Day 1: Niagara Falls and Toronto Road Trip

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Buffalo, NY, Old Fort Erie, Centennial Lilac Garden and Niagara-on-the-Lake

Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada

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Old Fort Erie • Centennial Lilac Garden • Niagara-on-the-Lake

BUFFALO, NEW YORK

The weather was cool and overcast for the first day of our trip. On our way to Niagara Falls we stopped at a couple of places to get food in Buffalo, NY.

Our first stop was Alethea’s Chocolates. I had read they have good sponge candy. I’ve loved chocolate dipped honeycomb candy since I was a child; I used to get it a lot from Disneyland. From what I’ve read sponge candy is the same as honeycomb candy, but it’s called by different names in the country, with seafoam candy being another name for it.

Alethea’s Chocolates has an ice cream parlour and a candy shop. We were shocked by the crazy high price of their sponge candy. I make my own chocolate dipped honeycomb at home and it’s a small fraction of the price to make compared to what Alethea’s is charging for their sponge candy. In addition to the high prices, the employee we spoke with was very rude and the chocolate we tried was not very good, so Alethea’s was a huge disappointment.

From Alethea’s we drove to Anchor Bar – the home of the original buffalo wing. The environment inside is neat, but the wings are just ok. We’ve had much better. They don’t make their own blue cheese dressing, instead they offer Ken’s blue cheese dressing, which is alright, nothing special, and they charge 59 cents for extra blue cheese dressing (as of May ‘24).

Next we stopped at Good Guys Deli and Grill. I had read that they have good cheesesteak sandwiches for decent prices, so we decided to try one. It was decent, but we’ve had much better.

OLD FORT ERIE

With full tummies, we crossed Peace Bridge and visited Old Fort Erie. This fort was not in our original plans, but the Niagara Falls, Canada attractions pass we had planned to purchase was no longer available, so we opted at the last minute as we were eating our lunch in Buffalo to purchase a pass that cost us a bit more but had more sites included, one of which, Old Fort Erie, was conveniently pretty much on our way to our hotel in NIagara Falls, Canada.

A live demonstration of the various muskets that were used in 1812 at the fort was beginning just as we started to tour the fort, so we headed straight over to observe it. It was interesting and informative. The man who was explaining everything had a good sense of humor, which made the demonstration more enjoyable.

A free guided tour was beginning shortly after the musket demonstration, so we joined the tour, but after a short while we had to separate from the tour because one of the women in the group had perfume on that we couldn’t handle being around, so we toured the fort on our own. The nice part of touring without the group was that we could take photos without people in our photos.

As we walked around we encountered friendly staff dressed in uniforms to look authentic to how the British and American soldiers dressed in 1812, and they were happy to answer questions and take photos with us.

One of the rooms we toured was the kitchen and they offered us free lemonade and a free dessert that was made back in 1812.

Old Fort Erie, Fort Erie, ON, Canada

We enjoyed our time at the fort. In all we spent about 50 minutes there. We could have spent more time, but we got to see everything, at least we think we did, and we didn’t feel rushed.

CENTENNIAL LILAC GARDEN

Next we drove to Centennial Lilac Garden, which is a little over a half hour drive away from Old Fort Erie. This garden has free parking and is free to visit. We were fortunate because the lilacs are only in bloom for part of May and early June each year, and it’s never a guarantee when they’ll be in full bloom. They were in full bloom when we were there! There are lots and lots of lilacs in different colors.

Centennial Lilac Garden, Niagara-on-the-Lake, ON, Canada

Next to Centennial Lilac Garden is the Floral Clock, which you can walk to from the Centennial Lilac Garden or drive over to its small, free parking lot. The Floral Clock is also free to visit. We drove over, but the flowers weren’t in bloom. Oh well. At least the lilacs were in full bloom across the street.

As we were leaving the Floral Clock we saw a fox whose attention was focused on something. We got a couple of photos of the beautiful fox before he or she dashed off.

From the Floral Clock we headed to the village of Niagara-on-the-lake. We planned on visiting Queenston Heights Park on the way, but when we got to the parking lot we noticed there were parking meters, and I was being cheap and didn’t feel like paying for parking, so we continued on toward the village of Niagara-on-the-lake. On the way we stopped at a pullover for a nice view of the Niagara River.

NIAGARA-ON-THE-LAKE

From the Floral Clock it took a little over twenty minutes to get to the free parking spot at Niagara-on-the-lake that I had read about ahead of time. There are several paid parking spots in the village, but if you’re up to a ten to fifteen minute walk through either a nice part of the village where nice homes are or a nice walk along Lake Ontario to get to where all the restaurants and shops are, then this free spot might be worth checking out. You drive Queen Street to Mississauga Beach (just after Newark Street) and you’ll find a few free parking spots right next to a small beach on Lake Ontario at 487 Queen Street. When we pulled up (at 5:30 p.m. on a Saturday evening in early May) there were a few parking spaces available. When we left (around 7 p.m.) there was a car waiting for a parking spot, so there is no guarantee you’ll get a parking spot, but if you get one, it’s a nice place to park.

Click here for information on other places to park in Niagara-on-the-lake including where to park and how to pay.

From our free parking spot we decided to walk the path along Lake Ontario to get to where all the touristy action is. There weren’t many people on the path, but there were tons and tons of tiny flies called midges. They’re said to not be harmful, but there were several swarms of them and my husband didn’t want to get them in our mouth or eyes, so he walked with an umbrella open to block them from his face, which, unfortunately, also blocked the nice view of Lake Ontario along the way. Well, at least we didn’t eat any bugs!

I had planned on us touring Fort Mississauga, which is free to visit, and a lighthouse on the way, but those swarms of midges were all over the area near the water, so we skipped visiting those two sites and from Simcoe Street we headed to Queen Street where most of the shops and restaurants are located.

Niagara-on-the-lake is a charming village that offers nice shops and lots of restaurants offering various cuisines for various price ranges. The tulips were in bloom when we were in Canada, so we got to enjoy several small tulip beds along the sidewalks on Queen Street.

We stopped at Edward Spera Gallery. If you like animal paintings, you might enjoy visiting this gallery; it’s located at 91 Queen Street.

Our next stop was Olde Tyme Candy Shoppe, located at 43 Queen Street. They also have a shop in Niagara Falls and five other locations as well. They have a wide variety of candy available, including retro candy and some very unique items I had never seen before. My main reason for going there was for the salt water taffy. They sell Taffy Town brand taffy, which, IMO, is by far the best salt water taffy available. They offer a lot of the flavors, but not all of the flavors Taffy Town has available.

Shortly after visiting Olde Tyme Candy Shoppe we walked by the Memorial Clock Tower.

By the time we got to Niagara Apothecary National Historic Site it was closed. This site “is one of the very few remaining examples of an old apothecary shop,” and it’s free to visit. It looks like it would be interesting to visit, but I don’t think it would be worth going out of the way to see. It’s located at 5 Queen Street.

When we got to Simcoe Park we crossed the street and walked by the Prince of Wales Hotel, which is one of Canada’s grand railway hotels and it’s a national historic site.

The next national historic site we walked by was the Niagara District Court House. It’s a neat looking building from the outside, but we didn’t go inside.

Niagara Home Bakery at 66 Queen Street offers a nice variety of savory and sweet options, and we opted for one of each. Both of the items we tried were excellent and decently priced and the staff was friendly.

The Budapest Bake Shop has an interesting food option called Chimney Cake, which isn’t actually a cake. They have various sweet and savory options available as well as chimney sandwiches, sausage chimney and dips. We almost bought something but we weren’t hungry so we opted not to try it. The menu in their store wasn’t clear on the options and pricing, but their website is clear on all that.

We walked back to our car via Queen Street, which was a nice walk all the way to our car. Then we drove toward our hotel with a stop at Italian Pizza and Subs for dinner. They have excellent prices and great reviews. Unfortunately the food was nowhere near as good as the reviews claim. We ordered a pizza, an eggplant parmesan sub and wings. Not one of the items was great, but nothing was bad either. If you’re looking to get filled up for a good price, this place accomplishes that. If you’re looking for a tasty meal, it doesn’t accomplish that.

After checking into our motel we drove to Country Fresh Donuts. Several reviews said how great their wonton soup is and that they have good donuts. The wonton soup is ok, not great, but well priced. They had only a couple of types of donuts left, none of which appealed to me, so we didn’t try the donuts.

Then we drove on Niagara River Parkway to finally see Niagara Falls! We could see the mist way up in the air above Horseshoe Falls from far away and we got to see the falls for the first time at night when they were all lit up with changing colors. It’s so cool to see! We had a long day, so we drove back to our motel to get sleep for a very busy day to follow.

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