things in Toronto. It looks like the revamp
the whole city. This made it a bit more inconvenient to navigate around the city
and the train station. As I learned a bit later, summer is pretty much the only
season the construction works can take place in Canada, otherwise it is just
too cold or everything is frozen.
The boarding process was a bit confusing for me as they go
by Gate, not platform. To indicate the gate number they have put up signs,
which meant instead of looking at platform numbers I had to look for my gate
number.
Booking train tickets online was straight forward and easy.
Printing the boarding ticket saves you queuing time. In some cases greyhound
buses or a shared car ride can be cheaper depending on your route. If you plan
to travel a lot, one of their rail passes might help you to save some dollars,
worth checking it out.
I was on my way to Ottawa, the capital of Canada. The
ride took me around 4.5 hours and wasn't really scenic, but nevertheless
enjoyable. I was pleasantly surprised that you have free WIFI on the train
throughout the ride which enabled me to update my blog during the trip.
