Believe it or not, but I was sent to Niagara Falls for my annual Hazwoper refresher course (Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response)! Normally this is an eight hour class reviewing when we would need to wear certain gear such as a full respirator, tyvek suits, and stuff like that. Also we cover how to read hazardous waste labels, how to respond to specific conditions and general safety on a job site, not necessarily pertaining to hazardous waste. It's a lot of common-sense stuff, but you'd be surprised how much of it goes unpracticed until people are more informed and aware.
Anyway, the class was cut down to 4 hours with 4 hours of online training prior to the class meeting date. Which means that I had the morning to explore before attending the class at noon. I didn't waste much time. I arrived on Wednesday night and found to my excitement that my hotel, The Comfort Inn was literally 100 feet from the park entrance to see the American side of the falls. So after I ate dinner I walked down to the river (a two minute walk) and found loads of people milling around taking pictures. And then the falls themselves were all lit up with lights that kept changing colors-- it was really spectacular. I got pretty drenched but since it was like 80 degrees out, it didn't matter.
American Falls by Light
Then next morning I woke up at 6:30. Ok, I'll be honest. I initially woke up at 6:30 but got up at 7:00 and got ready as fast as I could, did some boring work emails and then grabbed breakfast, my passport, my camera and my purse and headed out along the park to figure out if I could walk over to Canada. The bridge leading across wasn't far, but I didn't enjoy driving around the area the night before, getting lost, so figured I would have better luck walking.
It was really easy. A sign at the bridge said, "Pedestrians to Canada," you walk across, answer a million questions, show your passport and then you're there! I made it to the other side in about 15 minutes and then let my camera fly. I had such a good time and although the lighting wasn't the best for pictures with the sun shining towards us, it was still great picture-taking time. It was almost magical walking along the perfectly manicured park with mist falling constantly in the sunshine. The plantlife growing there never lacks for water!
American Falls view from Canada
American Falls and Horeshoe Falls in the distance
Dressing for work is not the best attire for closeup falls viewing-- oh well.
Horeshoe Falls up close
And closer still!!
I got back in time for training and the rest isn't really worth mentioning other than I had a nice flight back reading, "The Time Traveler's Wife." I bought this at the airport because our plane was delayed and I had loads of time on my hands having finished my Spin-Off magazine on the flight over. I'm only a few chapters in since I read slow, but it is great so far!
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