Spring Break: Niagara Falls

It's spring break! We've been looking forward to this week for a while now, and we managed to plan a little getaway during the first half of the week.

On Monday afternoon, we drove up to Niagara Falls again, retracing the route we took this summer (basically a big loop around Lake Erie). Since our first visit back in July, we thought it would be cool to go back and see the falls in a different season. It turns out that March was a perfect time to go: there were still lots of interesting ice formations at the falls, but the weather was decent and we had no trouble on the roads. Also, the crowds were minimal. The biggest plus: we spent about 1/3 of the cost per night on the hotel! The downside was that a lot of things were closed or had limited hours, and many of our favorite areas on the US side weren't accessible due to the snow. Still, it was great to go back!

We arrived around dinner time, got checked in, and headed down for our first views of the falls, just before sunset.

View from our hotel room.

Then, it was a bit of a wild goose chase to find dinner, but we ended up at Rainforrest Cafe (something like our third choice after finding our other options had already closed).

After dinner, we walked along the falls to see them illuminated.

In the morning, we were off for a full day's adventure. We grabbed breakfast at the Tim Horton's in the casino near our hotel, then went down to the Table Rock Welcome Centre. We started at the Journey Behind the Falls, part of an attraction pass we'd bought online. This took us down into some tunnels and let us see the falls from below. (During the summer, more tunnels are open; now, the ice gets in the way).

Weird statue at the casino.

A cool panoramic pic from Mark's fancy phone.

Next, we walked across the Rainbow Bridge to explore the US side. There was a ton of snow over here, and a lot of areas weren't open. But it was still cool to see the falls from this perspective.

Back on the Canadian side, we had lunch at the sit-down restaurant at the Welcome Centre, with a beautiful view of the falls. We also did a bit of shopping, then took the bus a few miles north to the Butterfly Conservatory. On the way up, our driver stopped to let us take some quick pics of the whirlpool. On the way back, we stopped at Souvenir City for a snack (fudge), some window shopping, and a few cheesy pictures.

That night, we had pizza for dinner on Cliffton Hill and rode the SkyWheel, a giant Ferris wheel. The pictures don't do it justice, but it was awesome to see the falls and the city from this vantage point!

On Wednesday morning, we woke up to some pretty dense fog. After breakfast at a different Tim Horton's, we walked down to the Bird Kingdom, where we'd arranged to meet up with Judy, a friend of Mark's from ABQ who now lives in Canada. We hadn't seen her for something like 10 years, so it was great that she was willing to drive down to Niagara, with her 4 kids, and spend the morning with us. The Bird Kingdom is a multi-story place that is home to all kinds of beautiful exotic birds as well as reptiles and snakes and assorted other small animals. Though the birds made me a bit nervous, I could certainly appreciate the experience, and it was a good place to hang out and catch up a bit while Judy's kids had something to do. Unfortunately, toward the end of our time there, my camera died, so I don't have any pictures from the rest of our trip!

After parting ways with Judy and family, Mark and I walked back up to Table Rock for lunch. By this time, the fog had cleared and left in its wake a beautiful, sunny day. In the full sunlight, the falls and all the ice were absolutely stunning! I was kicking myself for not charging that camera the night before! We ended up back at the same fallsview restaurant for lunch, and eventually made our way back to our car to begin the journey home. We crossed the border in record time (unlike during the summer, when we left early in the morning and still had quite a long wait), had dinner at a travel stop somewhere in Ohio, and made it home in time to get the laundry done before bed.

While we don't know if we'll make it back to the falls again or not, we sure are glad we decided to take this trip!