The girls and I were laughing heartily this morning as we considered the message our van might have been sending as we had careened under yellow light after yellow light on Route 31.
The message from the last photo had us laughing the hardest as Marie suggested a new meaning for her soccer team cheer.
Psalm 121:8
The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.
We all slept eight straight hours. I don’t remember the last time I slept so well. I don’t know if it was all the walking around the day before, the two nights prior being poor sleep nights, the fresh air, or some combination of these things, but I’m not complaining. I woke as rested as I’ve been in a long time.
Breakfast was eggs and sausage. Again we didn’t get to eat together, but it was okay.
We broke camp down easily. The fact that Nigel and Marie were more than ready to head home made them both super-charged to get ‘er all packed up. That and the fact my kids are awesome helpers.
This just so happened to be Stewart’s 17th birthday. He thanked me twice for making camping happen. I’m so glad he enjoyed it.
Once both cars were packed and we were ready to pull out we went for a walk to try to get to the lakeshore.
Can you make out the skyline of Toronto? Seems fitting to look back to where our summer-fun started. Hard to believe camping was more fun than Canada’s Wonderland!
We found access. The waves were stronger here than any ocean I’ve visited save the Pacific (hmmm – there is irony in that sentence, no?).
Nigel helped his little sisters down, because he’s that kind of guy.
Nigel helped his little sisters up, because he’s that kind of guy.
We headed home by 10 A.M. and were home before noon. Everyone pitched in to get 100% unpacked and we shifted into gear to make Stewart’s birthday evening.
I have to give a Shout-Out to Marie and Nigel. Neither of them wanted to go camping. They just weren’t into it. But we were going. And for the full 48 hours we were gone they were all-in, and died to self, and just put up and shut up, and I really respect them both for that. There was no sulking. There was no reluctance. There was playing and joking and joyfulness and I hope I will remember that as much, if not more, than the campfires, the Redcoats, and the checkers.
Philippians 2:4
Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.
We are the kind of people who arrive at WDW parks an hour before they open. It should have surprised me, then, when we arrived at Old Fort Niagara moments before it opened. (Why don’t we mobilize more quickly on a regular basis???)
I found the campsite at Four Mile Creek to tie in to a visit at Old Fort Niagara. It didn’t register high on any of the kids’ interest scales when mentioned by name, but I showed them a quick peek online the day before we went and it piqued their interests a little. Once we arrived – the gloves were off and we were engaged.
We timed it perfectly to catch the first introductory film of the day.
Unless you know a lot about the history of this fort, I encourage you to take in the short film. (Even if you do know a lot, the film was excellent!)
No sooner had the credits rolled when a gentleman came in and invited anyone who was interested to join him for a free guided tour. For the next 40-50 minutes he narrated and we absorbed. It was outstanding. (He did act a little horrified when we didn’t have great recall on somewhat lesser known American History details: names of ships; the names of the five tribes of Native people in the region, etc. If he chided us more deeply, or suggest I question my children’s teachers, etc., I was prepared to assure him that we knew the 12 tribes of Israel and the 12 Judges of Israel.)
The fort was awesome, in the fullest sense of that word. I have lived my whole life in Rochester and I have somehow failed to ever visit Old Fort Niagara. We were absolutely BLOWN AWAY by this national treasure.
After we were in the fort itself he said goodbye and we started visiting the interior areas, most with live reenactors. Almost without exception these reenactors were fabulously engaging.
We got to go up into both the Redoubts.
Here’s what really blew us away… while nearby Genesee Country Village and Museum is another wonderful living history museum that we highly recommend, this place? is REAL. REAL battles took place. Real training. A real siege. And we are not only allowed to visit, we are allowed inside building. We could touch things. Sit on things. The overwhelming majority of accessible areas invited investigation. How cool is that?
This building – the Castle – is what the fort originally started with. It was set up with the plan of trading (the lower right hand door and windows were the trading post).
We got to move throughout and so much of it was accessible.
Back outside we visited the greens and met washer women, and soliders, and a black smith (photo above) and a Native American with a handmade canoe.
They taught us about the life of soldiers, and the method of fighting, and for a little while, anyway, it was “ok” to like the Redcoats.
We learned so much. And I can’t do justice to the history of this place. I’m so glad I finally saw it and think it might be the best kept secret in Western NY.
Ecclesiastes 3:8
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace
We woke slightly before seven. Well – there was also that 2 A.M. bathroom run…
I had my electric griddle and had the dry ingredients for pancakes prepped in a ziploc along with a recipe for assembling the wet ingredients. I have no idea what went wrong but they were runny. Very runny. So they ended up flat and spread out. So we had non-circles that we rolled up and dipped into syrup.
Or sprinkled on powdered sugar. They were crepe like, come to think of it.
That turned out to be the one thing about big-family camping I didn’t love. I wanted people to eat when it was hot, so we didn’t all eat together. It was a bit of a production, although it was fun to do it in a way. I just didn’t like not eating together.
After breakfast we headed a few miles west to Old Fort Niagara. I am going to do a separate post about that.
I did a pretty nice job with lunch, didn’t I?
Ok. I admit it. We ate at the Silo in Lewiston. It was delicious AND they went about and beyond with food safety for Stewart. Big thumbs up.
Katriel and Johanna got ice cream with their kids’ meals.
As John and the kids piled into the big van I wandered over to this statue. While walking I was thinking of little quips about what they were possibly pointing at in Canada. As I drew closer I got excited –
What a beautiful statue!!! Yeah. There was definitely a time when the sight of Canada meant freedom. Good job, Lewiston.
Back at camp we stared at each other for hours enjoyed one another’s company. Some hacky-sack. Some frisbee. Some football. Some Disney Emoji Blitz. Some checkers.
Dinner was pizza mountain pies and s’mores. There were more games and bedtime around 9:30 P.M. again. We were exhausted.
1 John 4:7:
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.
We left the Anne Shirley motel around 7 A.M. and started our trip to Bangor. Our first stop was going to be at the Bay of Fundy. Our trip times were coordinated to hit the low tide in our effort to maximize the treat.
I was able to access the Tide Times from here.
The parking lot was very crowded, and as this is a Provincial park, not a National park, we had to pay to get in. (Our entrance was somewhat delayed as I tried to explain to the cashier that the deal she was trying to talk me into for my “group” of three was, in fact, NOT in my best interest. I know it likely annoyed the people behind me in line, but I wasn’t going to pay the $3 more she kept insisting was the “deal.”)
We got into the very crowded learning center, use the restrooms, dodge the evolutionary content, and get out to the pathway in about 20 minutes.
The Learning Center couldn’t really prepare us for what we were going to see.
The first outlook offered us only a hint.
We began the long walk down to the ocean floor. It was lovely, and cool, and fragrant, and not buggy!
There were little spots along the way with outlooks for more peeks.
And then we finally go to the bottom section.
It was so cool to me to walk there, knowing that in 12 hours or so the spots under our feet would be under ~ 45 feet of water. It blows my mind that the space we were occupying would easy be occupied by fish later in the day. I LOVE CREATION.
It was slimy. Tab is more agreeable to mud than Marie and I and she ventured out further than we.
She went out further and further and, yes, I was getting a bit nervous…
She came back (phew!) and we started back up, stopping at the foot wash station…
Last, but NOT least, we enjoyed lunch at the canteen. Marie and I noshed on some amazing lobster burgers (slurp!) and Tab enjoyed a gigantic plate of onion rings.
Amos 9:6
Who builds his upper chambers in the heavens and founds his vault upon the earth; who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out upon the surface of the earth— the Lord is his name.
This is where I should be starting my series of posts on the surprise road trip I took Marie and Tabitha on the morning on July 24th. However, Stewart had JUST completed his digital photography class at FLCC and the camera was set to record each photograph as some fancy .NEF file instead of the normal .JPEG. We need to find a time and a way to convert each image. There are 300 of them.
I’ll be back.
We had our third yummy breakfast and let the kids have a swim. John’s status as a Preferred Member of the IHG group meant we had late check out options and though we’ve never used them before we did this time.
I enjoyed the patio a few minutes.
We stopped at a Pizza Hut outside Buffalo where the exceedingly friendly waitress showed us the smartest way to order fancy pizzas and we had fun trying new things.
Do you SEE that cheesy goodness????
It was short, and occasionally painful, but it was good to get away.
It can’t always be cruises and castles… as long as we’re together it is magnificent.
Was so awful.
Awful.
Awful.
Another yummy breakfast and to the park in no time.
I’d pre-purchased as much as possible to make our transactions smoother and to promote healthy exchange rates.
The day was not smooth.
Here – I shall cut/paste my review from TripAdvisor for your reading pleasure:
I hadn’t been there in more than 17 years, and I had fond memories of my frequent visits as a child. I can’t even. It was so unpleasant.
I purchased tickets, parking, meals, and refillable soda cups online a few days before our trip. This saved us some money.
We arrived just prior to park opening. We had no issue with our pre-purchased parking or admission.
By 3:30 P.M. I was sitting on the ground outside guest relations sobbing.
I am a Level 6 Contributor not prone to hyperbole. We travel often and I have a very upbeat outlook.
The park was tremendously busy. Very, very busy. Hideously busy.
And the park was tremendously understaffed. Very, very understaffed. Hideously understaffed.
I’m not sure what they should have done, except to quit admitting people to the park claiming full capacity based on the paltry staffing. The load/unload cycle at the rides was just awful. They also had only one or two vehicles in circulation on many of the rides. Not that I felt they had enough staff to keep more than the minimum going.
Our eldest has a number of food allergies. Prior to visiting CW, I thoroughly read their website which not only includes a information on dining with allergies in the Dining section, but they go so far as to recommend certain establishments in the park for certain allergies. As our biggest concern is nut allergies we used that as a guide. We found a restaurant that accepted our pre-paid meal deals on the list of nut-free restaurants. We waited 65 minutes in line. It was a fiasco. First we were told by not one, but two employees that they did not have ingredient lists for their food. (Is that even legal? It is not in US.) Then they *found* packaging labels for some products (not all, mind you) and these labels boldly claimed they were not peanut-free/tree nut-free. Really.
My son ate a 2.5″ square hunk of chicken and a coke… for $15.99 prepaid.
After the almost two hours it took to order, receive and eat our food we headed back out to the lines of the rides. My family got settled into lines (looooooong lines) and I headed to see if I could start figuring out what we could do for dinner food. After three more kiosks where they could not tell me what ingredients were in their foods, I was encouraged to go to guest relations.
The line was out the door.
It took 19 minutes for it to be my turn to speak with one of the representatives. It was a Very Busy Day in that office. I should know. I was in there for 65 minutes. NOW – to be completely fair, the men and women in that office were superb. There were some Very Crazy Requests being made of them. (For example, teens who lost their group, but didn’t have even the name of the group they were with much less a contact number expected Guest Services to help them find whom they had lost???) The guest service people were so patient and helpful and upgraded dozens of season passes, and corrected scores of over charges, and issues parking permits by the handful. I had asked if there was someone who perhaps oversaw dining in the park whom I could speak with to shore up a plan for later in the day. She took my question and left… for almost an hour. I saw a TON in that time. Sadly, when she returned she suggested he eat a salad.
I will never go back. Ever. The infrastructure in the park was so miserable. We love to travel and we love amusement parks, but I have very little confidence in CW and Cedar Fair as a whole right now.
The one saving grace was that the exchange rate is outstanding right now, so when we got home and looked on our credit card statement the numbers were slightly less painful to look at.
PLEASE NOTE – if you purchase a one-meal-deal it includes an entrée, side and beverage. Every place we went wanted to argue and say the beverage was not included. We had to point it out on the print out each time.
Also – if you purchase the refillable soda cup, please note there are only certain places they can be refilled and the lines are long and they are “self-serve” but you have to have your cup scanned first.
OH – And there was no ice to be found anywhere after 2 P.M.
Six minute swan ride had a 50 minute wait.
We finally found Stewart safe pizza at 6:30 P.M. Too bad there were no cold beverages to drink along side.
Room temp Coca-Cola is nasty.
I want to time warp back to last week and make other plans.
Hotel and miserable beds around 11:00 P.M.
“Say goodnight, Gracie.”
Marie and Hanny shared the pull out sofa in our living room of our suite. They were the first kids to wake as John and I went through the morning routine. These ladies, and I, slipped out for some coffee and juice as we waited for the others to rouse.
A short time later the rest of our contingent joined us for breakfast and we feasted. This is one of our favorite parts of getting away.
We made the short, but time-eating, trek back down town and found more parking. We had about half-an-hour to poke around before looking for our tour group in the Great Hall of the Union Station.
Oh – poor Stewart… “No Zoup for YOU!”
The Great Hall is undergoing much refurbishment…
At 10:30 A.M. we met our tour group led by Jody. She is a film-maker and has lived in Toronto her whole life. She was animated and informative and made the tour a lot of fun.
We explored lots of downtown, beginning with the Royal York hotel. She taught us a lot about architecture, the history of Toronto, and the many phases of development and growth the city has gone through. Neat stuff.
A lot of Toronto is underground. The city is connected in blocks under the city with full shopping and dining experiences. Day-to-day activities can be accomplished without ever setting foot outside! Such a different experience than rural NY.
We headed back to where our car was parked and grabbed lunch in a food court. We were happy to find safe meals for everyone, and a variety, at that.
We headed back to the hotel where the gals and Daddy headed for a swim, and the boys, well, the boys had to do some homework for Public Speaking. We had very limited time to execute a fast trip given their aggressive school schedule.
The boys finally joined us and we all enjoyed the swim time. We had the pool area to ourselves.
We headed up to Borden to visit with Cathy and Dave, stopping to grab pizzas and ice cream on the way. It was great to see where they lived and visit the base. They’ve lived Out West for so long, it was never even an option to visit before.
We headed back to the hotel and were in bed by about 10:30 P.M.
We are so excited to visit Canada’s Wonderland in the morning.
Dayspring Disciples 