I will be doing a fair amount of travelling (mostly for work) over the next little bit, so I’m looking for some recommended locations near some pretty disparate places:
San Jose, California (probably no time to get up to SF, going to be busy)
Toronto, Ontario
Eastern Pennsylvania (the week of Replay FX :()
Southampton, England
If anyone has somewhere they’d love to recommend in any of those towns, I’d love to hear it.
There are a bunch of different options in Toronto depending on where you are and how much you are willing to travel. I personally like cabin fever near Keele subway station.
Are you looking for location play, or trying to drop in for one night of a league?
If you don’t want to publicly post your schedule, shoot me a PM and I can help, (I am 1.5 hour drive from Toronto so don’t know the scene that well, but can hook you up with people that do.)
If you can’t get out of San Jose the Silver Creek Sportsplex is the place to go these days. I haven’t been myself, but it’s where pinball happens in SJ these days. http://www.yelp.com/biz/silver-creek-sportsplex-san-jose-3
Harbor Town Pub and The High Dive
The guy that has games at Harbor Town Pub has some more downtown I believe but, never made it there. If you can find out where, its almost guaranteed the games will be in good shape. I was in SJ for a conference a while back and visited HTP three times I think. The OP was there two out of three days fixing stuff and the games were in excellent shape. They have a great beer selection as well. The op’s name is Mark Schultz and hes an awesome guy who does a TOPS tourney thing and a league night etc. Even gave us some free credits while he was hanging around fixing stuff.
The High Dive games are in great shape and they all played well. I just missed the LOTR “fix” coils in Metallica during my trip 
I think Firepower was loaded with power balls but, I didn’t get to play it. I came in the evening and it was pretty packed inside. People were using Firepower as a condiment station/jacket and purse rack so you might want to come earlier in the day. You need to be a fan of 90s top 40 radio jams if you go to the High Dive though. For some reason the 90’s jams were relentless when I was there.
I may stop into K/W when I’m in Toronto as well–I have family in the area. Last time I was in Canada locations were still a bit thin on the ground, so I’m glad it’s gotten a bit better. I also dropped into ToPL, which seems like a cool league.
While great locations, Harbor Town and High Dive are in San Diego. San Jose is about 450 miles away. 
Uhhh oops… Even though I quoted this and it clearly says San Jose… Everything I mentioned is just a short drive away in San Diego… lol WOW
I dunno anything about SJ locations but, SF and Alameda aren’t terribly far from SJ. If you can make the drive, the pacific pinball museum in Alameda is great and Free Gold Watch in San Fran is also excellent. They are closer than San Diego too!
I think I need to avoid the internet today… Avoid my advice at all costs!!
Don’t forget to check out Waterfront bar and grill while you are in SAN DIEGO!!!
Feel free to drop into TOPL again
If it’s a Monday we are playing somewhere, and everyone is always welcome.
Southeastern PA’s 2 best locations are Pinball Gallery in Malvern and Railroad Street Bar & Grille in Royersford. If you’re up near Allentown or Scranton those will not be very close.
BAPA has league nights at the sportsplex on Thursday nights, and I’m pretty sure they still allow guests.
They’re also on FB, I’m told. Good bunch of folks. If you want to get a feel for the games before league, I can probably meet you there before league and give you some pointers. I’m real close.
Where in Eastern Pennsylvania, if I may ask?
Seven Springs, PA for my other hobby—boardgaming at World Boardgaming Champs. We’ll be driving in and out, though, so close is good enough.
I may take you up on that, cheers.
BAPA is doing a mini-league the next three Thursday nights right now. I haven’t had the time to join in for the regular league, but I’m going to try and swing this one. https://www.facebook.com/groups/BAPAExpressLeague/
Seven Springs is near Pittsburgh…
Re: 7 Springs: Oops. Memory fail: I got two places confused and didn’t doublecheck. Unfortunately I don’t get out of there until after ReplayFX closes 
, and I’m sure everyone in Pittsburgh will be sick of pinball at that point…
Location-visiting update: Went to the Sportsplex in SJ last Monday (the 6th) with a friend who came down from SF to meet up with me after work. Nice selection of well-maintained games, along with some new stuff. Hadn’t played GB or GoT before, so got a couple games in, plus played a selection of the older stuff. One comment: the US really needs dollar coins/dollar coin readers on games. Feeding a machine with six or eight coins (for a price break/2P game) seems silly. Would’ve gone back for League Night, but fell over due to jetlag instead.