Travel

The Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum (CWHM) in New Hope, Ontario, is unique because it is home to world’s largest collection of flying vintage aircraft.   The museum also houses an aviation art gallery, interactive displays, audio-visual presentations, and an assortment of aircraft photographs and memorabilia.
The Museum began as a labor of love for four friends, Dennis J. Bradley, Alan Ness, Peter Matthews, and John Weir.  The men did not just set out to restore just any planes, they specifically wanted to preserve and maintain a collection of the aircraft flown by Canadians and the Canadian military services from World War II to the present.
In 1993, an inferno ripped through one of the hangars at the Hamilton International Airport that the Museum was using for storage and restoration and destroyed five of the restored planes.  The museum reluctantly acknowledged the need to move to a single facility that could accommodate both the displays and the space needed to do restoration work.  As a member of Canada’s royal family and the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum’s royal patron, Charles, the Prince of Wales officially opened the new building in April 1996.
The Museum has over forty aircraft from the 1940s warplanes to jets from the 60s and 80s.  Most of the planes are military and many of them are rare.  Nowhere else will you find such a large collection of flight-ready vintage airplanes.  The Museum flies one of their operational planes once a day during, the summer season, and Thursdays through Sundays in the spring and autumn, weather permitting.
The Museum’s ride program, Legends Flight, gives people the opportunity to reserve a ride in either an open-cockpit bi-plane or the Harvard Trainer.  They also offer two different flight paths, the Niagara Escarpment Tour over Hamilton and the Lake Ottawa shoreline or the Grand River Tour.

If you’re traveling in Ontario, Canada with your kids anytime between May 1st and September 8th and find yourself anywhere near Greater Sudbury, make some time, a day would be best, to detour to Dinosaur Valley Mini Golf for a unique experience in family entertainment. Open from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. seven days a week, this singular attraction offers service in both English and French.

The park began as a dream for owners Josee and Marcel Rainville, who, after five years of work, completed the first 9-hole course in 1998. Over the years five more courses were added as well as the amazing steel dinosaurs, all scaled to size. The park owners make all of the skeletal replicas.

Dinosaur Valley offers a variety of amusement options ranging from a total of 54 unique holes of miniature golf to labyrinths and over 20 mammoth dinosaur and insect exhibits, plus their new Raptor and Dragon exhibits, added in 2006.

It is fun with a purpose, too. The Rainvilles have dedicated the entire park to cancer families to honor of the memory of their son, Steven, who died of leukemia. Dinosaur Valley also hosted Canada’s first Pro Mini Golf Tournament in which 100% of the proceeds were donated to charity (the Canadian Cancer Society).

This family fun centre is reasonably priced, too, with labyrinth entry only C$2.50 per person and 18 holes of miniature golf starting at C$5.99 for children and C$7.00 for adults. While some of the exhibits may be a little extra, most of the extraordinary metal models are incorporated into the golf courses.  The park accepts cash, debit, Visa, and American Express. For those of you who like to plan ahead, you can book your visit to Dinosaur Valley Mini Golf online via their website