The trip

May 1970

My grandparents made their maiden trip to the US of A. My uncle drove my grandparents, his 2yr old son and wife from Houston to Niagara.The journey has been narrated multiple times over the last 25 years.Apparently,It took them 6 days by car. Hand written maps , home made food to last the journey and just one photo - a prim faced family with the view of the falls

July 2007

My maiden trip with family to US of A( & of course Niagara). This time it was my bil who drove my parents,his parents, his wife and a jetlagged- me. Probably a 3hr journey from Pitssburgh and I was too sleepy to look around.

My first reaction after seeing her(the falls) was plain :o. (I'm obviously talking about the Canadian side!:P). The only difference from the trip my g'parents made 30years ago was we had a garmin gps. Which meant, we erm didn't get lost (mostly!) but hey! we didnt have reviews, online tickets and wait a minute Apps.

So, we still had to find our way for decent indian food for most parts , had to cringe looking at stale food/dirty restrooms/shut restaurants (cos there were no reviews to read) ,had no clue when our flights were delayed AND (we didnt get points for the numerous check-ins .sigh).

June 2011.

i decided to surprise my inlaws for their wedding anniv and took them to Niagara. It was the first niagara visit for them & my hubby and i had to pick this one - It was Grand Canyon,Niagra or Mt Rushmore. Tickets to Rushmore were insane, Grand canyon was ruled out because of obvious reasons( u club it with Sedona and las vegas dont ya)

and so it was Option1. So basically the trip was to cross one more destination in the patel check-list.(if you know what i mean!).

My good friend DD gave me 1 awesome tip - Get the Discovery pass . Seriously, if you book the discovery pass online you save 20bucks per ticket plus you get the special darshan queue respect every time. highly recommend.

So this is how our trip started - Southewst App alert on Sun morning indicating flight schedule. Flight on time.

Reach buffalo. Scan app for frequent flier.

Figure out restaurants and reviews on our way to the restaurant itself.

Proceed to the hotel which was a stone's throw from the falls. Check-in. Scan app for membership rewards.

Walk to the Falls. Use the discovery pass. Spend the rest of your vacation (using apps& becoming a Mayor) and find time to relax.

Although much fun was had with the family, we spent a considerable amount of time using all kind of apps and check-in points. The trip was perfect in everysense - no delays anywhere, no problems with food or stay but I think I would have loved to be on a car for 5 days without a GPS just like in the 70's.

I think this will be the last time at niagra falls unless of course we move to Buffalo or Detroit or Toronto (in which case it becomes unavoidobale).And honestly,i was not spell bound this time. What attracted me this time were the food trucks, hard rock cafe (they opened last year i hear) and the wonderfully shot movie about the falls in imax.

PS: the probability of bumping into your school friend /neighbor/ neighbor's kids/ grad school friends(with wife)/ grad school friends (with wife & kids) are HIGH. The blue /yellow raincoat

with hood is pretty useless if you want to dunk your face.