Niagara - day 8

What a busy day.... wet, wet, wet and wet again! Started with us driving up to Niagara on the lake (at the point where the Niagara river meets lake Ontario); the route went past all that we walked yesterday and continued North up the river. Fabulous huge houses on the route, we were trying to guess how much they were. By 9:30 we had signed a disclaimer to Whirlpool Jetboat tours for both ourselves, and any descendants, that we would not make any claims against them. At 10 we were given a safety briefing, a poncho (optional), a life jacket (compulsory) and some deck shoes (optional) and we got into our silver jet boat and headed South down the river to the whirlpool. It was exhilarating, the power was incredible; 1500 horsepower; and the 360 turns and skid slides breathtaking. Then came the Grade 5 rapids... can't really explain, but Grade 6 is as rough as they come so you can probably imagine. Anyway we have the films for you to look at. The hostel owner lent us his waterproof, shockproof camera. It's not easy filming whilst your gripping on for dear life so excuse the fact that you spend rather a lot of time looking up my nose! I will try to load the videos below! Anyway, needless to say, we got very wet; the ponchos were absolutely pointless (except I suppose to prevent the windchill factor on the return journey when we were soaked through). We dried off and got into clean clothes and then headed back towards Niagara. After visiting a Buddhist temple whilst we waited our turn, we walked the 'White Water Walk' which is a boardwalk along some grade 6 rapids... I'm glad we didn't run those! Then after a bit of a rest we went on the Maid of the Mist.. right up to the falls in the spray with the thundering noise of the falls blasting at your ear drums so that it hurts. I'm glad they gave us our silly blue ponchos even though we all looked absolutely ridiculous, some sort of horrific bunch of teletubbies. Not nearly as wet as on the jet boats but wet all the same. After that we went on the Walk Behind the Falls, down into some tunnels with port holes looking out behind the Horseshoe falls, again the pounding of the water hurt your ears; incredible to think that a 7 year old boy survived going over the falls in 1968. Then we got very wet again outside right by the edge of the falls. Finally we went to see a film (movie) about how the Falls were formed, it was one of those 360 degree theatres but with moving floor and wind and.. Yes you've guessed it... lots of spraying water and we got wet again! Back to the hostel for a late supper and now it is past midnight so I'm sorry not to write too much. Both yesterday and today were just fantastic; I haven't done them justice here but I hope the photos and the videos tell the story.