Our 4 Must Do’s Niagara Falls Canada adventure in Ontario – The Niagara Falls Region is, with 18 million visitors a year, the most visited tourist attraction in Northern America. The south-eastern side of the Niagara River lies on US American ground, while the Horseshoe Falls, the bigger of the two waterfalls, is part of Canada. And as you can imagine, we put the best activities in Niagara Falls on our three-day itinerary: Niagara River Cruise, The Journey behind the Niagara Falls, Zip Lining along the Niagara River, and a helicopter flight over the Niagara River Region! Join us now on our Canadian Niagara Falls Adventure and see our four Must Do’s in Niagara Falls, Canada, through a couple of men‘s eyes!
– in collaboration with Tourism Ontario –
This April, we as gay travel bloggers visited Toronto located by Lake Ontario in the Canadian province of Ontario. While Toronto as the biggest Canadian city has much to offer for LGBT travelers and locals, we decided to add an adventurous gay-friendly weekend trip to Niagara Falls, Ontario to our gay travel bucket list. After our must-do’s on the Canadian side of the Niagara River at the Horseshoe Falls, we explored the wonderful small town Niagara-on-the-Lake including sightseeing and wine tasting!
Highlights of the Canadian Niagara Falls
We arrived in Niagara Falls, Ontario by bus on a Friday morning in May. You can reach Niagara Falls from Toronto by car or by bus in about three hours, depending on the traffic. The weather was just perfectly warm and sunny giving us a breathtaking view over the Canadian (also known as the Horseshoe Falls), and the American Falls including the smaller Bridal Veil Falls. It was a wonderful feeling to finally see the world-famous water attraction from so close by (the power of the water is almost magical). But, first things first! We checked in at our hotel, the Sheraton Hotel Niagara Falls with a spectacular view of both, the Canadian and the American waterfalls, before we started our super exciting Niagara Falls activities.
#1 The Journey behind the Falls
First stop: Table Rock Welcome Center right in front of the Horseshoe Falls, the Niagara Falls on the Canadian side. At the counter of the Welcome Center, we met our tour guide for “The Journey behind the Falls”. She gave us plenty of information about the history of the falls, how the staff of Niagara Falls is maintaining all facilities of the attraction and handed us over our chic yellow ponchos. There is only one way to reach the platform and tunnels at the bottom of Niagara Falls: by elevator. Walking through the tunnels, it was a breathtaking experience to stand behind the falling water of which more than 6 million cubic feet (168,000 m3) go over the crest of the falls every minute. Since it is manually regulated, this amount of water can only be seen during peak daytime tourist hours. Measured by flow rate, the Canadian Horseshoe Falls is the most powerful waterfall in North America. Check here for the best tour rates >
#2 Hornblower Niagara Cruises with Pink Ponchos
Next on our list: A Niagara River Bout Tour with Hornblower Niagara Cruise to the bottom of the Canadian Niagara Falls. It is seen from afar, the pink ponchos waving in the wind on the Hornblower cruise ship in the river valley. So, we couldn’t wait to put them on and get wet! Get wet? Yes, you will get wet as the falling water is so powerful that it steams up in the air and gets blown in your face because of the wind the falls produce. The drop height of the Horseshoe Falls is 54 meters after all! You can see clearly in our video of the four Niagara Falls highlights how wet we got. But it was worth every wet second! Book your adventure here >
Time for lunch Break with a view!
Our choice was the Elements on the Falls Restaurant with a delicious burger for Karl and a vegetarian burger for Daan. But don’t you worry: Even when having lunch you can enjoy the view over Niagara Falls while sitting inside. We had the chance to meet the Executive Chef of the restaurant, Elbert Wiersema who was born in the Netherlands, like Daan. You can imagine how much the two enjoyed talking in Dutch about traveling and living in Canada and about how special the Niagara Falls are, even after living and working there for several years.
#3 Wild Play’s Mist Rider Zipline to the Falls
After lunch, we got a bit tired and sleepy but knowing what was ahead on our day planning got us awake right away! But before we would plunge ourselves down a thin line, we had two options, either laying down in the well-maintained Queen Victoria Park or take a slow walk along the Niagara Parkway Sideway with an incredible view of both falls to our next adventure. Well, we did the letter taking photos, some people and bird watching and preparing ourselves mentally for the next adventure! Then, it was time for us to take our courage in both hands and fly down the Wild Play’s Mist Rider, a Zip Lining experience upstream along the Niagara River. Equipped with a blue helmet, a safety harness, and our GoPro, we walked up the stairs to the edge of the tower where we got fixed on our zip lines! Wow! What a fantastic view while hanging in the zip line harness facing the Canadian Niagara Falls. Even for scared little birds, this is an easy, but beautiful zip down so don’t be scared and overcome your fears! See for yourself in our video! Click here for the best Zip-Lining offers >
#4 Helicopter Tour with Niagara Helicopters Lmtd.
The next morning, we had one last thing on our Niagara Falls bucket list left which was also the most exciting and scary thing at the same time! We jumped on one of the Niagara Helicopters to see the huge river valley and the powerful Niagara Falls out of a bird’s-eye perspective. The colorful helicopters of Niagara Helicopter Limited taking off and landing a little downriver of Niagara Falls City. After checking in at the desk, we got a starting time and within 15 minutes we were guided to our helicopter, strapped, and prepared for our adventure. Everything went so quickly, that we did not have much time to think nor to be scared of the flight. We could just enjoy the incredible view over both sides of the river valley and got a pretty good impression of how big the Niagara River and both falls actually are. The flight was over in a snap but the memories and footage we took will stay with us a very long time. Click here to plan your own helicopter Niagara trip >
Extra Tip: Wine-Tasting at Niagara-on-the-Lake
Still a bit shaky after our helicopter flight, our tour continued to the lovely place at Lake Ontario, the Canadian town Niagara-on-the-Lake. Not a lot of international gay and LGBT travelers know about this heavenly place, located at the point where the Niagara River meets the huge Ontario Lake. We checked in at the vintage hotel “Prince of Wales Hotel & Spa” and started our walking tour around the picturesque Canadian town visiting St. Mark’s Church, the Cenotaph with clock tower, and learned about the world-famous Shaw Theater Festival. What you might not know: Niagara-on-the-Lake is a popular wine region with several vineyards and wineries which gave us the opportunity to get quite tipsy of the delicious wine and cuisine at Two Sisters Vineyard in the blissful Niagara Wine County. Definitely, our tip to extend your trip to the Canadian Niagara Falls!
Our 4 Must Do’s Niagara Falls Canada
Our weekend trip from Toronto to gay-friendly Ontario and to Niagara Falls, Canada, was a great idea. We seriously enjoyed every minute of it. Although it was early spring in Canada and the parks and trees had not been fully green yet, we can only imagine how wonderful it must be when everything is blossoming, and the juicy wine grapes are hanging in the green vineyards. When you are planning a trip to Niagara Falls in the high season (summer), we advise you to book your stay early enough to get the best Niagara Falls Canada deals and rooms with the best view!
Do you want to know more about our gay travels around the world? Stay tuned on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. See you again soon in Toronto, Niagara Falls, Ontario, and Canada!
Please note: This trip was made possible in partnership with Destination Ontario. Anyhow, our opinions are 100% our own, as usual.
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Wednesday 31st of July 2019
I enjoyed this post, keep up the great work!