Can’t Get There From Here

I’m currently making my travel plans for my final storage virtualization seminar. Or, to be precise, trying to make my plans. You see, apparently one cannot (reasonably) get from Cleveland to Toronto, even though they’re only 193 miles apart.

• Want a direct flight? That’ll be $1,080 round trip on an Air Canada Dash-8. But it only takes 1:15 to get there! For comparison, I could fly to London (UK) from Cleveland for $650 round trip.
• Ok, let’s connect then! That’ll run at least $650 on American (or over a grand on United) and take 4 hours, connecting through Chicago. Or you can connect through Washington DC on multiple airlines.
• Hmmm… Amtrak? It’s cheap at $120 round trip, but the journey there takes 13 hours, and it’ll take a whopping 19 hours to get home! London (UK) is only 12 hours away (with a connection!)
• Ok, Amtrak goes straight to Buffalo in 3 hours. Then it’s another hour and a half to Toronto by car. And there’s only one train per day. And it arrives at 3:30 in the freaking morning.
• How about driving? That’s a 300 mile, 5-hour journey. Just long enough to be too painful.
• Might as well walk. Google says it’ll take just 4 days!

Any suggestions?