Niagara Falls, Nature's Wonder
In my previous post I said that we had booked our car 1 month ahead, but this trip is complete opposite to that, We decided to go to Niagara Falls at 4 PM on the 21st of April 2006. Suddenly K calls me and asks if we can go to Niagara as he is a bit free that weekend. Immediately I called A and asked if he is fine with it. A was fine so immediately I went and picked up A and went to Enterprise and rented a Suzuki Grand Vitara. N and K came home and later A reached home. I had some work to finish, so I finished it and reached home at 6:30 PM. We packed our stuff and started by around 8 PM. Going here and there, by the time we left from Chicago it was 10 PM. We took I-90 E towards Indiana, Ohio and Newyork state.
On the way in Ohio all of a sudden a cop car stopped us, A got a correction saying our tail light was not working and he needs to fix it as soon as possible and then only drive. So we pulled on to a near by gas station and found that we did'nt switch on the light hence the tail light was not burning. In Ohio we had a lot of fog and the visibility was very bad. Due to this we missed the exit where I-90 splits from I-80 and hence we went on I-80 instead of I-90. We kept driving and never realised. I was expecting some time I-90 should get split but it never happened. At around 8 AM we entered Pensylvania state. Once we entered Pensylvania I had a strong doubt if we were on he right track. So we stopped over at the welcome center, K and I looked at the map that was for display. We found that we had missed I-90, so we looked at the map and found that I-79 goes and joins I-90 which we are supposed to take. After this there was small argument between K and A regarding who is going to drive, finally A started driving. We went on I-80 a little further and then took I-79 and then later I-90 and reached Buffalo, NY at 10:30AM. We had booked a room online at BestWestern in Buffalo, NY. So we reached the Hotel and was amazed to know that we can checkin to room only after 3PM and not before that. So we took permission of the receptionist to use their common rest room to freshen up and started heading towards the Niagara Falls.
We reached Niagara falls at 12 noon. The place was so scenic that we turned every possible direction and took photos. We then bought the tickets for Maid of the mist and boarded the boat. While boarding the boat we given the Maid of the mist Pocha's. We wore the pocha given to us and then waited for the boat to leave. The boat started going towards the American falls. The boat goes really close to the falls. By the time we came away from the American falls we were totally drenched, but it was really enjoyable. I felt like all those kids who like to get wet in the rain. From there the boat went towards the Horse shoe falls (Canadian Falls) and this time we could not even open our eyes to see the falls, the water was just hitting us from all sides.
After going on the Maid of the mist we walked along the river and then went to the Goat Island to have the awesome view of the falls from a close proximity. There are two view points one next to the American Falls and the other next to the Canadian Falls. The sight of so much water flowing down the falls was real treat to the eyes.
Later we had a some awesome lunch at a Punjabi place near by and then waited in the car for the light show. After a long wait of about 2.5 Hrs wait we were all set at a great spot to have a nice view of the light show. But to our dismay the light show was really childish. Just some coloured lights being flashed at the falls.
We watched it patietly for about 30 mins and then we lost patients and left to checkin at the hotel. We went to our rooms and dozed off disappointed after the Chicago Bulls loss to Miami Heats in the playoffs.The next day we started early at 8:00AM to Rochester, NY. One of my friend P lives there. So we thought we will go visit him. By the time we reached his place it was almost 10:00 AM. From P's house we left for Letchworth State Park. We reached park as planned and we were driving towards the upper falls and A got his first Ticket in US for speeding.
A was going at 40Mph at 25Mph region. Later K took over and we saw the upper and middle falls. We were the only ones wandering around in the rain in the park. Later we drove back to rochester had lunch and dropped P back in his house and started to drive back to Chicago at about 3:00 PM. We reached Chicago at around 12 midnight. We dropped N and was returning home and when we were about 1.5 miles from our house I got a speeding ticket for going at 46Mph at a 30Mph road. I felt really sick of my luck and went to bed as soon as we reached home. Alas! finished my trip to Niagara.
