The writer and his wife at the Canadian part of Niagara Falls. — Photos: MOHD HALIEMY SAPARI
Niagara Falls. It always amazes me whenever I see photos of, or read about this natural wonder. With a vertical height of more than 50m and nearly 170,000m³ falling through it every minute, surely, it’s a sight to behold.
It is high on my wife’s and my checklist of places to visit around the world. Having consulted several of my friends who had studied in the United States and Canada – Niagara Falls is situated along the border of these two countries – most of them said that it would be more “beautiful” to view the falls from the Canadian side.
The planning started with us getting our visitor’s visa. We filled the application online and submitted the supporting documents required. Subsequently, several more supporting documents were asked of us, and we duly submitted them. Finally, after almost two months, our visas were approved.
Then, we did the rest of our travel programme: Planning the routes, securing air tickets, booking accommodations and checking car rental services, getting our travel takaful (insurance) and of course, figuring out other places of interest that we should check out besides the Niagara Falls.
Once we finalised everything, our three-week journey would take us from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore to Vancouver, Calgary and Toronto in Canada, then from there, to Doha in Qatar and then back to KL.
The couple were proud to see a PETRONAS logo (first building from the left) in Calgary city.
We stayed at an Airbnb for three nights in Vancouver, and booked a few walking tours of the city. In the first two days we walked for more than 30,000 steps each day! All that walking took a toll on my knees but it was okay because the next leg of our journey involved an eight-day self-driving tour from Vancouver to Calgary.
It was a beautiful, long drive – close to 1,500km – passing through the Sea-To-Sky Highway, Whistler Olympic Village, Icefield Parkway, Columbia Icefield Skywalk, Jasper National Park, Lake Louis, Banff and Canmore, just to name a few. The trip allowed us to stop whenever and wherever we found interesting and beautiful places to check out, or take pictures.
Interestingly, during one of the nights, we stayed at a place called Destination Inn so when I said to the reception lady that our trip was all about the journey and not the destination, she joyfully replied, “Yes, but this is the Destination Inn!”
We really enjoyed the view of snow-covered mountains, colourful trees, the blue and turquoise-coloured lakes, crystal clear rivers and waterfalls. Every place was really a sight to behold and we had not even reached the Niagara Falls.
When we got to Calgary, we returned the rented car and from then on, relied on ride-sharing apps like Uber for transportation. In this city, most of the Uber drivers used Tesla, which I thought was interesting.
My wife and I felt so proud to be Malaysian when we saw a PETRONAS logo on top of one of the buildings in the city centre.
From Calgary, we took a flight to Toronto. By then, our excitement had escalated. The ride from the airport to Niagara Falls took about an hour, and we could hear the roar of the falls and saw the mist going up to the sky as we were nearing the park entrance. It seemed so surreal to be there.
Most visitors will not remain dry when visiting Niagara Falls!
The tour included a boat ride to the bottom-edge of the falls, where we got drenched with water. But that was fine as it was truly a mesmerising scene, just like how we imagined it to be.
After more than two weeks in Canada, we finally flew back, but first made a pitstop in Doha. We wanted to experience the public transportation in the city and check out the facilities that were built for the 2022 FIFA World Cup. However, we had to rely on the Karwa (local e-hailing) instead.
We managed to visit several World Cup stadiums, a number of beautiful mosques including the futuristic-looking one in Education City, the famous Souq Waqif and got on a gondola ride in Villaggio Mall.
Overall, our bucket list trip was an amazing one. The Niagara Falls was truly wonderful to see in real life, and the journey to the park still lingers in our memory.
Unfortunately, there was one bad thing that happened during our holiday: My wife’s credit card was “hacked” and with three suspicious transactions made on it that amounted to RM9,500!
The purchases were for farm machinery and industrial printing ink, which obviously would not have been made by my wife, a retired lady. Luckily the transactions were flagged by the bank and none of the charges went through.
The views expressed are entirely the writer’s own.
Peyto Lake is beautiful all year round.
