Susie's 65th-Final Part-Sunrise at Niagara Falls, Canada, Back to the USA & Lily via a Lightship

Friday June 29th, 2018

For some inexplicable reason I woke up at 5.15am and was just going back to sleep, when I remembered that sunrise was about this time.  I couldn't resist.  I got up and looked out the window.  What I saw was a haze and mist and the sun slowly rising.

I thought about this for one moment, was going to get my camera, as quietly as possible, and then I thought, maybe I should wake Bryan up.  Would he be mad at me, or would he be even madder that he hadn't seen this?

Well, I decided to wake him up gently!!!  He was not enthusiastic, but once he saw what was outside the window he was suddenly awake!!!  He got his camera and was taking pictures within a couple of minutes.

It was very eerie.   The mist meant you couldn't see very much at first, except the glow from the sun.  It was rising behind the Skylon Tower.  When you look at the pictures, what does the tower remind you of?  The Cross.  How awesome is this.  There was a reason I woke up when I did!!

I took this picture of Bryan looking at the pictures he had taken.  The reflection from the sun seems to go straight through him.  I thought I could see a face above his head, but if it is, I think it might be my reflection, ha!!ha!!

The mist gradually cleared.

We had coffee, packed our bags, and relaxed in the room before getting ready to go to the breakfast buffet in the hotel.  I think we have been spoilt by the buffets in Las Vegas as this one was Ok, but nothing like the buffets in Vegas!!!

After breakfast, we came back to the room to get our bags before checking out.  I took one last picture of the falls.  Au Revoir, Niagara Falls.  I will miss you, but I'm so happy we had the opportunity to come and see you.

Some pictures of our drive out of Niagara Falls.

American & Bridal Veil Falls from the car

Double Decker Red Bus!!!

Hard Rock Cafe

We stopped at Tim Hortons for "Timbits", alias Donut Holes, an iced coffee for Bryan and smoothie for me.  Yummy!!!!  We needed something to help us survive the drive.

We're still in Canada.

or are we???  Yep, this London is in Ontario, Canada.

Approaching USA customs.

We're back in the US of A.

We stopped at the Huron Lightship.  We didn't go on it as we wanted to get home as soon as possible, and we had got the stamp for our lighthouse passport when we visited the lighthouse on our way to Niagara.

You can see the top of the lighthouse in the distance, to the left of the blue paraglider.

The St. Clair River, aka The Blue River, separates USA and Canada.

The Blue Water Bridge connecting USA to Canada.

We just crossed that bridge.

After stretching our legs and getting something to eat, we got back on the road and eventually got home, exhausted but safe and sound.

We had a wonderful trip that we will always remember.

Here's links to the other blogs associated with this trip in case you missed any. 😀

Susie's 65th-Part 1-Traveling through Canada, Lighthouse, Base Lodging
Susie's 65th-Part 2-Cave of the Winds, Niagara Falls, USA
Susie's 65th-Part 3-Niagara Scenic Trolley, Niagara Falls, USA
Susie's 65th-Part 4-Luna Island, Niagara Falls, USA
Susie's 65th-Part 5-Horseshoe Falls, Niagara Falls, USA
Susie's 65th-Part 6-Hornblower Cruise, Tour of Niagara Falls, Canada
Susie's 65th-Part 7-Various places including Niagara Whirlpool & Aerocar, Tour of Niagara Falls, Canada
Susie's 65th-Part 8-Horseshoe Falls & Skylon Tower, Niagara Falls, Canada
Susie's 65th-Part 9-Old Fort Niagara and Lighthouse, Youngstown, NY, USA
Susie's 65th-Part 10-Lighthouses, Hilton Hotel & Fallsview, Niagara Falls, Canada
and of course, this final part!!!

Can you guess what were my favourite days?  There were two that I just can't separate, so they are tied.  Although every day was amazing!!!!!

And that is the end of this final blog of Susie's 65th Birthday Trip - One that I will always be thankful for, and I will remember for a very long time.  Many thanks to Bryan. xx

Susie's 65th-Part 10-Lighthouses, Hilton Hotel & Fallsview, Niagara Falls, Canada

Thursday June 28th, 2018

I will warn you in advance.  There are a lot of pictures, a few videos and 2 webcams in this post.

We checked out of the hotel on base, and made our way across to the Canadian side of the falls.

Approaching Canada

We got through customs with no problems.

Welcome to Canada

We drove toward Niagara on the Lake.

We found it!!!

There were lots of vineyards as we drove along.

We did not go into Niagara on The Lake but focused on finding the lighthouse we had seen from Fort Niagara.

We found Niagara River Range Rear Lighthouse, but could only get a picture of it from a park nearby.

Bryan had to stand on this corner to get the lighthouse picture!!  The things we do for lighthouses!!!

He took my picture with Fort Niagara, in America, in the background across the river.

Bryan thought he had seen two lights on this side of the river while we were at Fort Niagara, and so we drove along to see if we could find the other one.  He spotted it down one of the side roads.  The description in the link above describes these two lights and their history.  They are both very similar.

There was a small museum here but we didn't go in.

The picture below was taken from the parking area, where we were for the second lighthouse.  It was beautiful.  We didn't go any further into Niagara on the Lake, because we didn't want to fight crowds and we were really tired from our previous days excursions.  We started to head back towards the Falls. We were looking forward to getting to our hotel room but check in wasn't until 4pm officially.  

We stopped at a couple of places on the way back to take some pictures.

There was an overlook, looking back toward the Whirlpool Rapids that we saw on our tour a couple of days ago.  This was from further down river.

Jetboat navigating past the Whirlpool.  There were people down on that rock with a closeup view.

This bird looked as though he was praying or bowing to us.

We were getting close to the hotel

We got to the Hilton, Niagara Falls Fallsview hotel at about 2pm and they let us get into our room.  We were on the 43rd floor, Room 4359. There are 53 floors in all, so we were quite near the top.  Here is a live WEBCAM from the hotel website taken from the 53rd floor.

Here's another WEBCAM taken from the Marriott Hotel.  There's no sound on this, but I did see a wonderful rainbow on it while I was getting the link for this blog. 😀

Unless otherwise noted the remaining pictures were all taken through our room window.

This was the view from our room. Amazing!!!!!!

American Falls on left and Horseshoe Falls on right

Here is a VIDEO of our room and the view from it.

The picture below clearly shows, from left to right, Niagara Falls Observation Tower, American Falls, Bridal Veil Falls with Cave of the Winds at the base of it.  The Hornblower boat at the base of the American Falls.  There are more pictures following that show the same area.

People boarding Maid of the Mist for their ride to the base of Falls

Maid of the Mist at bottom of Bridal Veil Falls

Love this picture.  It shows the American Falls with the Bridal Veil Falls on the right.  I can almost hear the rush of the water.

You can also see the people at the Cave of the Winds below the Bridal Veil Falls, and at Luna Island at the top between American Falls & Bridal Veil Falls.

Hornblower at base of American Falls

Rainbow over the American Falls and here's a short VIDEO of it.

The Niagara River Rapids going toward the American Falls and Bridal Veil Falls.

Goat Island on the USA side to the left and behind the Casino.

The following are pictures of the Horseshoe Falls also known as the Canadian Falls

Table Rock Welcome Centre

The Rainbow Bridge connecting USA to Canada.

The Niagara Scow or barge that I talked about on the blog of our tour.

and here's a five minute VIDEO showing the complete view from our room.

Bryan did some reading, trying to decide on dinner I think.

We decided to walk to the casino, which was connected to the hotel through a covered walkway, for their dinner buffet.  This picture was taken from the enclosed walkway, as it crossed the road between the hotel and casino.  Once we got to the casino entrance, we both looked at each other and decided we didn't want to go in there, or have the buffet.  We just wanted to go back to the room, relax and look at the view.

We headed back to our room and had room service with our view!!!

Fish & Chips for Sue (This was a child's portion!!!) and wine.

Was I glad we came back to the room.  Shortly after our return we were rewarded with this rainbow over the Horseshoe Falls.  Isn't that far better than the inside of a casino!!!

and here's a VIDEO of the Horseshoe Falls rainbow.

I sat and relaxed on my laptop by the window.

The sun started to go down and although it was behind us it gave an interesting glow to the falls.

It gradually got darker.

The illuminations came on.

Darkness set in.

The American & Bridal Veil Falls showed the USA colors of Red, White & Blue.

The Horseshoe Falls showed the Canadian colors of Red & White.

Then the fireworks started.  Here's a 5 minute VIDEO of the fireworks.

After all that, and what an awesome show we've had all day, it was time for a relaxing jacuzzi bath and bed.

What another amazing day. Sweet Dreams everyone.