Days 91 to 94 - Jasper, A Train, Toronto & Niagara Falls

Day 91 – Jasper to Edmonton
Up early and on the road back up North to Jasper. Heavy snow on the roads made driving quite tricky but Dave did a grand job of keeping all 4 wheels on the road!
We made it to Jasper with plenty of time to spare so headed to the internet café where we wrote the last blog.

Checked our bags on to the train then waited for a short while before we were shown to our seats. 2 each this time. Great!

There’s not much to say about the next 55 hours! We sat on a train, we had occasional stops where people got on and off, we looked out desparately for moose, bear or anything slightly exciting. We saw a muskrat, lots of deer and a few elk. Oh, and a bald eagle!

The scenery was stunning but whizzing along at high speed, we weren’t able to get any photos unfortunately.

We decided to treat ourselves to dinner as I for one couldn’t face another delicious pot noodle for dinner.
Due to the smallness of the dining car, we were joined by an elderly gentleman and a lady for dinner. The lady introduced herself as Karen, the gentleman as Happyness! At first we thought he was joking but he’s actually changed his name officially to Happy Ness Charron.
A very interesting character who spends his time writing inspirational books about his life, travelling round the country to book signings and speaking at prisons and to young people. He has a website which we’re sure to check out at some point! He’s had a tough life but come through it all and is now a very, very happy if slightly deaf and eccentric old man. He’s 73!

Back to our seats we tried to find the most comfortable positions for sleeping but however you tried it, there wasn’t enough room for legs, arms and being comfortable whilst horizontal. The only way for it was to sit up a bit. Not the most comfortable but not too bad.
M x

Day 92 – Edmonton to Winnipeg to Sioux Lookout
Not much different today. Another day of being on a train, reading, eating, stopping at a few stations and watching the world go by.
We decided to buy a pizza at one stop to have for dinner. We bumped into Happyness who urged us to join him for dinner again that evening. We explained that we had already bought the pizza as we were trying to save money.

Back on the train, we were both having a little snooze when who should appear but Happyness! He had reserved us seats for dinner with him and wouldn’t take no for an answer. What a lovely chap! Pizza would have to wait for lunch tomorrow!

Dinner was delicious, again, and we learnt more about Happyness’s life. He still didn’t learn much about us due to not really being able to hear us. He still thinks I’m called Mindy!

M x

Day 93 – Sioux Lookout to Toronto
Another almost full day on the train. We did get to get off the train at Capreol for about 30 minutes which was good – although I did feel like I had motion sickness! And we got to have pizza for lunch. Yum!

We finally arrived in Toronto, on time and collected our bags. The weather was good and really mild. We got a taxi up to our hotel (in the midst of renovation), checked in, showered (for the first time in 3 days, bliss!) then walked into the city to find dinner.
The place recommended in Lonely Planet looked awful so we made our own way to a Thai restaurant where we had a delicious meal. The waitress was Thai and we had a quick reminisce about our time there a few months ago – seems ages ago now!

M x

Day 94 – Toronto to Niagara Falls
Lazy start, taxi to station to drop bags off then walked down to the Harbour Front area. Cup of tea then we got a ferry over to Ward’s Island.

The sun was shining as we started our walk along the boardwalk alongside Lake Ontario. We saw a sign for a snake crossing and sure enough, there were snakes crossing. Lots of grass snakes.
We quickly moved on and enjoyed the warmth of the sun and the sound of seagulls – millions of them! Lunch at Rectory Café was a rip off but the only place to eat on the island – funny that!

We stopped on the other side of the island to take some great photos of the CN Tower (it is e-nor-mous!) before realising that we were going to have to wait for 3 hours to get the ferry back and there was absolutely nothing to do!

Fortunately there were 4 others in the same boat (ha ha!) so we got a river taxi back to the mainland.
Fruitless walk to try and find an internet café before we were yet again climbing aboard a train! This time fortunately only for a few hours to Niagara Falls.

We both snoozed which meant we were in Niagara before we could really get fed up of the train.
It was dead. There appeared to be no-one in Niagara at all. We bought greyhound tickets for our bus to Buffalo tomorrow then checked into the hostel.

Realising that the falls were illuminated until 10:00pm we hired bikes and cycled down to the edge of Bridal Falls and Horseshoe Falls. It was freezing! It was a fairly mild night but the spray off the water falls was so cold.
We could hear the roar of the water from a good mile away and the power of the falls was incredible. I admit they’re not as tall as we thought they would be, but very impressive none the less. With it being dark, it wasn’t possible to see them in all their glory but we got some good photos before cycling back to the town.

The restaurant that had been recommended in Lonely Planet had stopped serving food but the owner recommended another place just down the road – Nautica. Dave went in to confirm that they were serving food and came out to tell me that they weren’t but the owner had offered to make us Serbian sausages and salad. I was a bit dubious but hungry so we went in!

I admit, it was delicious. The sausages were 60% beef, 10% lamb and 30% veal. Yum! Even the salad was delicious and he served it with home made serbian bread. What a star!

Final cycle home then to a very welcome bed.

M x