My Next 40 Years

I haven’t travelled with my kiddos all summer so I planned a last minute (for me) trip to Niagara Falls. I feel like it’s one of those places that is just out of the way enough that it has to be a destination unto itself. Given my leave has been so restricted over the last decade, I’ve used my personal time for grander adventures. That said, I’m really glad we made the trek this past weekend and I’m equally glad that we’ve saved it for now.

Niagara Falls is only a 6.5 hour drive from our home outside of DC so I made the executive decision to drive (it’s much more economical, if feasible, for 3 people to drive rather than fly or take a train – go figure that out). Hoping to get a jump on traffic, we left DC at the ungodly hour of 5am and we were able to get out of town before rush hour. The drive was beautiful – mostly through western PA and very mountainous with sweeping vistas of green as far as the eye can see. This part of the country, pretty much the entire way up to Canada, is very rural so we made great time and arrived in the general region of the falls at 1pm.

After grabbing a quick lunch and checking into our hotel, we headed to the Canadian side of the falls. This meant going through passport control on the Rainbow Bridge. I have never driven through a passport check so I wasn’t fully sure what to expect. I will say, entering Canada was a breeze, returning to the US, not so much. From driving onto the bridge to passing passport control, it took about 30 minutes total entering Canada.

After figuring out how to change the car settings from metric to imperial, we followed the directions for parking and made our way to the Niagara Parks visitor kiosk via complementary tram from the parking lot. Prior to arrival, I had purchased the Classic Niagara Pass online. (https://www.niagaraparks.com/visit-niagara-parks/plan-your-visit/deals-packages/)

As I was saying, we arrived at the Niagara Parks visitor kiosk via courtesy tram and were helped to plan our time in Niagara Park (CAN) by one of the park representatives. Our first stop was the White Water Walk – a short .5km walk along the class 6 white water rapids which was fascinating. We were given little passports when we registered that shared historical blurbs about the various stops in the park and I was surprised to learn that this exact route was the end of the underground railroad. It really put things into perspective.

Our next stop was the Whirlpool Aero Car, basically a cable car that runs 3,500 feet across a canyon above whirlpools. Not my jam, I would have been happy with the butterflies, but the kids picked it, so dangle we did). I did not love the height as I’ve been recently experiencing issues with vertigo, but if you don’t look directly down, it wasn’t that bad.

After both of these experiences, we were beat. We’d been up since 5am, driven over 7 hours altogether and walked about 10K steps. We had dinner reservations at 7:30 that we decided to cancel and instead went back to our hotel and shared a pizza on the rooftop. (NOTE: it took an hour to reenter the US).

The next morning, we had a walking tour of the US side of Niagara Park planned for 10 am. As directed we arrived at 9:45. Our guide was about 5 minutes late so our tour didn’t get underway under until about 10:15. I was incredibly disappointed that our “tour guide” did not share any meaningful information about the park. No facts, figures, etc that were not already listed on plaques and signs along the way. I was really hoping that we would have an experience where we learned about the park, but we did not. I’ll say our tour guide functioned more as a people wrangler than anything else.

We did have some pretty amazing experiences, the first being the Maid of the Mist. This is an all electric boat that takes you past American and Bridal Falls and into the mist of Horseshoe Falls. 10/10. DO NOT miss this experience. I was struggling to comprehend the power of the falls but after this experience, I appreciated them so much more. Plus it was just plain fun.

After walking to various overlook points, we said goodbye to our people wrangler and ventured to our second experience on the US side – The Cave of the Winds. This is a wooden walkway that leads right up to the base of Bridal Falls and includes a “Tropical Storm” observation deck. This experience was AWESOME! I highly recommend that you take your shoes off. I was wearing my Vessi’s and assumed I’d be ok. At one point, I turned to take a picture and the water poured into my sneakers…. game over. They were waterproof which means that the water that got in, couldn’t get out. Small concession for a beautiful, once in a lifetime experience. The kids were brave enough to stand directly under the waterflow, but due to the spray, I couldn’t take photos.

Since we were soaking wet, we ran back to our hotel, changed our clothes and made our way back over to the Canadian side. (Passport control took 10 mins to enter Canada). We had dinner reservations at the Skylon Tower later that evening so we parked there and made our way down to the Niagara Parks kiosk. We had an excursion planned for 4pm that afternoon that we missed due to the late start of our US tour. The agent accommodated our request and changed our experience time without making us feel less than for missing our original time. It was very refreshing.

At this point, we have been all over then place. We’ve walked, we’ve boated, we’ve trammed. Now, we wanted to sit and enjoy the beauty of the falls. So we did just that. We walked to Queen Victoria Place and since the drinking age in Canada is 19, all three of us enjoyed cocktails on the patio while taking in the atmosphere. One of the many reasons why Canada is growing on me is the European vibe you get nearly everywhere. I’m a serious lover of Europe so it’s nice to have something very similar closer to home.

After a relaxing hour chatting, enjoying our cocktails and just soaking in the surroundings, we made our way back up to Skylon Tower for our dinner reservations in the more family friendly buffet style dining room. (PSA: skip the overpriced, not super delish dinner, and spend the $12 CAN ($8.50 US) to just ride to the top and enjoy the observation tower view.

Our last stop and final experience of this short trip was the Journey Behind the Falls. After our earlier experience, we were prepared with flipflops/crocs. Our reservation time was for 8:30 and it was absolutely fantastic. Due to the later timeslot, we basically had the experience to ourselves and were able to spend some time exploring. We first went down to the outside observation deck and took a look at Horseshoe Falls up close. Next, we walked through really old caves built behind the falls which led to cut outs where you could literally stand behind the falls. It was truly an awesome experience.

On our way back to the car, we enjoyed the falls light show. Both the US and Canadian Falls are lit from the Canadian side and they alternate through various light schemes which is incredibly cool. Again, I lamented not getting a hotel on the Canadian side as it would have been really cool to keep watching. Alas, we headed back to our car and the US. This time our GPS took us to the Lewiston-Queenstown Bridge (I assume because the Rainbow Bridge was absolutely jammed). While much less trafficked than the Rainbow Bridge, it still took about 45 minutes to cross.

An uneventful ride home and thus ends our Niagara Falls trip. All in all, a great trip. If you’re planning to go yourself a few tips: stay on the Canadian side, plan for a morning on the US side and accomplish this by walking across the Rainbow Bridge. Don’t pay for a walking tour, just the experiences you want to have. I recommend the Maid of the Mist and that’s it (and even this has departures from the Canadian side). We had the exact same experiences on the Canadian side for less money. The US side offers some fascinating up close views of the American and Bridal Falls that you should not miss. But once you’ve seen it, make your way back to the Canadian side and enjoy a more low key, walking friendly, full service experience.