Short of voting, protesting and getting into arguments with MAGA people I don't know what else I can effectively do.
If you go south you get sun and beaches. The coastal regions of Canada will be comparable to the coastal regions of New England and the Pacific Northwest, so there's no need to go all the way there if that's the sort of beach you're looking for.
Likewise your outdoors, your cities and restaurants and museums are all going to be about the same as the options available in the US, just further away. It's not really "exotic".
We don't really have the same emigrant relationship with Canada; my grandfather's family spent a couple generations in Canada, but my mother only found out about it after he died. He considered his family to be Irish and to have come from Ireland; that they came to the US via a couple of generations spent in New Brunswick was never a part of the family lore.
So there's no real "visiting the home of my ancestors" sort of feeling you'd otherwise see.
Living on the west coast, Vancouver's the easiest to get to -- I love Vancouver (and Victoria), and I've been both places several times, and I've gone to Whistler a handful of times as well, but, again, it's a lot like where I grew up in Seattle.
I really do want to visit Montreal sometime, but I also want to visit Chicago and Memphis and a lot of other "domestic" locations that I somehow never find the time for.
Also, when you grow up in a country you have a lot of local knowledge from culture, friends, television, education, so we just know a lot more about domestic places we haven't (yet) visited. Plus, a substantial number of people don't have passports. We used to be able to visit Canada easily without one, now we cannot.
As a film lover, I've been to the Toronto film festival many times, it's an unmatched experience--so many things to see, and watch films with a very engaged festival crowd just makes them better. (In the same way, even if you don't love Star Wars, going on opening weekend, with the most enthusiastic fans, makes the experience better.) And given that nearly half of Toronto's population was born outside of Canada, it makes even New York feel a little parochial.
* Montreal - it's a big-ish city, without piss in the subways. Also the restaurant scene is good, and the old town is worth seeing.
* Quebec City - again, the old town is worth seeing. There's not much else in the US/Canada like it.
* Alberta Rockies - The corridor between Banff and Jasper is beautiful. Also, Waterton is decent. It's right across the border from Glacier NP in Montana, but less crowded. And for skiers, the Alberta Rockies also probably had the best snow in North America this past year.
1. A lot of people can't afford vacations right now
2. For people in the US, socially and culturally, there's not much of a "drive" or desire to visit Canada. I've worked for Canadian companies, etc. I've never once in my entire life heard somebody talk about visiting Canada. It's always someplace warm and tropical or it's Europe or Asia.
Not surprised they want to keep safely within their "East-USA" territory and go nowhere. No one wants to be disappeared in Ecuador.
The Canadian people I met as we travelled were all amazing. I was humbled that they took time to talk. And were less interested in identity than issues. One older gentleman, who saw us pull into the McDonalds with Washington plates approached us in the foyer and wanted to tell me that despite what others might say, I was welcome there. It was on one hand kinda weird and at the same time really touching.
It's not hard to imagine people like these extending their good will to foreigners, even "hostile" ones.
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2026/03/05/in-25-countr...
In contrast, "The United States is the only place we surveyed where more adults (ages 18 and older) describe the morality and ethics of others living in the country as bad (53%) than as good (47%)."
There might be a bit more hockey ribbing for the next few weeks, but I know there's a ton of respect for Canada's team.
At the end of the day, the idea of "My problem is with the government, and not the people" is as old as time.
Also:
Give money to organizations that are doing the work on your behalf. Lawsuits are still important.
Call or write your reps *frequently*. They use software to automatically tabulate voter positions. (And they look at it--they want to keep their jobs!)
>effectively
these are mutually exclusive
https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/recall-of-state...
Beyond that, my state is not the problem.
The conditions of TSA and the immigration system are...not independent of politics (or even independent of the top tier of most divisive partisan political issues in the current American context.)
The administration could not do any of this without the support of Congress, which has not wavered. That support is unwavering because those elected officials are not getting negative feedback from their voters and donors, so they have every expectation that staying this course will work out just great for them.
This administration's actions only continue with the approval of their party who put them and keep them in power.
"But the party just ran a bad candidate!"
"Egg prices were too high!!"
"Kamala would've been just as bad for Gaza as Trump!"
No, sorry, voters don't get a pass because they're apathetic or love being the "enlightened centrist" that lets fascism takeover.
If the system decides to screw you over, that your average Cali resident disapproves doesn't stop you being in a holding cell for weeks.
I try not to let them influence my behavior too much, but at the end of the day, getting thrown in immigration jail on false accusations (yes happened to me despite presenting US passport) or detained for 12+ hours (also happened several times) puts constraints on vacation plans.
We just had to wait 3 hours in line to get into Costa Rica.
