Got up and had a liesurely breakfast in the hotel dining room overlooking a marina on Lake Erie.  Gorgeous!

Headed up to Niagara Falls.  I figured at first that we would take a couple of hours to look the place over and then move on to Philadelphia.  But after reading a brochure that we got at the front desk last night, we modified the plan and figured that we would be spending the lion’s share of the day there.

We arrived, and were greeted by a guy with a red flag who guided us away from the official “park parking lot” to a different lot.  We figured that this was overflow parking.  We paid our parking fee, and then were given a coupon for a free souvenier inside the visitors center, which was right next to the parking lot.  On entering the visitor center and approaching the information booth, a young man gave us a very rapid-fire presentation on the tour package that they were offering, including all of the sites at the falls that we would be seeing, guided by their knowledgable guides.  At the very end, he told us the price per person, which was almost exactly twice what it said in the brochure that the whole package should cost.  He tried to pressure us by telling us that the van was leaving in only 10 minutes, and was surprised when I asked when the next van was leaving.  (45 minutes)

After a 5 second conference, Sharla and I walked out and over to the park proper, where the folks at the REAL visitor center sold us the package deal for what was published in the catalog.  It didn’t include the knowledgable guide or the van (or the fast talking salesman), but it did allow us into everything that there was to do and to go at our own pace.

We started with the IMAX movie about the Falls.  Very interesting history, as well as some of the folklore about the falls.  The first person to go over the falls in a barrel was a 64 year old school teacher (who told the press that she was 43!), who wanted to become famous.  She survived, but died broke and unknown just a few years later.

After that we wandered down to the falls proper.  To get there you walk alongside several hundred feet of very powerful rapids, with the roaring of the falls in the background, and the mist rising just a few feet away, actually looking quite a bit like the smoke plume from a fire.  When we got to the edge of the viewing area, you could look straight across the falls, and straight down almost 200 feet!  Amazing!  We then went way up to the viewing platform (another 200 feet up), where we could see all three falls very well.  (American Falls, the first one on the American side; Bridal Veil Falls, a small one right next to American Falls; and Horseshoe Falls, which is on the Canadian side of Goat Island.)  We then went straight down below the viewing platform to the boat dock, and rode Maid of the Mist VII, a boat that takes you right out to the edge of the falls.  It gets very misty (they give you little blue rain slickers, which were kind of like large garbage bags with a hood, but which actually helped a lot), and kind of turbulent as you get into the downflow.  The real show starts right at the base of Horseshoe Falls, where the mist is like a moderate rainshower, and the boat starts rocking back and forth as the eddys strike the sides.  Intense!

After a brief lunch, we walked across a bridge to Goat Island, where we took the elevator down to the base of Bridal Veil Falls, and walked on the series of footpaths called Cave of the Wind.  You can’t actually go into the cave any more because of safety issues, but you can walk all around the base of the falls.  On one platform called the Hurricane Deck, you are close enough to touch the water coming down, the spray is massive, and causes a strong wind to really whip around you.  It was amazing!

After all that, it was later than we planned for our start to Philadelphia.  So we have stopped for the night at a town called Cortland, New York (about an hour south of Syracuse on I-81).  We will head south to Philly in the morning, and plan on “doing the town” the next day.

Good night and God bless.