The Niagara River

After driving for nearly nine hours we hit the Canadian Border. They asked us a few questions then asked us to pull over and go into the immigration office. The immigration guy asked us the same questions, stamped our passports and sent us on our way towards Niagara. It wasn’t long before we were in a hostel and in a shower. The hostel wasn’t anything fancy but it was the staff that made it great. We were welcomed by a Belgian guy who showed us around and then gave us a rundown of the things we could do that night from restaurants to attractions. There was also an English family in the lounge who we had a chat with discussing the volcano and other English interests.

We were staying in a dorm on the third floor but they weren’t busy so we had the whole room to ourselves. It had been a pretty hot day so the shower was very welcome, nice and cooling. It was made even nicer by climbing into clean clothes and then sitting on the balcony in a lounge chair, overlooking the town.

We spent the rest of the evening strolling through the town picking up a few Geocaches and checking out the falls from the top pavement level. They are pretty impressive and make the ones we saw in Yosemite National Park look like a sprinkler hose. The town itself is horrible, full of tacky attractions and several horribly unrealistic wax museums. When we returned to the hostel we found out that they light the falls up at night but we were both too tired to walk back down. We did however get to see the fireworks (for Memorial Day) from the balcony. Fireworks are something they do really well over here but it missed the thrilling atmosphere of the Cassiobury display. The English family joined me on the balcony for the display and I ended up chatting to the father for a couple of hours.



I slept really well that night, it was the longest stint of driving we’d done yet and it’s surprising how tiring it can be. The next morning we got up early and walked down to the Maid of the Mist. She’s the boat which runs along the Niagara River and into the base of the Horseshoe Falls. They provide you with a blue plastic poncho and load you onto a boat with hundreds of others. I had my camera in a waterproof bag and but I couldn’t really see what I was taking so I just pointed it in the right direction and clicked away. Similar to the Mist Trail, they don’t call it the Maid of the Mist for nothing. You get wet, very wet. Luckily the ponchos take most of the brunt.






A walk back up to the hostel and a shower later, we were ready to check out and be on our way. We walked down with the intention of paying Patrick the owner. We’d met Patrick briefly the night before when he came and introduced himself. He’d asked us if we’d booked three or four nights, we’d replied with “one”. He acted shocked and claimed that you needed at least three days to see the area. We took this as his way of just squeezing more money out of us so we said we would still be staying just the one night and he left us alone.

We came to pay and he asked us which way we were going on our way out. We were planning on heading down the river so he pulled out a sheet of A4 paper and began to draw a map. It depicted the area and the ‘real’ Niagara area. Away from the horrible town there are all sorts of attractions which hardly anybody knows about. Everybody comes to see the big falls and then leaves with a bad sense of the area because of the cheap, nasty and expensive town. Patrick is on a mission to ensure that everyone that stays at his hostel doesn’t go away with this opinion. We left with a double sided sheet filled with his drawings and a new found respect for Patrick. It really would take three days to see all the ‘genuine’ attractions.



The first thing we stopped off at from Patrick’s suggestions was a Buddhist Temple. It is only a short drive from the falls and is free. It was surreal walking from the hot street into the temple which has 10,000 hand carved models of Buddha throughout. Two busloads of school children walked in soon after us which kind of spoilt the atmosphere so we moved on.

Next came the whirlpool which is apparently the largest in the world. We parked up and walked to the foot of the trail. Patrick had told us there were two ways down. One trail had stairs and the other was a steep path which goes over rocks with ropes so you could hang on and you repelled down. I don’t have to tell you that we took the latter.

Once we were at the rim of the whirlpool we stopped and took it all in. All the water that goes over Niagara Falls pushes its way down the river until it hits a kink. It smashes against the rock and creates class six white water rapids. Rapids are classified based upon the speed of the water, the amount of hidden rocks and many other dangerous features. Class six is the highest that the classification goes. After these rapids the water speeds into a huge bowl where the whirlpool occurs.

From the bank, the water looks quite calm, slowly swirling but further in and beneath the surface it is really violent. They say that if a telegraph pole enters it will spin at the bottom for eighteen hours; a human body will be in there for four days. The bank is surrounded by smooth logs which have been dragged in, sanded down and spat out. I actually walked into the water a couple of meters and stood on a rock submersed about two feet. The cool water was really refreshing. I was just saying how I could stand there all day and spear any fish that swam past when what I think was a catfish about a meter long swam right past my feet.

We took the stair route back up to the car and drove to a point where you could overlook the whirlpool from higher up. An old guy also pointed out a couple of what he called otters just around the corner which were rummaging in the grass.




Our next stop was Niagara Glen. This has a great view of Devil's Hole Rapids which are class five as well as some natural bouldering spots. We trekked down from the car, not really knowing where we were going when we came across the rapids. There were some huge rocks sticking out into the river right by the rapids so I obviously had to climb onto them to get a better look. It was a precarious climb which involved leaping over a side stream coming from a calm run off pool and edging around a big rock, hanging on by my fingertips and on tip toes. It was worth it though as I got onto a large rock which gradually sloped down to the river where it water ran over it.



I took my shoes off and once again let the cool river water run over my feet. I watched as a huge tree trunk came down the river, hit the rapids, got thrown into the air then disappeared under the water. A speed boat runs up and down the river splashing the tourists on board in all the rapids, we waved to each other but they only passed once.

Eventually I supposed I couldn’t sit in the warm sun staring at the water go past all day so I got up to leave. It all happened so fast that I don’t know what happened but I think my foot slipped on some algae as I was getting up but I was suddenly in the river. I was about three meters out by the time I got my bearings and started to swim. Andrew hadn’t gotten up onto my rock and there was nobody else around. I was literally swimming for my life in class five rapids. The rock I’d been on did provide some shelter but I was still being pummelled by the water. I’m not sure how I did it but I managed to get back to the rock but there was no way up, everything below water level was slippery with algae but I got a grip on a lip further up, dragged myself out of the water and lay panting on the rock, staring up at the sky.

After a couple of minutes to get my breath back and take in what had just happened I made my way back to the bank. I threw my shoes down to Andrew and because I was wet already I could just swim across the run off pool. I enjoyed the hike back up to the car, I was glad to be alive.

We continued our drive along the Niagara River to Lake Ontario where we sadly left it and headed further into Canada.

J.