the world through my eyes…

We’ve had a few guests ask about day trips to Niagara-On-The-Lake, so I decided to try doing a day trip there and see how it went over.  We left the hostel at around 11am.  I had a group of 7, which was a pretty good number.  Our first stop? Fort George.

During the War of 1812, Fort George served as the headquarters for the Centre Division of the British Army.   A visit to Fort George is to go back in time.  The workers dress in period costumes and there are demonstrations of Muskets, and Canon firing.  The fort was impressive and we spent more time there than I had originally thought we would.

Following Fort George we boarded the free shuttle into Niagara-On-The-Lake.  A brief stop at a shop selling all things English, made most of the guests VERY happy.  At one point the 2 English boys (Dumb and Dumber as they will be known in this blog) we so excited, I thought they would burst!  Every-time they saw a candy or chocolate they liked, they’d shout “God Save the Queen!”.  The were incensed however when they went to pay, and upon saying God Save the Queen, discovered that the shopkeeper was not even English!  I mean, how RUDE!!

For lunch wewalked along King St to The Irish Harp, one of the local pubs.  The pub was very cozy, with an great menu.  Their fish and chips were amazing!  I’m wanting more as I write this entry.  I’ve promised myself to ALWAYS eat at the Irish Harp when I’m in Niagara-On-The-Lake.

After lunch we wandered through the town, checking out the Niagara Apothecary, which was open until 1964, (and now a small museum) and browsing through shops.  I had made the mistake of buying small, toy, wood pistols for Dumb and Dumber to keep them quiet and occupied, which pretty much backfired on me.  Nothing like walking into a shop and having one of them exclaim, “Pam, I’ve got a gun in my pants!”

I’m finding that if I leave Niagara on my days off, I tend to relax more, as I’m in a different environment.  I also seem to be happier when I return.  This last week I decided to go to Toronto for my days off.  I’ve always loved the city and hitching a ride up with Moose Travels or Magic Bus is not only easy, but free for the staff at the hostel.  Even my bunkbed at the HI Toronto was free, so I couldn’t really beat the price! haha

 My original plan was to roam around the city and take photographs.  I spent the first night on Yonge St and then ran into some guest who had stayed at the hostel in Niagara so I went to Scotland Yard with them for a bit before returning to my squeaky top bunk at the hostel.

The following morning I started to roam through the city, but made a last minute decision to take a bus to Newmarket and spend the day with my sister-in-law and my very cute 6 mth old niece, Ila.  It was a great day.  We had fun shopping and running errands.  The last time I saw Ila she was just 2 weeks old, so naturally she has grown quite a bit.  She’s such a happy, smiley little girl.  I couldn’t get enough of her.  It was the best way to spend my day off.

Beat, is a very friendly guy from Switzerland (thankfully), so driving to Ottawa with him was a lot of fun. His English is quite impressive and the 7hrs of driving from Niagara Falls seemed to fly by. Upon arrival in Ottawa our first goal was to find the B&B he was staying at and then we’d look for the HI Ottawa Jail, where I would be sleeping.  Luckily they were about a 10 min walk from each other.  After dropping his rental car off, we walked to the HI Ottawa Jail, where I was staying.

Thankfully, I work for Hostelling International, as my room was free! The hostel in Ottawa use to be the jail until 1973 and is the site of the last public hanging in Canada.  They’ve kept it pretty true to form.  The halls are very cold, white and institutional.  Each room is an actual jail cell complete with heavy iron doors.   The room itself, however, was fairly roomy.  I must admit that I wasn’t too keen about taking the Crime and Punishment Tour.  After we took a few pictures, Beat and I headed for the Byward Market.

I immediately feel in love with this area of Ottawa.  Lots of fruit and veg farmers, cool shops, great places to eat and lively Irish and Scottish pubs.   Our craving for fish and seafood won out as we settled into our seats at The Fish Market.  The food was excellent and the free Salmon Pate appetizer was fabulous.  Afterwards we just roamed the market streets and tried out a couple pubs.

After a pretty restful night at the jail (oh how I was teased about this), we met Tuesday morning in the lobby.  Beat had planned out our entire day.  Although its not something I would normally do, it was a lot of fun.  I did things that I never would have done otherwise and to top it off I had a quirky Swiss guy to do them with!

The morning consisted of a walk to Parliament Hill to watch the changing of the guard.  Although it was interesting to watch, it was way too long! After 20 mins we just looked at each other and agreed to go elsewhere (I feel so unpatriotic saying that!).  Instead we did an impromptu walk through Parliament building, including walking down some hallway until we were stopped and asked to go back because we weren’t a part of a tour group.  However we did go to the top of the Peace Tower for free, which had beautiful views of both Ottawa and Gatineau, Quebec.

Leaving Parliament behind we walked along the Rideau Canal to the National Gallery of Canada.  Beat wanted to see the 1930’s collection, which I gladly agreed to.   The Dali paintings we fantastic and I was more than thrilled to view work by some of my favourite artists, including: Monet, Degas, Cezanne, Van Gough, Picaso, Jackson Pollack, Klimt and so on.

After lunch at the pub we took a boat tour along the Rideau Canal.  It was a beautiful day for it.  I kept chuckling though as there were several times when I would look over to see Beat sleeping beside me.  However after tramping around the Byward Market and a fabulous dinner at an Italian restaurant it was my turn to feel tired and draggy.  I tried hard to stay lively as we visited the pubs from the night before, but by 10pm we were back at the B&B and I was getting ready to take the Greyhound bus back to Niagara Falls.

I LOVED my 2 days off in Ottawa.  Last minute trips are always the best ones!

Last nights event was a group to Nightmares Haunted House followed by the Wild Mushroom.  I’ve seen pictures of people that have gone through Nightmares and really had no desire to go.  However, I was doing the group last night, so that meant that I HAD to go in. There were 10 of us all together, 4 of the them had gone out with me the night before to watch the fireworks, so we were more friendly with each other this time around.

I had to convince one of the girls to go, and she kept saying how scared she was to go and that she would probably chicken out.  The 3 guys from France came as well, so I thought it would be a fun idea to put her with them, as I had a feeling they would make it more fun for her.  Yeah…. I wasn’t wrong at all! haha  I went in with the first group and in no time the Pierre (who was in the front) kept stoping… “No, I don’t want to be in the front, you go first!”  We had to push them all the way through!

It wasn’t a gory thing, it was a case of not knowing what was going to happen and where.  However, so as to not ruin the experience for anyone who may come to Niagara Falls, I’m going to stop there.  Needless to say there was a lot of screaming, which is played over the PA system in the store below as you walk through.  I was told I was screaming the loudest, which I would believe as my ribs were a tad sore when the whole thing was over.

Afterwards we went next door to the Wild Mushroom.  A very lively night, everyone mingled, drank and had a good time.  I was proud to see my little french boys open up and have fun, as they were so withdrawn the night before.  Those boys are hilarious!  They bought 1 pint of Guinness to share amongst the 3 of them, took a sip and didn’t like it, but that didn’t stop them.  They continued to buy 1 at a time and share it.  It was too funny for words.  8 pints later there was a lot of dancing going on!

The last part of the week has been a tad stressful.  When Thursday rolled around, I checked my bank account for my last pay from my previous job, only to find there was no deposit made, PLUS my new job hadn’t deposited my pay either.  Needless to say I was very nervous, and scared that my old wasn’t going to pay me.  However, I sent an email to my old boss and about 9hrs later he replied to say I would receive my last pay and holiday payout next week.  I have never felt such relief!!

In between working and taking groups of guests out at night I’ve been trying to tweak my trip here and there to get the most for my money.  I tried to work on it a bit this morning during the slow parts of my shift, but I’m still really sleepy from last night.  Friday nights = fireworks over the falls in Niagara, so naturally I was taking a group to the top of the Skylon Tower.  There were only 12 people, so it wasn’t too bad.  However, afterwards I was suppose to take them to the Wild Mushroom so they could have some drinks etc.

Normally I take a taxi, but for some dumb reason I was told to walk them over from the tower.  Not knowing where to go, I asked a co-worker and I was told to walk up the big hill to Victoria and then walk until we got to the bar.  So we see a big hill, we walk up the big hill, no sign of Victoria St anywhere.  BUT, there’s Stanley, I know Stanley.  So with my group losing confidence in me I take them down Stanley.  I had no clue where I was going.  I knew I was going in the right direction, but I couldn’t see any familiar landmarks.  Plus everyone was thirsty!

By the time I saw a very familiar sign, they no longer believed me when I said I knew where we were.  The reaction was, yeah right Pam, you have no clue!  BUT, I did and we finally made it.  Thankfully everyone mingled and got along nicely.  Only 1 guy in the group got completely smashed and when I got back to the hostel I had to walk him up to his room as he had no clue where he was. lol 

All in all everyone had fun, so I guess it was a pretty good night.  However with only 4hrs sleep, I need a nap before taking another group to Nightmares Haunted House tonight!

Hidden just off Victoria and Bridge St., is a fabulous Italian fruit and vegetable market called LoCoCo’s.  Surprisingly enough, this market has been in business in Niagara since 1906!  They sell all kinds of super fresh fruits and vegetables in a somewhat cool room, authentic Italian breads (not the kind you buy at grocery store chains), and fresh meats.

There’s something very satisfying about walking to a local, family run market and buying produce that’s so fresh.  Eating it is like Christmas for my taste buds. 

I was holding off on seeing the movie, as I just wasn’t sure if I wanted to go or not.   But last night Mich wanted to go, so I said I’d go see it with her.  I have to say, the movie was fantastic!  I had heard that Heath Ledgers performance was a bit scary, so naturally I was curious…

Although I didn’t find him to be creepy or scary, the madness of the Joker character was very apparent!  However he did it, he did it well.  I can now understand some of the rumours about how this particular character may have contributed to his death.

Although I’m not a huge comic book fan, I was still familiar enough with the basic story of batman to know what should happen, and the movie did not disappoint.  I can only assume that there will be a third one, as the connection between this one and the classic batman movie with Michael Keaton is not really there just yet.

I would definitely recommend it!

Last night, being Friday was another fabulous fireworks display here in Niagara Falls. We had a sign-up sheet out for guests at the hostel so we could take a group of them to the top for the show. It was a very good thing that Mich called ahead. As it turns out the elevator to the top was out of order and being worked on, which meant nobody was being allowed to the top of the tower.

After speaking with David, she was able to get us a guarantee of going straight to the top of the tower. We had a group of 22 hostel guests with us, and the last thing we wanted to do was disappoint them and cancel the trip. 4 taxi cabs later, we were at the Skylon Tower, waiting in line to get to the top. It was 9:40pm and we were cutting it really close, as the fireworks started at 10pm.

The crowd at the top wasn’t too bad, and thankfully we made it within a few minutes to view the fireworks. Trying to keep track of 22 people up there can be a challenge! As usual the fireworks were beautiful and a big round of applause erupted as it finished 20 minutes later. The one draw back to the tower is that it takes so very, very long to get back down! However, once everyone was back on the ground we piled into taxi cabs, some of us going back to the hostel and the rest going to the Queen for karaoke!

It’s funny, last week, nobody went to karaoke from the hostel, this week, we had about 12 guests there.  It was pretty good times.  It only cost me about $15 to convince a couple of guys to stay at the Queen and then to get them to sing later.  They were SO shy in the beginning, but with a little coaxing, they sang and loved it enough to sing again, without me pushing them! haha  There were lots of laughs, which was great.

At around 1:30am I decided to head back to the hostel, as I was working at 7am.  Nobody else was leaving at the time, so that left me to walk alone.  I wasn’t exactly nervous about walking on my own, but at the same time I still didn’t take to streets that went right past the old abandoned detention center! haha.  I’m such a loser!

I’m seeing a very different side of Niagara that I’m not use to.  I was always familar with the tourist side.  Strolling up and down Clifton Hill is like walking the strip in Vegas, except there is only 1 casino and the rest of it is shops, amusements and restaurants.  SO naturally the amount of peole on Clifton on any given night is intense, and I try to avoid it at all costs.

Yesterday was Michelle’s birthday, so we all went out last night.  Starting at Queen’s, her favourite local bar and then on to Boston Pizza and Casino Niagara.  For anyone who loves to people watch, Queen’s is the place to be.  I’ve only been inside twice, but each time was equally entertaining.  Drunks have got to be the funniest people alive!  The woman (in her sixties at least) last night was hillarious.  She was in her happy drunk phase, and WOW!  It got pretty interesting as the night progressed. She danced around hiking up her skirt, spoke loudly and the things she was saying! I won’t go into it here, but if you want to know, just email me! Did I mention that aside from us there were only 3 other people in there… lol

After Queen’s it was time for food, we were all starving so we hopped into a cab and went to Boston Pizza for dinner.  By the time we finished eating, played some games and spent some time at Casino Niagara it was 5am and time for some much needed sleep! 

It was a fun night, with some great memories.  Thankfully my room is cool and I have the day off today.  I need some serious sleep!

For the last few days I have refused to accept that my iPod of GONE!  I had it when I checked in, as I had stashed it under my pillow when I went out of my room.  I was there only person in there, so I didn’t have to worry about somebody stealing it one me.  Very early the next morning (1am) I was told I could just move into my own room. So I gathered everything up and moved across the hall.

I could swear I grabbed my iPod from under the pillow and took it with me, but now I can’t find it!  I’ve tore my new room apart several times now, and no iPod.  Michelle was telling me a few days ago that the resident ghost moves things sometimes(no I don’t really believe that), so I’ve been telling myself its all her fault.  Alas, I don’t think I can blame her anymore.  I’m so sad its gone.  I’ve never lost anything while traveling before…