74 Behind the falls

Canada
Québec & New Brunswick
Nova Scotia & Newfoundland
Québec & Ontario
Manitoba to the Pacific

60 Ferry to Québec
61 Back in Québec
62 Drive to Tadoussac
63 Tadoussac
64 On to Québec
65 Québec
66 Québec
67 On to Ottawa
68 Ottawa
69 Ottawa
70 Ottawa
71 On to Niagara
72 The falls
73 Canadian wine
74 Behind the falls
75 Morty goes home
76 On to Toronto
77 CN Tower
78 ROM
79 Stocks, tower and dance
80 Toronto Saturday
81 Off to Florida
82 Coping with Wilma
83 SeaWorld
84 Back to Canada
85 Casa Loma and shoes
86 Killarney
87 To Sault Ste. Marie
88 Goulais River
89 To Thunder Bay
90 Thunder Bay

Canada: Ontario

Sunday 16 October 2005

We had decided to see a little more of Niagara before moving on. We had some chores to do before we left and spent some time just generally catching up with ourselves before heading into town. Our experience of a Koa campsite has been a good one. The people who had been in the site next to us only stay on Koa sites and I can see why. They were clean, with good facilities and good site sizes.

In Niagara a crap bit of map reading by me meant that we drove further out of town than we had intended to and beyond where we wanted to go. It turned out to be to our advantage though as we had good views down along the river towards the falls. It helps to create a sense of perspective of how fast and powerful the water becomes before it crashes down over the edge.

Journey Behind the Falls

We parked on the river front where there were well kept gardens and lawns. The immediate strip along the river edge is the only park of Niagara Falls that has not succumbed to high rise, neon tackiness. We went close to where the power plant is where you can see the water crashing over the edge of a man made flat strip of land. It was so fast it did not look like water. It was almost as if someone was pouring a thick sauce over the edge and that if you touched it you would end up with gooey hands. It was like a river of hair gel!

Before leaving Morty in the car park we had made a picnic lunch and sat on the river bank outside one of the fast food joints eating our sandwiches. There was something satisfying about doing that. In front of us the local bird population revealed their meal of choice – French fries. It made us wonder whether they generally have a high fat diet and obesity problem.

One of the “tours” you can do here is a walk behind the falls. We had not initially planned to do it but it came highly recommended (by my sister) so we thought we would give it a go after all. A short tunnel system has been blasted through the rock behind the falls. There are two observation tunnels which enable you to get about three metres away from the water as it comes crashing over. Every time I thought that we could have got closer, the wind turned direction and blew a wave of water into the tunnel, reinforcing why you could not go closer. As the falls keep eroding over time these observation tunnels also need to move. The ones we were in were the second set. The first ones, blasted in the 1920’s were uncovered by the water some time in the 1950’s.

It was pretty impressive standing at the end of these tunnels and watching a white wall of water crashing down in front of you. For me though, what was even better was the observation deck. This has been built just on the left hand side of the falls and it gives you fantastic views of the horseshoe and of the water crashing down. From here you can see that the waterfall itself is about two or three metres away from the vertical wall of the rock face. The wave of water is about another metre thick – glacial green turning to icing sugar white as the water sprays up into the air.

It was a mesmerising place to stand. From here there were also great views of the Maid of the Mist boats. They really battle against the currents to hold their place. One we watched looked as if it was having difficulty turning around but it soon swung round and headed down stream. Headed… I should have said whooshed. The force of the water sent it rocketing back towards the deck further downstream. It is certainly not somewhere you would want an unplanned and unprepared for dip into the water.

Having had our fill of water, we headed back onto the Queen Elizabeth Way for our journey back up to Toronto. The road took us back past the local vineyards which lined the route both sides. The vines are so close to the road it made me wonder whether they get affected by pollution from the traffic rushing by. Perhaps it simply adds a certain something to Canadian wines.

As there are no campsites central to Toronto itself we decided to stay outside the centre at the Koa campsite in Campbellville. Their advert claims that the campsite is only twenty eight minutes from metro Toronto so we thought it was possibly close enough to easily get into and out of town so that we could stay here rather than in a hotel. When we got there we both realised it was quite a way out of town. Stef started to try and change the game plan but I resisted. We will be in hotels for close to a week so need to stay out of town for tonight at least.

We checked in to the site, a very slow process as the lady at the desk liked to talk, and then hooked up for the night. The campsite was on the side of the main route 401 highway and you could hear the traffic passing by outside. There were a few other people there but it was not fully booked by a long way.

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