Honeymoon Capital of the World

My bride and I of almost 40 years enjoyed our visit to Niagara Falls.  But first we had a little of that Maker's Mark to toast our trip!

Cheers!

 We stayed at a very nice State Park called 4 Mile Creek, which is right on Lake Ontario about 15 miles north of the falls.  Parklike, huge sites, we just had to do a little figuring to get our satellite TV, so we pulled into our sites rather than back-in.  More on that later.

Pretty idyllic

So we jumped in the Jeeps to head down to the falls first thing in the morning because we wanted to take a ride on the Maid of the Mist and wanted to beat the crowds.  Jan and I have been to the falls several times but neither of us had ever ridden on the Maid of the Mist.  Our plan worked out well, parking was a snap and we got on a boat that was about half full.

Our intrepid group minus the picture taker

Our boat up close and another heading upstream

Disappearing into the mist

The American Falls

 I don't have any more pictures from the boat, as it got quite wet, what an understatement, there is a reason you get and wear a rain parka!  It was an incredible experience, the captain noses the boat right under the Horseshoe Falls on the Canadian side.  The powerful torrent of water is roaring in your ears as the "rain" pours down.  Very cool and well worth it.

A view of the American Falls from the top.

You can see the Horseshoe Falls in the background

We went out on Goat Island, the island that sits out in the Niagara River that splits the falls.  It is accessible from the American side only.  It is a beautiful park surrounded by rushing water making its way down and over the falls.  They have a restaurant, Top of the Falls, out there overlooking the Horseshoe Falls which we opened up, hey, we were hungry with the excitement, sat outside on a 2nd story deck with and incredible view and a great lunch!

Our view for lunch

We split up after lunch, Karen and Jo off to antique and Jan and I to tour Goat Island, take a short hike, check out a Lowes for an air hose.  We walked out a path that went to a little island out farther into the river, you wouldn't want to fall in, I tell ya!

Looking downriver towards the falls

Found a place where all the seagulls rest up for their assault on the falls:-)

 Now we are off for 1000 Islands.  Oh yeah about the sites.  We get back and are met by two Park workers who explain to us that we will have to turn the motorhomes around because we had broken the rules by pulling into our sites rather than backing in????  They said that they had rules about that.  We reasoned that we had spent one night there without any problem, couldn't we spend another pointed in?  No we couldn't, they had been tasked by their boss to get us to move:-(  I explained we had food cooking on the stove, we weren't hurting anything pointed one way over another, and most of all, we wouldn't be able to get the sat TV if we turned around!  So sorry they said, it was their boss's decision.  OK, so I went down to talk directly to him, and with my incredible negotiating skills and calm demeanor, I was able to prevail and he let us stay one more night the way we were, but "if you ever come back, you will have to back in!"