Exploring the Niagara Falls

Coming to the US and not visiting the mighty Niagara is out of question. A planned 3 day trip to the Niagara falls, Philadelphia and Washington DC wasn’t the best choice but the falls alone made it up to the rest two not-so-interesting days of the trip.

Day 1- We left New York at 7 in the morning. The bus took us for a beautiful ride through New Jersey to The Niagara Falls, stopping by at a place called Secret Caverns( which isn’t quite a mysterious place as the name suggests). We reached there at 6 in the evening and attended the half an hour Spirit of the Mist. A dance show portraying the history of the native American Indians with some interesting dance forms which you probably won’t understand, but it looks kinda nice with those colorful costumes. 

After the show, we went to watch the giant falls in the colors of illumination. Pink, blue, green, yellow!! Wow!! A water color palette (like literally). 

Since Niagara is at the border of Canada and New York state, you get to enjoy it from both the countries (a better view from Canada though).While I took some time drowning in those colors (disadvantage of being an artist), others were happily taking pictures. We then left for the hotel we were to stay in Maryland-Adam’s Mark. 

 

Day 2 -After a nice short nap of 7 hours we headed to the Old Niagara Fort. The 18^th century buildings built by the French were fascinating. With Lake Ontario to this end, the fortress looked beautiful (No wonder they fought so much for it). The firing musket demonstration was kinda fun. We got an hour or so to look around the fort. It was like a time machine travel to the past, imagining how the war happened, how 500 British troops crossed the river in 1813 and acquired the fort.

The Fort on Lake Ontario

Outside the fort

The Enterance

From inside the fort

Me and my sister all set to enter the falls (ignore the bald guy)

With brains quite filled with knowledge, we headed to the falls, this time to actually go inside it. The Maid of the Mist is what I am talking about. We got our tickets, wore the raincoat they gave us and waited in line to get to the boat which was gonna take us inside the enormous waterfall right behind us. Almost lost inside that raincoat, I was looking at the Canadian end, wondering about “The extra” that Canada offers. It takes you to a “Journey behind the falls” where a tunnel would lead you to portals where you could watch the thunderous Niagara right in front of you, being one-third of the way behind the massive sheet of water. Plus the observation deck is right beside the waterfall.  Yes we did miss out on that. But none of it mattered when we got on that boat.

Yes, that's the Maid of the Mist

Rainbow :D

 I had my camera ready to capture the most beautiful sight of the sun shining on the water and a rainbow just above our heads.

Like a little kid, I wanted to be right at the end of the boat, so I get to enjoy the waterfall a little more than the others. As we got close, I could feel the mist on my face and a lot more on my spectacles, blocking the god damn view (all coz I wanted to be right at the tip). I got a little busy cleaning my spectacles and putting my camera inside the cover and before I could realize we were already inside the falls. 

The intensity of the water flow and the mist was exuberant. Every drop was like dew falling from a leaf, so fresh. It was indeed a sprinkle like that of the first rain, just a little more surreal. I felt I was in a cloud of rain, all white and beautiful.

The next moment, through the slightest vision that I could get from my drenched spectacles, I saw the sun shining all over again. The boat took a turn, we saw the Great Niagara Falls from every possible angle and were back in no time. 

Stairs to the top

Happy Mum and Dad after the amazing experience

You could climb up hundreds of stairs or take the elevator to reach to the observation deck. We chose the elevator for we were running short of time. The observation deck gives a magnificent view of the falls. Took some more pictures there and headed out to fill our tummies. 

A while later, our bus headed to Philadelphia and I slept like a baby.

 

The Great Niagara Falls from the observation deck