Day 2

Day 2: 05/19/2015 (Day trip to Niagara Falls, Buffalo, and Syracuse)

400 Miles

So today we confirmed that there is definitely a hole/leak in the air mattress we brought.  Hopefully we’ll be able to patch it up soon; otherwise, we’ll be looking forward to waking up on the ground every morning.  We also had some heavy rain last night so we woke up to a few small puddles around the edges, but we pulled the tent tighter and I think we’ll be good in the future.  There is definitely a learning curve for this trip – watch out Day 50!

Around 9am we started our 150-mile journey to Niagara Falls.  Driving through upstate New York was pretty cool.  There is a mix of wine country and Amish country.  We counted at least 11 vineyards that were mainly on a 5-mile stretch – say no more, we <3 NY!  We were also lucky enough to see a few horse and buggy contraptions ride by, unfortunately we didn’t catch a picture for you all.  Honestly, I think the driver saw us sticking the camera out the window – so that was awkward.  The first hint of Amish we saw was a woman out in the yard using one of those old school push lawn mowers, though we didn’t really connect everything until we saw the buggies.

We arrived to Niagara around noon.  As we crossed the bridges over to the State Park you could see the mist from the falls rising up.  Right away we spotted the Hard Rock Café where we picked up a pair of sticks for Jillian’s brother, Sean, who’s a collector.  The clerk also showed us to some of their memorabilia which included signed sticks from Joe Calato.  He created the Regal Tip for drumsticks (nylon tip) and they have continued to solely be manufactured in Niagara Falls.  Then we finally reached the falls and bought our tickets for the Maid of the Mist.  We were able to go out on an observation deck before heading down.  It was a pretty good view, but nothing compared to being on the boat.  We donned our fashionable blue ponchos and stood on the upper deck of the boat.  The American Falls spits a bit of mist at you, but once you reach the Horseshoe Falls, it rains!  You really don’t notice the power of these falls until you’re at the bottom of it all.  

Once we emerged from the mist, we headed in separate directions.  Rico went across the bridge to Canada to check out this well-revered view of Horseshoe Falls and Jillian headed around to the US side on Goat Island.  We were actually able to spot each other across the way and snap a few very fuzzy photos of each other.  Rico took a few pictures of Canada's flora and fauna before heading back to the US and he caught an amazing picture of a bird flying off a plant (see below!). We met back up at the car and that was the end of our visit.

 (Rico's picture of Jillian)

(Jillian's picture of Rico)

The next stop was Anchor Bar in Buffalo, NY.  Buffalo is a fairly short ride from Niagara, which was good because we were starving, and this bar holds the reputation of being the inventor of the chicken wing.  So of course, we ordered some buffalo wings and a few beers from the area.  The wings were great and super crispy!  Jillian was excited that the sauce wasn’t too spicy.  We split a plate of wings because we still had plans to hit Funk and Waffles in Syracuse before heading home.

We called Jillian’s sister, Chelsea, to make sure we would arrive before they closed (Thanks Chels!).  We had plenty of time to get there, and we were happy to hear from Chelsea that there was a comedy night and a Phish cover band booked for the night.  We saw this restaurant on a Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives episode and immediately added it to the itinerary.  The waffles range from breakfast to dinner to dessert.  We ended up getting half of a spinach and mozzarella stuffed waffle topped with shaved turkey and half of a regular waffle topped with bacon, brie, and basil.  We stuck around for the comedy partly because we were interested and partly because they had free wifi. (Sorry we didn’t upload the posts then).  We quickly became the only non-comedians in the audience so when we left (after an hour) we got heckled for it.  Within that hour, we were able to see a 50+ woman make her debut in comedy and “joked” about Five Below, plant diets, and tried demonstrating her exercises for us – she was pulled off stage after only a few minutes.

Once we got back to camp at Taughannock Falls, we were happy to see it didn’t pour since we had hung our towels out on a clothes line.  We forewent the campfire and just headed straight to bed so we would be able to be up and ready to go early for Day 3.

Fact:

The single waterfall at Niagara is called the Wedding Veil and it flows at 75,000 gallons per second

Lesson:

If you want good wings, go to Buffalo, NY – specifically Anchor Bar where they were created!

Eat Well; Travel Often

Rico & Jillian