Niagara Vortex

We are in Niagara Falls, New York. We drove into a KOA camp Friday afternoon, and I think we will stay here a few days. Saturday Mom called Enterprise to get a rental car and the conversation went something like this: “Hi, do you have any cars today? (No, we only rent balloons?) Good, we’d like to rent a small car. Where are we? Niagara Falls (Mom, we’re in Lewiston) Yes, we’re in Littleton. In New York. Oh- Lewiston I mean. Well, we don’t know where we are! Where are we from? Arizona-we drove cross- country to New Hampshire to move kids, and now we’re just wandering around before we go home. I’m retired and my daughter is on disability, so we don’t have to be anywhere, unless her husband calls and needs her to come home. Wow!!! $18.95 a day? That’s the cheapest I’ve seen this whole trip! That’s great, can you deliver that to us? No, I don’t know the address or the zip. I'm not even sure how we got here! (Here’s the brochure with the address, Mom) Oh yeah, here it is-You can bring that this morning? Great! Well, you have a good day hon, thanks for your help.

After sorting out where we are, and having Enterprise pick us up, we were off on our adventures. Actually, it started with the driver- he took us on a quick tour of Lewiston and a little history lesson. Turns out that Lewiston was a main portage point for freight coming west from the Atlantic Ocean. The ships came down the St. Lawrence River onto Lake Ontario, but the Niagara Falls prevented them from moving on to the Great Lakes. Everything had to be unloaded at the dock in Lewiston, hauled by wagon up the hill past the Falls, then onto ships on Lake Erie, where they could continue through the Great Lakes, thus fueling the western expansion of both Canada and the US. This happened from the 1500’s into the 1800’s, when the Erie Canal was finished, and Lewiston is a picturesque little town with lots of character. It is pretty yuppie and upscale compared to Niagara Falls. The city of Niagara Falls is an interesting contrast, even to itself. The downtown area is decrepit, most of the commercial buildings are closed down, with the windows broken out or boarded over, pretty ghetto looking. Just a couple blocks away is a brand-new Casino, at least 20 stories high, all glass and glitz. That part of the city is well-dressed and the roads are in decent shape. The State Park is a little worse for the wear, but still worth the visit. We took a trolley around the Park after we looked at the Falls. Mom wants to see the Great Lakes, so next we went looking for Lake Ontario.

I’ve decided that Niagara Falls is a vortex, because every time we left the downtown area looking for new horizons, we ended up back in downtown again. It happened yesterday when we left the casino, (yes, Mom insisted we had to stop there!) After we were taken to the Enterprise office and rented the car, we did laundry, found some great ice cream, and then Mom had to have her slot fix. Nothing serious, mind you, just a little cash at the casino for fun.
It’s easy to find downtown Niagara Falls, but once you’re there, something just changes, and the vortex sucks the car right back into it. We drove into downtown twice before we could get out yesterday, and then today again after we left the park. It couldn’t be the driver and navigator (I was driving, not navigating!) It had to be a vortex- all the water falling into a chasm creates an energy vacuum, which pulls everything toward the zone. I swear, it has to be that! We left on one road, looking for Lake Ontario, driving along the river, it was a beautiful drive, but then we realized we were driving south instead of north. We took another road north, about 5 miles inland from the Falls, but still ended up right back downtown Niagara Falls. Finally we found the road to Lake Ontario and Fort Niagara, and saw where the Niagara River flows into Lake Ontario. That itself is confusing, because Ontario is actually north of the river, so the river has to flow north. Weird. I tell you, there’s a vortex there…..