Niagara Falls

After Toronto, John and I headed over to Niagara to see those famous falls.  Much like the Grand Canyon, words and pictures don't really do them justice.  I found they really are worth the hype.

Before I get into it though, I feel I have to mention that sometimes I feel a bit braggy when I am talking about the cool places I occasionally get to tag along with John while he works, but then I remember I am a single mom most of the time and this is pretty much the silver lining to that whole deal.  These are my "dates."  Most married couples get to go out regularly to dinner and a movie or whatever, but John's not around much so it's more like we save up all those little dates for one big one a couple times a year. And sometimes this arrangement of ours sucks and sometimes it doesn't.  Like this trip. This trip was fun.  Especially this little leg of it.

Right from the start everything was perfect.  It started when we walked into the Marriott and walked up to the counter to check into our room.   While the guy was pulling up our reservation information, I pointed to a picture on the counter of a room with an amazing view overlooking the Falls.  I (semi-jokingly) told the guy I wanted that view.  He smiled at me rather condescendingly, as if to say "I'm sure you would lady, but more than likely you will be on the back side of the building with a nice view of a couple other buildings." 

Then John's profile popped up on the screen, and he was all "Oh! Mr. Berrett! Thank you for staying with us!  I'm happy to tell you we will be upgrading you to a suite, no extra charge, with a Jacuzzi tub, fireplace, and you'll be getting that view Mrs. Berrett!"  I kid you not.  Marriott LOVES John.  And they should, John gives them more money annually than we pay in our mortgage each year.

So, yeah, the view was awesome.

View from our room.  On the left side are the American Falls, and the US of A in the top half of the picture, and the Canadian (horseshoe) falls on the right side with Canada in the bottom half of the picture.

Our plans were to eat dinner, then go on this walk behind the falls.  We got the scoop on where to eat in town (the whole town is full of your standard American chain restaurants) or your cheesy over priced touristy places.  Apparently there's a rotating restaurant at the top of this big needle that is not worth it at all.  While the view might be great, supposedly the food sucks. So we went to this little place all the locals go to one street over from the main drag. It was a good choice.

Almost before we finished dinner, this major storm rolled in and we pretty much raced the dark gray clouds to our hotel.  The wind picked up, and the temperature dropped and we barely made it to the hotel before being drenched.  Just like that.  It was crazy.  At first I was a little disappointed to not be able to head over to the falls right away, and was a little upset the storm would probably stop them from shooting off the fireworks over the falls like they do every weekend night.

But then the lightning started.  And Holy Cow.  I have never in my life seen anything like it.  This whole lighting storm centered itself over the Canadian side of the Falls, and the combination of the mist, and the changing colored lights the city illuminates the falls with at night, and the raging electrical storm over head was phenomenal.  John and I turned on the fireplace and just sat on the couch and snuggled under a blanket and watched the show through our giant wall sized window. 

I didn't want to go to bed. I knew I would probably never see anything like that again.

But eventually I did, because I knew we had a busy day the next day.

So we totally did the Maid of the Mist boat trip.  That was cool.  And very wet. 

Here we are in the midst of the mist.  You seriously couldn't see a thing.

I had to take my glasses off because they were more of a hindrance.

I had always heard that the "Canadian side was better" but never having been before, I never understood that comment.  In my head the "Falls" were merely the horseshoe shaped falls you see in pictures and one side was American and the other Canadian.  In my head they each had an opposite, but equal view.  Now I get it.  There are actually two sets of falls, separated by an island.  And the way it's situated, the American side doesn't have much of a view.  

My guess is those are mostly Americans without passports.

After that, we did the walk behind the falls thing.  That was cool. And crazy.  And wet. 

What's that old Disney Jungle Cruise joke? "The 8th Wonder of the World!  The Backside of Water!!" Or something like that.

And the sheer power of it all was unbelievable.  And then you hear stories like the 63 year old school teacher being the first person to survive going over it in a barrel.  With her cat. She survived with only minor scratches.  A cat?  Really?!?

I was fascinated by this boat. Why is it there? How long has it been there?  Why do they leave it there? (It's called the "Old Scow" and it's been there about 100 years. It's too dangerous to try and salvage it.)

Smack dab in the middle of the picture you can make out the "Old Scow" just up stream from the horseshoe falls.

We also had to try Tim Hortons.  (donuts and hot chocolate) I thought they were pretty good donuts.  I won't go out on a limb and say "Best EVER" but definitely better than most. (Hot chocolate too.)  I

LOVED the little cakey Timbits.  (donut holes) and I usually don't care for cake donuts.

They don't do "dozens" in Canada.  I mistakenly asked for a dozen.  Personally, I think this is the one time when the metric system is not better.

And that's pretty much it.

On our way home, since we had a little bit of a flight delay in Buffalo, NY we were able to grab some wings from the Anchor Bar, the establishment where Buffalo Wings were invented.

When in Rome, right?