I've been to Niagara Falls before. For me it's almost been two years since I made the journey up here. At the time I could only see the American Side of the falls and it was quite magnificent. I felt super proud of myself for making it all the way here and for being able to do something on my own. Nobody but me to guide the way. Of course this year I went on my Birthday trip with my Dad and it had been almost forty years so of course it's changed quite a bit since then. If anything I was more excited about him seeing the Falls again. It's a place where I could show him all the cool places and it was also new territory for me since we would be seeing the Canadian side.

So once we were in Canada we went to the camp site, checked in, and set up camp. From there we bought these WeGo passes which allows us to take a bus into town anytime we want for up to 48 hours. Now who can complain about that? After that we had to go find a bank and some food. First we went a found a nice little Chinese Restaurant which had wonderful food at really good prices. After that we made our way down the road to a bank. Now I don't know if you guys know this buy Canada has plastic money. Yes, plastic money. The exchange rate is also very different. I brought a little over $600 with me and after changing to Canadian money I had a little over $700. For me it was just crazy that it was plastic and here we are adding another $100 to the deal. After we got done at the bank we went back to the campsite and made our way to the bus, waited and got on board. Once we got off the bus we decided to grab a drink before we wet all the way down the hill that lead to this magnificent piece of our world. Since im legal in Canada I was able to finally buy my own drink. Very empowering and also a lot of fun.

After we had some booze we went down the hill and just as you made the clearing you could see the falls clear as day. Beautiful scenery in front of us and a whole different view from the American side. Of course the cameras came out immediately and we set off with the videoing and photo galore. We walked the entire stretch towards the horseshoe falls and decided to check out some of the stops along the way and get a chance to see the prices of everything. Now the main thing we wanted was to do the Behind the falls. This meant that we would get to go in a tunnel that came out right NEXT to the horseshoe falls and also explore the tunnel that went underneath. Once we got an estimate on everything we started walking back towards the other side and just as we were about to make a decision to go back towards camp, we ran into a sign with details about the illumination Cruise. This included a trip on a boat around 8:30 p.m where you get a up close and personal look at the falls while they are being illuminated by the lights. You also get to have a drink while you are enjoying this experience.

Now of course we decided to do this cruise over doing the Maid of the Mist. I mean you hit two birds with one stone and for us it was something that we just couldn't pass up. So without much debate we waited as the time came by having a drink and sitting for a bit. After all we had been walking a majority of the day.

I will tell you that I did The Maid of the Mist and it was NOTHING like this illumination Cruise. You can see the lights from up above but seeing them so close was a different experience. Its 40 minutes of awesome and we thoroughly enjoyed the experience. We got a little wet but that's ok because they gave us ponchos to protect ourselves. If anything it was a nice start to our trip and gave us a little insight on what was to come our way when we went out the next day. We both felt pretty satisfied and it also marked one of the things we wanted to do off our list and it also gave us something to remember for sure.

So if you are ever in Niagara and are on the Canadian side then do the illumination cruise because it is so worth the experience.