New York state

We had a long day of driving when we left Quebec City. We stopped about 4 hours into it to go up in the Thousand Islands Tower. This was a very touristic thing to do, but it was pretty cool to get a bird’s eye view of this unique area on the US - Canadian border.

These 1,864 islands scattered in the St. Lawrence River for about 50 miles was a fashionable retreat in the late 19th century.

Our goal for the day was to get to Ithaca, NY where we hung out for 3 days to relax, hike and wine taste. ;)

Ithaca sits at the southern end of Cayuga Lake, which is one of the Finger Lakes. If you look at a map of western NY, you’ll see why they are called ‘finger lakes’.

Both sides of most lakes are lined with vineyards, and we did our fair share of tasting at various vineyards in the area. They definitely specialize in white wines, and we bought several bottles to enjoy this summer.

My favorite hike in this area was at Watkins Glen.

There were numerous waterfalls…

… with this one near the beginning of the hike being a favorite, because you can easily see the surrounding rock layers, and not have mobs of people in the way.

The gorgeous carving the water has done in the walls was extraordinary. Unfortunately, the best day for us to visit Watkins Glen state park was on July 4.

We walked up the gorge about a mile and a half…

… with constantly changing views…

… and bottlenecks…

Steve chafed at having to snake along in a long line of people, but I really enjoyed all the views -

When we reached the end of the gorge…

… we returned back to our car via the Rim Trail, with hardly any other hikers.

We stopped by a few other waterfalls, but they had disappointing (summer) water flow. Lucifer Falls was in an impressive amphitheater -

Our next stop was Niagara Falls. We first visited the American side…

… where you can really appreciate the power and thunder of the falling water -

The picture above is of Horseshoe Falls, which was my favorite due to the scope and configuration, but it always had large amounts of spray, so was hard to photograph cleanly.

We walked across the Rainbow Bridge into Canada…

… and were able to get a panoramic view of the entire falls complex -

The American Falls is on the left, with Bridal Veil Falls as the small separate fall next to it, and in the background is Horseshoe (Canadian) Falls.

The people on the walkways are visiting the Cave of the Winds, getting soaked in the hurricane-force winds at the base of Bridal Veil Falls.

Walking along the Canadian side gives you the best views of all the falls…

… from numerous perspectives.

Steve got our best shot of Horseshoe Falls on our last day there, as the storm clouds were rolling in.

We visited a few wineries in Ontario near Niagara-on-the-Lake, specifically to sample their ice wines. I’ll bring this post to a close with a neat cloud formation -