Casino Hotels

The complex on Île Notre-Dame grew out of the pavilions built for Expo 67, and the French pavilion's angular aluminium form still gives the property its outline. It sits in parkland on the Saint Lawrence, apart from the city centre, which gives it a campus feel that downtown properties rarely have.

As a hotel it works as a base for the island and the city both: restaurants across several price points, a cabaret room used for touring shows, and easy access to Parc Jean-Drapeau's trails and the Biosphère. The licensed gaming floor is one of the building's facilities, spread over several levels of the former pavilion, and it is straightforward to spend a stay without using it.

Summer is the strongest season here, when the surrounding park is in full use and the Formula 1 circuit on the same island brings its own calendar.

Fallsview is built into the escarpment above the Horseshoe Falls, and the elevation is the whole argument for it. The upper floors look directly down the gorge, and the public rooms are arranged so that the view is available from the lobby, the restaurants and the terrace rather than reserved for the most expensive rooms.

The resort operates as a full hotel with a spa, a large theatre that books international touring acts, a retail galleria and a covered link toward the tourist district. Its licensed gaming floor occupies one level of the building.

Because Niagara Falls is busiest in summer, the resort's indoor scale makes it a more reliable winter proposition than most of the strip around it.

River Rock sits on the Fraser River in Richmond, a short run from Vancouver International Airport and directly on the Canada Line into downtown Vancouver, which makes it one of the better-connected hotels in the region for anyone arriving late or leaving early.

The property includes a marina, a show theatre, a large conference centre and a long list of restaurants, with Richmond's own extensive Asian dining scene immediately outside the door. Rooms in the newer tower are the quieter option. The licensed gaming floor is one component of the resort among several.

For travellers, its usefulness is mostly logistical: a full-service hotel with a train station attached, twenty minutes from the airport.

Casino Rama stands on the Chippewas of Rama First Nation land near Orillia, in the Lake Country region north of Toronto, and the setting is rural rather than urban — lakes, cottage roads and forest in every direction.

The hotel side runs to several hundred rooms with a spa and a substantial entertainment centre whose concert programme is the property's best-known feature, drawing audiences from across southern Ontario. Restaurants range from a buffet to table service, and the licensed gaming floor is one facility among these.

It functions in practice as a Lake Country resort with a strong events calendar, most useful to visitors already heading north from Toronto for the summer season.