THURSDAY 6TH - NIAGARA FALLS

After another frenetic but uneventful trip on the Los Angeles freeway system yesterday morning, we successfully returned the motor home having added no more damage to its slightly battered exterior. We departed Los Angeles at 11:00pm last night and landed in Toronto at 6:46 this morning after a four and a half hour flight. We have had a surprisingly productive day but I suspect that we will sleep very well tonight.

We collected our hire car this morning and were immediately introduced to the Toronto freeway system. More by good luck than good management, we found ourselves on the right freeway to Niagara so successfully arrived here at about 9:30 this morning. We no longer need the trusty little Garmin that served us so well in the U.S. The hire car has a GPS and is a dream to drive after the motor home.

 

For those interested in such things, the car is a seven seat AWD Ford Flex which we have never seen or heard of before.

Niagara is just magic and, if you ignore the garish tourist traps, the environment is brilliant. We have moved from a dry desert to a lushly vegetated region. The claim to fame that Niagara Falls makes is that it has the greatest volume of water flowing over it. I know that Iguasu and Victoria Falls also make claims. I think one claims to be the highest and the other claims to be the widest but they are all spectacular.

After a comprehensive walking tour this morning, we did the obligatory boat cruise to the base of the falls. We were issued with ponchos to keep us dry but they were only partly successful.

This afternoon we rode the 100 year old Whirlpool Aero Car over (as in 250 feet above them) a set of rapids not surprisingly called the whirlpool. The strength of water flow is such that the rapids are classified as an unnavigable class 6 rapid. I asked the operator how the cable car was powered 100 years ago but she didn't know. Apparently nobody had ever asked her that question Accordingly to Google, power was provided by a small Buick engine for the first 45 years.

 

This is a view from our hotel window. The falls are partially obscured by the USA Bridge, so called presumably because it links Canada and the USA. We carefully avoided getting on to it this afternoon when we went driving.

Who knows what tomorrow will bring? I haven't got to that yet but we do have a motel booking at Barrie a town north of here on a circuitous route to Ottawa where we have to be on Sunday.