May 24, 1994
I bought a beautiful little 5×7 hand-bound book, made by David Oiye, from the gift shop at the Festival Theatre. The cover is formed of overlapping script pages from the play we’d just seen, and the frontispiece has a few lines from the play, too.
Joe and I were at the Shaw Festival to see George Bernard Shaw’s “Arms and the Man,” which we enjoyed tremendously. I’d seen the book on an intermission break, and by the end of the play I knew I had to take that book home with me. I made my way to the gift shop to claim it.
Visiting Toronto
Joe met me at Toronto’s Pearson airport on Saturday afternoon, and he was easy to spot in his black Pioneer logo’d jacket (with “LaserDisc” on the back). We hugged and laughed about finally meeting one another as we headed to his souped-up, audio-tricked-out “guido” (his word) mobile.
He took me to change money at the bank, we stopped for grocery shopping at Loblaw’s (I found President’s Choice Key Lime Cookies), to “The Beer Store,” “The LCBO” (liquor store), and to his home, where we did nothing but drink beer, talk and hang out all night.
Road Trip to Niagara
Sunday dawned a beautiful day, and we decided to go to Niagara that morning. Joe didn’t want to be inside a museum on such a gorgeous day, and I agreed. We checked the festival schedule, saw that “Arms and the Man” played at 2pm, and rushed leisurely out the door. Bank stop, fill up and wash, and on the road.
I think I’d thrown him off with the espresso I made that morning (brought my French press) because he forgot to eat breakfast. Well, both of us were starved by the time we neared St. Catharines (just before the 55 to Niagara-on-the-Lake). We’d missed numerous Tim Horton’s coffee shops, and blew our last chance before the Garden City Skyway between St. Catharines and Niagara-on-the-Lake, too.
The day was 86 degrees Fahrenheit, bright and dry, and the traffic on the QEW (Queen Elizabeth Way) highway was snarled because of construction on this 2-lane freeway (or 4-lane, if you count the reverse traffic).
We followed the signs for Niagara-on-the-Lake. On Highway 55, a rural through way, we got away from the traffic, and into beautiful countryside. Barns, orchards, prettily kept brick and white-washed single-story houses.
As we drove east, we came across some signs for homemade fruit ice cream, and I nearly suggested lunch ice cream. But we were only 20 minutes from curtain, and we didn’t yet have our tickets.
We managed to locate a pizza place, Heavy Duty Pizza, and had a slice of crusty, sweet-sauced, dry cheese, is-that-pepperoni? pizza, with soft drinks we both needed after the hot, dry weather. We wouldn’t do that again.
The Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake
You turn right at the bottom of the 55, and you find yourself on the cutest Main Street, full of flowers and a variety of small storefronts. Niagara-on-the-Lake is a pretty town, with an East Coast flavour, the small boutiques one sees at Balboa Island, California and similar places. I was sorely tempted by a small sign which revealed a Samsonite travel store/outlet. Then it was hard for me not to dash out when I saw the bookstore. It’s close to the clock tower which signals the centre of town and splits the two lanes of traffic. We had to keep going if we were going to get to the play, though.
The Shaw Festival theatres were on their own green, blooming grounds, with parking peeking out from behind trees, similar to the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, California.
We made it with only a few minutes to spare before the curtain rose, revealing a young girl on her balcony, mooning at the sky.
Joe admitted later that he hadn’t expected to like the play, and he’d really enjoyed himself. I had, as well. Especially impressive to me was the actor who played the Swiss “chocolate cream soldier.”
Niagara-on-the-Lake was very busy, with people from the United States and from other areas of Canada touring this May holiday weekend. There were multiple well-kept inns and B&B’s which tempted me to look inside, but it was 4-ish and we still wanted to get to Niagara Falls before the sun dipped too far and we froze in the cool water mist.
Stopping for Ice Cream
We did think to head out the 55 so we’d find our ice cream shop (between the second and third winery, I remembered, on the right-hand side). I had a creamy scoop of “Crunchilicious” – vanilla with Nestle Crunch bars. Joe chose the Chocolate Chip (chocolate chips with a little vanilla ice cream, served up in a waffle cone). We also bought a bag of “Jumbo Bavarian-Style Beernuts made with jumbo cocktail peanuts, specially prepared by Picard Peanuts Ltd. Windham Centre + St. Jacobs, Ontario.” I’d find out later that Picard’s Peanuts was a thing, here.
We happily ate the ice cream at a table outside, next to a flower pot with a wooden yellow-dressed Holly Hobbie watering wooden flowers.
Niagara Falls and the Horseshoe Falls
Niagara Falls was only a short ride away, 30 minutes by car.
The air is noticeably cooler as soon as you near the Falls. We rode all along the parkside, first seeing the American Falls. Then our attention riveted to the huge mist cloud being created by Canada’s Horseshoe Falls. The Horseshoe Falls are truly awesome in scope. Thundering water whose sound becomes a background hum as soon as you’re outside (or open the car windows).
Did you know you can go “behind the Falls?” Admission to the Journey Behind the Falls was $5.25 Canadian. We wrapped ourselves in the included, yellow, biodegradable water-resistant condoms (hooded ponchos) that stuck to our clothing with static cling. I wanted to get an up-close-and-personal look at the rush of green water over the clifftop without getting doused in water. You take an elevator down, and can access a wet cement platform just to the side of the Horseshoe Falls. Along one of the tunnels you can get directly behind the Falls themselves for a sense of the power of this water. It’s a curtain of wet, thunderous, never-ending glistening tumbling white.
The elevator takes you back up top, where you can recycle or keep the poncho, then exit through the gift store.
We spent the evening at the Table Rock House Restaurant, watching the Falls and waiting for them to light up at 9pm. The lights weren’t all that impressive at first, but became so as it grew darker.
We took a walk outside along the bluff and over to the American Falls before we headed back to Toronto after a great day trip.
–A snapshot from my travel journal of Niagara-on-the-Lake and Niagara Falls.
