Wed 17 Jul - Toronto, ON

An organised bus tour for all of today - a very unlikely and rare event for us.

We wanted to see the Niagara Falls (Di especially after seeing the old Houdini movie with Tony Curtis) and a bus trip made more sense than DIY. An overview of Niagara region as was presented in front of the bus.

Our driver, seen here near the back of the bus was a chatty Montreal Iraqi man. We had to listen carefully to his commentary as his accent was difficult to decipher at times. A Dutch couple sitting behind Hans in the bus asked Hans several times for what he said as they didn't get it.

On the way we heard about the falls and the waterways that connect Lake Eerie, further south west, to Lake Ontario. This canal and shipping channel with huge locks is close to the falls and built to bypass them.

The trip took 2.5 hours due to heavy traffic, mostly caused by rubberneckers at two seperate accidents along the way. One accident was particularly nasty - the front cab of a semi trailer was burnt down to the axles. Grim.

We stayed on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls, known as Horseshoe Falls, which distribute about 90% of the water of the Niagara River. It's hard to show in photos the volume of water pumping down through here and over the edge.

The obligatory self portrait overlooking Horseshoe Falls.

The boat trip is known as Maid of the Mist and was included on our tour agenda. We were excited as it heads right to the base of the falls. You may guess why almost everybody is dressed in blue...

Looking down Niagara River you can see the New York state side of Niagara Falls in USA - they are the smaller falls on the right. One thing you can't see here are the hotels and casinos lining the hilltop on the Canadian side overlooking the falls. The area was very commercialised but we didn't feel that it detracted too much from the awesome water falls.

The fence is not really high and does seem to encourage people to sit or stand on it...no Hans...

There are very few warning signs and our driver told us a few stories of accidents and suicides - so Di took the sensible option and kept her bum firmly planted.

This cheeky seagull was right at home in front of the cameras and the Horseshoe Falls.

Niagara Falls do attract a crowd - even on a hot Wednesday (by the way it's 34 degrees today and very humid so an air conditioned bus or vehicle is a must).

Di amongst the crowd. Very misty here.

After 45 minutes at the top of the falls we headed to the Maid of the Mist boat ride. All very efficient - our driver issued us a ticket, we slowly walked down a ramp to fill up an elevator, descended and were issued with a blue "souvenir rain poncho" for our boat ride. This photo shows the boat and queue to get on board.

Di keen to go, just a little ahead in the queue with her poncho over her backpack and her hair up. We sensibly changed into thongs (flip flops) as we had been warned you could get drenched.

Due to some good maneuvering we got spots on the top deck up the front for our boat for our ride into the falls.

Looking upriver to Horseshoe Falls - our destination.

First we passed the falls on the US side. Not as impressive but we were still covered by a fine mist and you can tell plenty of water is coming down there too.

The USA and Canadian sides are split by Goat Island which is US territory and can be accessed via a bridge there. Also, the actual water fall on the American side can somehow be accessed in the middle by people.

We found separate spots out front so we could see. Hans took a self portrait before things got too wet...

Di was offered a place at the front railing by some lovely Indian women after Di helped them with their rain ponchos. Cool.

The wind whipped up as we got closer to the falls - the ponchos tell the story.

We looked back towards Canada and you can see the Skylon Tower and some of the hotels and casinos but they are nicely blurred by mist.

We got closer and closer to Horseshoe Falls. Then we started to get seriously wet. It was like being in a heavy rain shower but the wind was whipping it horizontally at times. We got wet.

The drenching continued for about 10 minutes as we hovered at the base of the falls. Big grins, lots of fun.

Hans was standing near a "bus buddy" from Castle Hill in Sydney, called Bob, who took this great photo of Hans.

Di maneuvered closer for her photo - the white wall behind is all waterfall!

Hans returned the favour for Bob.

We were all laughing and nicely drenched. Not sure of the validity of the rain ponchos... Great fun though.

Turning back down river we got a little more protection from the boat itself. This photo is looking back up to where we had been earlier in the day. Those little specs in this zoomed in photo are people. It's a long way down, down, down. People have gone over and survived...but not many.

Returning to our dock, Hans reveals the new wet look. You can see another Maid of the Mist heading upriver behind him.

The Rainbow Bridge links Canada and USA just downstream from the falls.

The USA side has an additional viewing platform as they are further from Horseshoe Falls than we were on the Canadian side.

Still, the USA side of the falls is pretty mighty too...

In this photo you can see our dock with a line of blue poncho people waiting to board once we disembark. We loved the experience - and we noted the ticket price per person was $19.75 - a bargain in expensive Canada.

Back at the top again and quickly drying off in the sun.

One more photo of the truly impressive Niagara Falls before we leave.

It was 1pm and time for lunch so we headed up into town to the right of this photo. Niagara town is very tacky with everything from a Hard Rock Cafe to Fast Food, funfair and souvenir joints. We ignored all of it and found a Starbucks inside the Sheraton Hotel. No free wifi but their drinks were nice and we found a cool spot to enjoy our sandwich lunch which we had brought with us.

At 2pm we were back on the bus to continue the tour. We drove north on Niagara Parkway along Niagara River to firstly the Whirlpool Rapids. Yes, that is again US territory on the other side.

There is a gondola there that goes across the water from Canada to...

...Canada. No, you can not cross the border to the US by using a gondola. Would have been cool though...

A bit further north on Niagara Parkway we encountered a joint hydro power operation. This is how the American hydro power infrastructure looked from the Canadian side.

And a bit further north again is the Canadian equivalent. The bridge behind it is another Canadian / US border crossing.

We proceeded to a stop at Niagara on the Lake - the settlement by the British in the early 1800's after they fled the war of 1812 with USA. We thought it was a lovely town but we only had an hour here so we bought gelato and headed to the lake. We could have spent longer here.

And yes, Niagara on the Lake did remind us of an Australian town more than any other North American town has done to date. A Clocktower at the middle of the Main Street is a common Australian town feature.

If you ignore the top floor, this hotel could have been any number of Australian country corner hotels or pubs.

This building is called "The Romantic House". Seemed to be a big hit with Asian tourists (and Di).

Lake Ontario, where Niagara River empties its water into it, is only about 3 blocks away from the Main Street of Niagara on the Lake as per above. We wandered to the waterfront for a look. A few pics...

Across Niagara River on the American side is a fort called Niagara Fort. We assumed that it dates to the American / Canadian war of 1812 given its highly strategic position.

Our final tour stop for the day was for ice wine tasting at Diamond Estates, a winery co-owned by Dan Ackroyd. We heard from our tour driver that there are approximately 160 wineries in the Niagara region. Who would have thought?

Note the Dan Ackroyd Wines logo bottom second from the left.

Wine tasting - one white and two ice wines...

Ice Wine is unusual and hard to harvest - which is done, by hand, at midnight after 3 consecutive nights of minus 10-12 degrees C. That must be fun...NOT. The result is a sweet dessert wine that can be made both white or red. Given the work that goes into it there was no surprise to find that a 300ml bottle costs $34.

 

A few more pics from around the Diamond Estates winery.

Back on our bus around 5pm (we were supposed to be returning to Toronto between 5 and 6pm) for what we figured might be a slow trip home. Sure enough traffic slowed us down at the outskirts of Toronto and it was after 7pm when we were dropped near our hotel.

We decided that it was best to have a quick dinner before retiring for showers and drinks in our room. We went back to the Dundas Square food court that we found yesterday and ordered Caribbean fast food for $7.79. The food was good, sweet and spicy chicken on mash with corn, and the servings were enormous. We could have shared one, but didn't. Next time...

Back to the hotel doing blogging, reading and drinking beer and wine before crashing sound asleep. A huge day. Good night.

 

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