Trip Report: May 12 - June 2, 2002
by Ted & Sylvia Blishak
SPRING JOURNEY ACROSS THE CONTINENT AND RETURN
NIAGARA FALLS TO TORONTO
Sunday, May 26, 2002
We set our alarm for 5:30am in order to view the falls before the crowds of other tourists awaken. Fallsview Avenue is built along a bluff which is a glacial moraine. One narrow street descends to the park along the river. For the benefit of the many visitors staying at the hotels on the bluff, there is a funicular descending to the park, but it is not open at this time of day, so we jump into our rental car and drive down. Parking is in designated lots in the park, and the fees range from $3 to $10 Canadian, depending upon its distance to the falls. At this early hour, nobody is there to collect parking fees, so we park as close as we can get and walk over to view the water rushing over the lip of Horseshoe Falls.
The only other person out this morning is a Japanese tourist with his camera and tripod. No traffic, no tour buses, no helicopters, no crowds on the sidewalks. This is the way I viewed the falls for the first time in 1956, and it is worth getting up early for. Huge clouds of mist from the falls drop like rain.
We walk downstream along the bluff of Niagara Gorge, through beautifully landscaped parks with fountains, and lush with multicolored tulips. By the time we reach the classic Brock Plaza Hotel, originally the General Brock Hotel, it is 7am and we have developed an appetite. We are early enough that we easily find a choice of window seats in their rooftop restaurant, and enjoy breakfast with a birds-eye view of the falls.
This art deco era hotel, with its grand curved staircases, lavish chandeliers and dark wood paneling, is one many of our clients (who we book on independent itineraries through Brewster Tours) have enjoyed.
The hotel is located at the Canadian end of the Rainbow Bridge. This bridge is a replacement for the Honeymoon Bridge which was destroyed by ice floes in 1938. A photograph taken as it was collapsing is on the wall here at the hotel along with other historic pictures.
http://www.infoniagara.com/d-history-bridge.html
Next door is the newer Sheraton on the Falls Hotel. Just up the street is Clifton Hill, with its collection of museums of horror and other various attractions and souvenir shops. The sidewalks get busier as more people awaken and come outside. The first sailing of the Maid of the Mist leaves at 9am and we observe its progress upstream as it chugs very close to the falls. The passengers are clothed in yellow raingear to avoid getting soaked in the mist which rises up hundreds of feet from the plunge pool at the base of the falls.
Returning to the Renaissance, we pack up and take a nap before checking out at noon to continue our drive to Toronto. By this time the honky-tonk area of Clifton Hill is jammed with tourists. It is so crowded that some tourists are overflowing the sidewalks and actually walking down hill to look at the falls. We drive past a Hershey's store, easily identifiable with a huge, partly-eaten replica of a candy bar leaning against the building, along with a giant a candy kiss on top. Posters of chocolate shakes with a kiss on top lure me into dropping Sylvia off to buy a couple, but she comes out empty handed at 11:55am. Sold out! Well, this is Memorial Day weekend.
Continuing along the Niagara Parkway, we stop to walk along the gorge at the Whirlpool, where the river turns sharply to the right. [Photo 85] Visitors are lined up at the entrance to the Spanish Aero Car, waiting for an exciting aerial ride across the gorge, directly over the Whirlpool. We observe the abandoned roadbeds of the trolley lines that once ran on both sides of the river far below. We also see the evidence of why they no longer run, the roadbeds at several locations are completely covered by rockslides, with some boulders the size of large houses. There is much evidence of the instability of the gorge, including the abandoned wreckage of the Schoellkopf Power Plant on the American side that was destroyed by a rockslide in 1956.
Helicopters launched from a nearby pad hover overhead. It is time to go. A short drive down the parkway takes us past the two newest and largest power plants, the Robert Moses Niagara Power Plant on the American side of the gorge, and the Sir Adam Beck Generating Station on the Canadian side. Combined, these two plants divert about 50% of the water that naturally would go over the falls. A little further on we reach the edge of the Niagara Escarpment and the road descends to the level of the Ontario Plain to the town of Niagara-on-the-Lake. This is the beginning of the wine country, and countless visitors from the Toronto area are making the tour, riding everything from motorcycles to chauffeur driven limousines.
A short side trip to the shore of Lake Ontario reveals a century-old steamboat, the S.S. Pumper about to depart on an excursion. It is quiet here, away from the main highway, and one could imagine that it is really 1902 and we are getting ready for a holiday excursion under steam.
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