Exploring Canada's Hidden Gems: A Journey with Porter Airlines

You know Montreal. You probably know Toronto. And you’ve at least seen the pretty pictures of Vancouver. But if you really want to see what Canada has to offer, you’re going to need a guide.

You could buy a Fodor’s. Or you could book with Porter.

This sounds like an ad. It’s not. Air Canada flies everywhere, and if you need to get everywhere, they’re the ones for you. But if you want a filter, Porter flies to all the good bits. Their drop-down menu is the must-see map of Canada. They fly to Montreal, and Toronto, and Vancouver.

But they also fly to Halifax.

Though Halifax is definitely in the running to be Canada’s most under-rated city, it’s got chops.

For instance: It has two of the best cocktail bars in the country; the acknowledged best bartender in the world; far and away the best pub in Canada, and a YMCA with views that would make even the wealthiest Vancouver pied-a-terrans envious.

With so much going for it, I feel like I should start with what’s not great.

It’s also got the old Lord Nelson Hotel & Suites.

There’s a five-star property in town, relatively new, called the Muir. Skip it. The Lord Nelson’s better, and much more Halifax.

From the moment I stepped up to the old wooden reception counter on a recent trip (booked with Porter, with an assist from Nova Scotia Tourism), the hellos were open and casually, credibly friendly, and clearly not out of an employee handbook script. It was pretty much how the whole stay here went. Unlike the Muir, which was polished and slippery, the Lord Nelson was lived-in and lovely. Still luxurious, still comfortable, less than half the price the week I was there, and in a much better location (abut 100m from that amazing Y with wraparound windows overlooking both the Halifax Common and The Citadel), surrounded as it was by parks and the actual city of Halifax rather than the Queen’s Marque confection.

From there, the hits just keep coming. 

Like the brilliant, mostly Ghanaian food at Mary’s African Cuisine. No visitor to Halifax should leave without trying one of the pepper soups, especially on a cold day like the day I walked in out of the late March snows.

The best pub in town has a solid claim to being the best pub in the country. 

I went to The Narrows on a Saturday night and got a seat at the bar right away. The Narrow’s famously does not take reservations, and I was told several times by Haligonians I met later that it was bordering on miraculous that I didn’t have to wait an hour. One of the benefits of going solo, though going with a friend would make an excellent night. There was a band playing trad music, well, to an enthusiastic crowd. The beer was good, and the food was better. I had the Dutch Mess, which is their seafood stew. It was $20, and it was memorably good. The service was ebullient. The room was idiosyncratically beautiful. I’m not a fan of waiting in line, for anything. But this place might be worth it.

(Photo Credit: Bert Archer)

Field Guide is known in Haligonian cocktail circles as the training ground for a generation of excellent bar people. The current dojo, Christian Palmer, concocted the current menu, which includes a Pinky Tuscadero (Blanco Tequila, Nonino, Campari, cinnamon, orgeat, grapefruit, lime, egg white, soda), a 17th-century milk punch, and a non-alcoholic 1940s Coke (Coca-Cola, spiced grenadine, lime, cherry). Everything I tried there was uniformly excellent.

And then there’s the Highwayman, a tapas restaurant that’s home to Keegan McGregor, 2024’s Diageo World Class Global Bartender of the Year. That’s a big deal, and as close to anything as being synonymous with best bartender in the world. He travels the world now as a result, but he was in the night I went, and he made me three of the best drinks I’ve had in a long time.

The conclusion I came to after this most enjoyable little citybreak (or Porterbreak) is that Halifax is best when it’s itself. I have old friends who’ve lived in or around Halifax most of their lives. When I mentioned I’d be trying breakfast at the restaurant at the Muir, they both made a little face. They’re both doctors, so it wasn’t a money face. It was a face that told me this place was not really their kind of place. And by “their kind of place,” they clearly meant the kind of place someone from Halifax, no matter what their income, would really be interested in. I went anyway, and it was terrible. When they took me out for supper, they took me to Quinn’s Arms on Quinpool Road. It was friendly, it was happy, my doctor friends like the beer and the house wine, and our server was everything you’d want in a server. The food was good too.

The city is full of ground-level charm, like this Saturday market in the courtyard of a brewery built in 1820 (Photo Credit: Bert Archer)

The same goes for Tony’s donairs (1976), and diners like the Bluenose II (1964), the Ardmore Tea Room (1956) and the Armview (1951).

Porter works on a hub system with Toronto being the biggest, and Montreal the second. So hop up there, enjoy all they have to offer, and then go forth and explore. And if  you do go to Halifax, treat it like you would any urban travel destination: look for the stuff that you can only get here. Let Halifax be Halifax, in other words, and it’ll be as good a time as a weekend in Lisbon, Edinburgh, or or Marseille. Just with better prices, and (recognizable) English.

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