.....And The Next Four.....

I will try to post some pictures tomorrow...............

We are having a great time on this trip.....it's funny how some things bring back memories from vacations when I was a kid. I am sorry for not being able to read more of your blogs recently and comment on them, but I promise I will do so once we get home and get settled back in. Trouble is, that while we are gone, my kitchen is being completely re-done and therefore, we also have to "move back into" our new kitchen. All of our kitchen stuff is right now in our living room. That will be a fun time, I'm sure! But it will be exciting to walk in to see all the new stuff in place! Anyway, here are 4 more of our days.....

July 29, 2007: Today was pretty much just a driving day. We left our hotel at about 7am, grabbed some breakfast (at McDonald’s again!) and headed for the interstate. We had to drive across about half of Ohio, just a little bit of Pennsylvania, and into New York State. I’d say we drove about 2/3 of the way across New York. Our motel tonight isn’t the greatest one we’ve ever stayed in……to say the least. I think I was lucky to get a motel room at all though, with today being the induction day for the Baseball Hall of Fame and Cooperstown being only 22 miles away. From what we heard tonight at a restaurant, there were over 75,000 people in Cooperstown today. But anyway, we are staying at the Townhouse Motel tonight, in Oneonta, NY. We are about 250 miles from New York City from my calculations. We ate dinner tonight at a Friendly Restaurant, which was similar to Denny’s and very tasty! We went to a Wal-Mart for a little while to kill some time and the girls both found backpacks for this school year. B1's is "High School Musical" and B2's is a pink shoulder bag design.


July 30, 2007: Today we got up and went to a Dunkin’ Doughnuts for breakfast. Then we headed up Hwy. 28 to Cooperstown. We passed by our hotel for tonight on our way into town, which is a Best Western. We got into downtown Cooperstown by 10am and found some places to park, which wasn’t easy. Not only did the Hall of Fame induction ceremony take place yesterday, but there are also many little league baseball teams in town because of Cooperstown Dreams Park, a baseball school just outside of town. The gift shops and card shops were full all day long. We ate lunch at a place called Triple Play Café. I also saw a little diner called the Cooperstown Diner which I remember eating at when I was young, with Mom, Dad, my brother, and of course Grandma Philipine. We took some pictures in front of that place for old time’s sake. We tried to go to the Hall of Fame but it was so crowded that we decided to wait until tomorrow. So we came back to the hotel and I did some laundry while Dad swam with the girls. We all went to Pizza Hut for supper, just across the parking lot. Mom and the girls and I played some Skip-Bo while my hubby walked and Dad sat outside and enjoyed the weather. We all went to bed about 10:30pm. We are all staying in the same room tonight because of the cost, which is $214 for the night!

July 31, 2007: This morning I walked outside around our parking lot and the entire complex several times. We all got ready and left the hotel by 9am. We had a hot breakfast at the hotel, which was very good. We headed downtown again and parked on the main street. It wasn’t as busy today as yesterday, which was good, but still there were plenty of people around. We got to the Hall of Fame by 10am and took a self-guided tour. We were through with that by 1pm. It was a nice tour with many interesting things to read and look at. Then we went to a restaurant called TJ’s for lunch. After that, we got in the car and headed out of Cooperstown, north on Hwy 28 towards I-90 west. We drove all afternoon and got into Buffalo, NY by 6:30pm. We found a restaurant that Mom and Dad had heard about called the Anchor Bar and Grill. Supposedly, it is the place where buffalo chicken wings originated. We ate dinner there and found out that their wings are almost exactly like the ones at Alfonzo’s in Maryville! We were done eating there about 8pm and then found our way to our hotel in Niagara Falls, NY. We checked into our rooms, which are adjoining so that’s nice. Mom and Dad went to bed but the 4 of us went exploring. We took a nice night walk and saw the American Falls by night, which was pretty. The girls were amazed at the falls, and they haven’t even seen the Canadian ones yet! Then we played a game of miniature golf. Finally, we came back to the room and went to bed about 12:30am.


August 1, 2007: Today we got up and got going about 9:30am. We did a lot stuff today and spent too much money, but it’s VACATION!!! We went across the Rainbow Bridge to Canada and then had to go through customs, which turned out to be not a big deal at all. We only had to show our driver’s licenses and the girls’ birth certs. We first headed to the Skylon Tower and bought tickets to go to the top to have lunch at 11:30. So then we had about 1.5 hours to kill. We walked down to the falls and got a good look at the Horseshoe (Canadian) Falls. The closer we got, the wetter we got! Then we walked back to the Skylon and headed up for lunch. The Skylon is a tower sort of like the one in Seattle or Toronto, like a point. We ate lunch at their buffet, facing the falls, and then went to the observation deck. After that, we went downstairs and played some games in their arcade. Next, Dad and my hubby went to the casino across the street for a very short time while Mom, the girls and I hung out at the arcade a bit longer. Then we all went to the IMAX movie, which was pretty good. In the IMAX lobby now, they have all the barrels, etc. that people have attempted to go over the falls in. When I was younger, those were in a different location. Mom and Dad separated from us after that. I believe they came back to the hotel room to rest for awhile and then headed to a casino on the US side. We headed for the Maid of the Mist boat, where we rode to the base of the falls and got pretty darn wet! I rode that boat many years ago, probably in 1982, on my first trip here, but haven’t been on it since. Very cool! I especially liked when the captain of the boat said (while were at the base of the Canadian Falls) “Ladies and Gentlemen…..THIS is Niagara Falls!” It was awesome. Then we headed to Clifton Hill and the area of Niagara Falls that is totally commercial, but fun. We ate dinner there at a place called Kelseys, which was OK. We also let the girls go into some funhouse thing, which was a total waste of money but you live and learn, and once again it's vacation! We had dessert there too and I had a piece of frozen turtle cheesecake, dipped in chocolate and then rolled in mini chocolate chips. Talk about heaven! We then went back down to see the falls (both sides) while they were lit up for the night. Bruce dropped us off, drove around the block a time or two, and then picked us up. We came back to the hotel room and met back up with Mom and Dad. Bruce and Dad went to the casino (yeah, my parents and my husband like to gamble) a couple blocks from our hotel (on the US side). I helped the girls write out some post cards to their friends before getting on the computer for the rest of the night.