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Published: February 26th 2011
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On a sunny but bitterly cold day we drove to the area around Niagra, filled with fruit and wine farms. Obviously the trees and vines were Winter-bare but the neat, regimented rows of neatly trimmed trees with their red-coloured branches stood out against the dramatic snow-laden sky. We travelled along the southern shore of the lake with the Toronto skyline in the far distance across the water as the sky got darker and more leaden, but the weather held as we toured the quaint town of Niagra-by-the-Lake with its high-end boutiques and pretty parks - its a very attractive area that I intend to revisit in another season. On the way to Niagra Falls we stopped for a brief walk along the river that forms the border between the USA and Canada, to watch giant lumps of ice flowing past.
As it was my last day and to thank Robbie for being such a great host, I treated him to a posh dinner at the Keg restaurant that has huge picture windows high above Niagra Falls. It was a wonderful lunch and the views were breathtaking, so we lingered for a couple of glorious hours watching the dramatic scene
below us. The area surrounding the main bowl-shaped Falls was frozen and covered in glittering ice and icicles, making it look like a scene from the Snow Queen’s palace. After lunch Robbie dropped me off right by the main viewpoint to take some more photos - it was absolutely freezing and by the time he returned I couldn’t feel my hands and my nose was blue (nothing whatsoever to do with the lunchtime bottle of wine). Despite the cold I had spent a magical 15 minutes listening to the thunderous roar of the water and watching millions of gallons pour over the edge and plummet hundreds of feet down into the mist below. There was thick ice on all the trees and shrubs around where the spray had frozen and it was a truly beautiful and memorable sight. Amazing.
Just before dusk we went to cross the border into the United States as I was flying out of Buffalo (way cheaper than flying from Toronto) but we were held up by the Immigration Officer and I had to wait for a while and go through an interview. No sweat and they decided to let me in, but it was
dark as we headed through Buffalo, thanking all the gods that we had a sat-nav as the route to the hotel was totally confusing and badly signed. It was very sad to say goodbye to Robbie.
I had booked a few days in a Miami hotel to acclimatise and then a 4 day cruise on Royal Caribbean’s Majesty of the Seas to the Bahamas. I had made contact with a few people who would be on the ship via the Roll Call message board on Cruisecritic.com and we all met up just after sail-away - they were a great bunch and it turned into quite a party. Leaving Miami was interesting as the route along a wide man-made canal takes you past a couple of islands covered in the mansion homes of the rich and famous and then past Miami Beach with a stunning view back towards the city and the skyline of the CBD, plus we were in a mini convoy with 5 other giant cruise ships leaving the port, stretched out in a line behind us. I didn’t know it at the time, but this was a sight I would enjoy several times over in the coming
couple of months.
The Majesty is the oldest and smallest of the RCCL line but was fun with a great crowd of people and delightful crew. I had an oceanview cabin but I didn’t spend much time there, as I packed in all sorts of activities on the short voyage, including having some very good meals in the main dining room where I shared a table with 6 other people travelling solo, so mealtimes were filled with great food, wine and conversation. We often would order several desserts and share them, trying to convince ourselves that we were saving calories - huh!
Our first stop was Key West where I been before, but I revisited the main shopping area and wasted a couple of hot sweaty hours traipsing to the very far end of town in search of replacements for my wonderfully comfortable sandals (the old ones should have been thrown away ages before this), only to find that the shop was closed and nowhere else sold them. To cool down I consoled myself with a couple of beers in one of the many bars that claim to have been Hemmingway’s local watering hole.
We were due
to stop at Coco Cay, RCCL’s private island in the Bahamas the following day, but the wind was strong and the water was too choppy for the tenders to comfortably ferry passengers to shore. It was a great shame as I had been looking forward to this stop, but the skies were overcast and it would not have been great weather for the beach. The weather had improved a little the next morning as we docked in Nassau, so I wandered into town for a look around. I had expected Nassau to be prettier and better maintained and so was slightly disappointed, plus it felt a bit uncomfortable if you wandered away from the main shopping area alone. So I mooched around the high-end designer shops with the crowds and looked at some of the stupidly overpriced “duty free bargains”, but after a couple of hours I headed back to the ship. It turned out to be great timing as the rain started 2 minutes before I scooted up the gangplank. I felt very sorry for the people who had shelled out large tour fees for trips to the famous Atlantis resort or for snorkel trips, as the weather was
pants in the afternoon.
The next day we sailed back to Miami where the weather was hot and steamy. I had booked a few days in a cheap hotel in South Beach, followed by a couple of days in a lovely art deco hotel that was more expensive but worth the experience. I spent a couple of days on the famous long, wide beach and took a trip to the main shopping area. I found the best way to eat economically was to go to the tourist-trap restaurants along Ocean Drive, just across from the beach. They all competed with each other by offering lunches for under $10, assuming you would order one of their horrendously overpriced drinks, but if you didn’t drink anything but the free water, it was a bargain. Another tip was to share the 2-for-1 oversized cocktail deals they offered from 4-5pm at Happy Hour prices - you could always find somebody else that would share, mainly ladies whose husbands/partners wanted beers instead, or were not keen on being seen with giant girlie drinks, some of which were bright pink.
The cruise had whetted my appetite for sailing the Caribbean so I scoured the
web and found a great deal on another, longer cruise that I will cover in the next blog. Little did I realise that this was going to be addictive.
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