It’s Day 232 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey, and the end of a full week in Ontario. It took me barely a half hour to drive from Oakville to The Docks in downtown Toronto. If I hadn’t been driving on a Sunday morning, it probably would have taken twice as long.

The Docks on Polson Pier is an entertainment complex with go-carts, beach volleyball, a nightclub, mini-golf, and a driving range, all within a stone’s throw of Lake Ontario. On weekend evenings, that driving range transforms into what we care about, a two-screen drive-in theater.

That drive-in opened in late spring 2001. In a Toronto Star article about the grand opening, they addressed the loss of older drive-ins over the previous years. “You took something away from people that they didn’t want to be taken away,” said a Docks spokesperson who asked not to be named(!). “It was pure economics. But it was inevitable that they’d come back.”

In 2004, Toronto Life ran an article saying mercurial then-owner Jerry Sprackman was trying to replace everything on the site with a casino if he could get approval. (The article was quoted at length by a poster at TorontoNightclub.com.) That didn’t happen. The article noted in passing that “(t)he movie screen was up at the drive-in before approvals were given or anyone noticed”.

The Star ran what amounted to an update this January, related to a request for a new liquor license. The Docks lost its license in 2005 after noise complaints from neighboring islanders. In 2008, a new company got a license with strict conditions, and now more ownership changes have complicated the issue. If you read the article and take notes, you might be able to figure out the timeline.

When it opened, The Docks was showing movies seven days a week. Now it’s down to weekends, and I was there for its Sunday Carload night. Its listed capacity is 400 cars, but a few years ago they proved you can fit 500 MINIs.

The video of the day comes from The Docks’ Facebook page. Another nice video on YouTube shows a gathering of Volkswagens at the drive-in, but the nicest images don’t come till the end.

Miles Today / Total: 23 / 27637 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: Logan Lucky / 146

Nearby Restaurant: Hanging around downtown Toronto, I gravitated to the Real Sports Bar and Grill. The ambiance reminded me of a huge Las Vegas sports book, with subdued lighting and a huge TV screen surrounded by dozens of smaller screens, all playing sports of course. I felt compelled to order chicken wings (sold by the pound) to balance the Molson Canadian beer. It was an experience!

Where I Virtually Stayed: You knew this already – there are a whole lot of very nice hotels in downtown Toronto. For this trip, I got to check an item off my bucket list by staying at the Renaissance Toronto Downtown Hotel, better known as the hotel in the Rogers Centre. Back when it was SkyDome, the new home of the MLB Blue Jays was the first stadium with a built-in hotel, with 70 rooms facing the field. The Jays were on the road, but I still got a room facing the field. It had a mini-fridge and solid wifi; sometimes that’s all I need.

Only in Toronto: The Toronto Islands hold more than noise-hating neighbors. They’re also the home of Centreville Theme Park, a place that was children’s heaven. The islands were hit hard this year by spring flooding and are slowly getting back to normal. For grown-ups, there are bicycle rentals, cafes, a lighthouse, and even a small commercial airport.

Next stop: Mustang Drive-In Theatre, Guelph ON.

It’s Day 231 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey, and my sixth day in Ontario. It only took about a half hour to drive from the Starlite Drive In Theatre in Stoney Creek, just outside of Hamilton to the 5 Drive-in Theatre, just two miles west of the Ford plant in Oakville.

I’m really not sure when The 5 opened, but I have a theory. There once was the Oakville Drive-In, and according to a 1957 newspaper ad, it was “2 miles east of the Ford plant, between Q.E. and Dundas Hwys”. Two miles east on the road in front of the plant would be in Lake Ontario, but as I just wrote, two miles west would put you where The 5 is now. So if I’m right, that was its single-screen beginning in 1957 or earlier.

The International Motion Picture Almanacs indicate that the Oakville persisted until at least 1969, then by 1972 The 5 appeared and the Oakville was gone. On The 5’s old website’s History page, it said that it had been “(o)wned and operated by Premier Operating since the early 70’s”. So maybe the drive-in changed its name to the nearby Highway 5 (also known as the Dundas Highway) when Premier acquired it.

(A couple of other respected online sources claim The 5 opened in the mid 1960s, but that doesn’t match the almanacs or line up with the official history. But what do I know? It’s just a theory.)

What we know for sure is that The 5 was a single screen until Premier added a second in 1980 and a third in 2001. To read what it’s like today, and see some nice photos, check out a sponsored blog post about a trip there less than three weeks ago.

The video of the day is a YouTube trip through the winding entrance ramp to the iconic 5 sign on the central concession building. But you should really also check out an official video with plenty of aerial coverage showing just how busy it gets there.

I was so glad to be pointing at the huge original screen for my movie this night. The Hitman’s Bodyguard might not reward careful thought, but it’s a fun action movie that works well at a drive-in.

Miles Today / Total: 28 / 27614 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: The Hitman’s Bodyguard / 145

Nearby Restaurant: With the short drive, I had plenty of time to relax with my lunch at Stoney’s Bread Company. There are plenty of sandwiches available, but I wanted to fill up on healthy roughage for a change, so I went with the grilled chicken salad. There were pecans and asiago cheese in there, still it was better for me than a lot of my recent meals.

Where I Virtually Stayed: There are plenty of my kind of hotels in Oakville, but the one I chose this time was the Hilton Garden Inn. My comfy room had the full set of amenities including a Keurig coffee maker, and a very full breakfast was free in the morning thanks to my Hilton Honors gold status. I’d love to have this available at every stop.

Only in Oakville: The Oakville Museum is housed in the former estate of the town’s founding family. There’s an exhibit about the way Oakville celebrated Expo 67, and also displays about its history in the underground railroad and local black history.

Next stop: The Docks, Toronto ON.

It’s Day 230 of my virtual Drive-In-a-Day Odyssey, and my fifth day in Ontario. Taking Highway 20 all the way, it took me less than an hour to drive from the Can-View Drive-In near Fonthill to the Starlite Drive In Theatre in Stoney Creek, just outside of Hamilton.

It appears that the Starlite began its life as the Scenic Drive-In in 1955. That was an aside in a short note in The Hamilton Spectator. It had a single screen backed by a wide tower and could hold about 600 cars. Reference books suggest that it was owned by the Rosenberg family when it opened and the Dydzak family by the early 1960s. It was probably the Dydzaks who changed the name later that decade.

Premier Theatres bought the Starlite in 2004 and added two more screens within three years, bringing its total capacity to at least 780. They installed in April 2012.

In a different Spectator story from 2012, Brian Allen, head of Premier Theatres, said business was great. “When you’re doing something no one else is doing they always think you’re nuts, but our business has been going up every year,” he said. “The demand for drive-ins never disappeared, but supply has fallen off because of the demands of real estate.”

Today’s Starlite is so dog-friendly that it has a Woof’n Park dog roaming area next to the parking lot. And for some wonderful photos of this amazingly colorful place, check the recent post in The Inlet blog.

There are a plethora of Starlite videos available on YouTube. I chose the 2012 local news segment from CHCH, Hamilton’s News Leader, because it had the best night shots of the glorious marquee. I could have instead chosen a 2003 music video shot there, showing how it looked before Premiere took it over, or a 2009 tour by Toronto Landscape TV on a bright windy day. Enjoy!

For the first time in months, I drove in for the second show, the new release Logan Lucky. There was another early-evening event in town that I just couldn’t miss (see below).

Miles Today / Total: 39 / 27586 (rounded to the nearest mile)

Movie Showing / Total Active Nights: Logan Lucky / 144

Nearby Restaurant: On the east side of Highway 20, just before reaching the Starlite, there was Tim Hortons. And on the west side of the highway, there was another Tim Hortons, embedded in the Esso gas station. It’s sort of a regional chain, even if that region is all of Canada and some northeast US. At any rate, since I was near the birthplace of the coffee and donut chain, I stopped for one of each. Just don’t order a “regular” coffee unless you want a cup loaded with sugar and cream.

Where I Virtually Stayed: I drove a short way to stay at another Homewood Suites in the heart of downtown Hamilton. Again my room had an embarrassment of amenities with a full kitchen and a full-sized fridge, pleasant overkill for a one-night stay. Breakfast the next morning got me ready to get back on the highways of Ontario.

Only in Stoney Creek: For the first time in months, I caught the second show at the drive-in because the Hamilton Tiger-Cats played a home game. They’re my favorite Canadian Football League team even though they’re often one of the worst, such as this year when they finished this night’s game with an 0-8 record. They play at Tim Hortons Field, which opened in September 2014. (Tim Hortons was also founded in Hamilton.)

Next stop: 5 Drive-in Theatre, Oakville ON.