New York, NY to Niagara Falls, ON

Experienced our first Amtrack journey from Manhattan to Niagara Falls, very comfortable and were lucky to have an inspector who doubled up as a tour guide along the way! Arrived at the Falls at 5pm and checked into a very nice Quality Inn and then headed down to the attractions, I say attractions as Niagara is very commercialised and so the Falls are in competition with the "Blackpool" feel! The Falls win each time though, they are magnificent.

We ate by the Falls, which were showing off by the way of a light show and then popped up the Skylon Tower to admire an aerial view.

Next day it's time to experience the real thing, so we took a tour on the Maid of the Mist, it was both spectacular and fun. Once again we joined the tourist brigade and popped on the very attractive poncho's, nice blue this time!

The falls are spectacular indeed, with millions of cubic feet of water flowing every minute. the day we arrived, two unfortunates had gone over the wall surrounding the falls, and did not survive. It's quite rare, but as you walk around, people do sit on the top of the railing and you want to tell them to get down, have they not heard the news!?

Later in the day we then travelled to our next destination - Niagara-on-the-lake, where we stayed at a very "twee" B&B. This town claims to be the prettiest in Canada, it is very pretty, with great views across the lake to Toronto. Next morning we met my relatives at the Prince of Wales Hotel. After morning coffee we pop by the Peller Estates Vineyard for lunch at Jason Parsons' restaurant - who is an English chef who has a TV series with two other chefs (called "The 3 Chefs") in Canada. The lunch was excellent.

The following day its off for a drive down to Sarnia (across the border from Port Huron) and Dresden (the location of Uncle Tom's Cabin). At Sarnia we were introduced to a French-Canadian snack "Poutines", Ian of course tried this, perhaps not the healthiest side to French cuisine as we know it!!

A quick pose by the St. Clair river with our lovely family (l-r: Ian, Rosina, Morag and Edgar), who kindly encouraged us to stay longer than planned. It's been great to have time out, relax, and plan the next step of our journey. It feels like home here - all the place names are either English or Scottish. It's fantastic to spend time with our family - life and time are both precious.