The Ultimate Falls Experience in Canada

Get ready Canada - here we come!!!  After a nice breakfast at the hotel, we headed to the parking lot on the American side and started walking over the Rainbow Bridge into Canada!  This was our first view of the falls - WOW - I had NO idea how magnificent it would be!!  Check out the Observation Deck - that's one place we must go!!

It was a nice walk over the bridge and about 1/2 way over is the boundary line into Canada!

This is the Rainbow Bridge - there's a special pedestrian walkway and on the other side of the railing were all the cars that were lined up to get into America - the line was LONG!

As we got a little further on the bridge, this was our view of the American Falls, as seen on the Canadian side!  Yes, the falls are MUCH more beautiful on the Canadian side as you're basically on top of them, on the American side!

We purchased the Adventure Pass which would get us into the Maid of the Mist, Niagara's Fury, Journey Behind the Falls, and White Water Walk.  The day was beautiful - absolutely gorgeous - but still we decided to go ahead and do the "wet" tours first - a very wise decision!!

First on the agenda was the Maid of the Mist which is a boat ride pretty close to the falls - here's a picture of one of the boats - they were pretty large and held a lot of people!

Rain coats were handed out - don't Patty and Teri look cute?

The boat ride was fun BUT wet!!!  You can't imagine the spray that comes off the falls - it was like it was raining out so there was no way you could take your camera out to take pictures - we didn't think to roll up our pant legs so the water kept dripping off of our raincoats down onto our jeans and tennis shoes - we had pretty wet pant bottoms by the time the boat ride was done!!

As the boat turned around headed back to shore, the spray wasn't so bad so I snapped this picture!  One of my favorites!

The next 2 tours were too far to walk - we grabbed a "bear claw" to split - yummy!!! - and then got on the bus which was included in our pass!  Next on the list was the Journey Behind the Falls!  Again we donned rain coats only in a different color, yellow!!  We walked down long hallways to the end where you could see the water coming down from behind - lots of interesting facts to read on the different places you walked and it was very well done!!

The next tour was Niagara's Fury which was a movie - a cute one that kids could understand about the falls - and after that we headed into another room where guess what, raincoats again!!!  This time we stood and watched a movie on the falls which included snow coming down on us, thunder, lightning and finally the rain!!  But we didn't get soaked this time so that was a plus!!  After coming out of the movie, we saw this perfect place to snap a fall picture!!

Lunch was a hot dog stand by the falls - nothing like some beautiful scenery to look at while you eat!!  As you can see, the color of the falls is beautiful!!

Our final tour was the White Water Walk - again, we took a bus to the other end and walked along a really nice boardwalk that was surrounded by beautiful fall trees to look at the white water - these rapids are a class 6 - one of the highest classes in the world!!  I sure wouldn't want to be on those falls in a raft!!  It was a nice walk and so pretty with all the fall trees!!

We rode the bus to Skylon Tower as we knew we wanted to go to the top for the view - there is also a restaurant at the top but it was by reservation only and pretty pricey!!  The elevator took us up in 52 seconds and the tower itself is 775 feet!!!  And were the views amazing???  ABSOLUTELY!  Take a peek at the American Falls!!

And this is Horseshoe Falls!

I can't tell you how many photos we took that day of the falls - we just snapped and snapped and couldn't seem to get enough!!!  There just aren't enough adjectives to describe what we saw!

Here's a picture of the tower - we rode in a yellow cable car type thing that went up on the outside.

After our ride, it was time to eat!!  Patty had overheard some people talking about Mama Mia's so we headed over to that area and found it and that's where we ate!!  It was a cute place inside and the food was great!

We all enjoyed a glass of wine - red for Teri, blush for me and white for Patty!! After our meal, we walked along the "carnival" type streets (everything you can imagine from Ripley's Believe It or Not to Haunted Houses to a huge Ferris Wheel to wax museums - you name it, it was there!!!) and I spotted a crepe place - a must have!!!  SO we ordered the Tutti Fruitt one which had fresh strawberries, bananas, nutella and whipped cream - we all split it which was a big mistake we decided later as Patty and I each wanted our own!!!

Then it was back to the falls to see them lit up at night!!  They have huge colored spotlights and they are beautiful but of course we weren't able to capture them on a camera!!

We finally headed back over the bridge to the American side (where you have to pay .50 to get back in - how ridiculous!!!) and headed back to the hotel - 3 tired sisters but all smiling from ear to ear from our wonderful day!!!