In Non-COVID times, the York University Retirees’ Association offers two theatre excursions each year, one to the Stratford Theatre in the spring and the other to the Shaw Festival Theatre in the fall, organized through Great Canadian Holidays and Coaches. The YURA group (usually thirty or more) is picked up at the York campus at 9:30 a.m. and we enjoy a leisurely coach ride to our destination. The first stop for the Stratford trip has been to the Queen’s Inn where we are served a buffet lunch and then driven to the theatre. For the Shaw Festival the lunch is arranged either at Queen’s Inn or at the Pillar and Post Inn. Following the performances, the bus returns to the campus at approximately 6:30 p.m.
In 2020, YURA had arranged theatre outings to see “Chicago” at Stratford on June 9th and “Gypsy” at Shaw on September 29th. Unfortunately, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, both events were cancelled. YURA again decided to forego its Stratford or Shaw trips in both 2021 and 2022 due to continuing concerns about COVID-19.
In recent years, YURA's theatre excursions to Stratford were to see Carousel (2015), Shakespeare in Love (2016), Romeo and Juliet (2017), The Tempest (2018) and The Merry Wives of Windsor (2019). YURA's day trips to the Shaw Festival were to see You Never Can Tell (2015), A Woman of No Importance (2016), Saint Joan (2017), The Grand Hotel (2018) and Brigadoon (2019).