Friday July 6
Arrived at Wyndham Garden in the afternoon. Wyndham + Garden always makes me think of “Gundam” >_< We lucked out because we booked a Deluxe 2 Queen Bedroom....however, they made a mistake and we ended up getting the Super Deluxe or Family Deluxe 2 Queen Bedroom. Basically, we got an upgraded room...for free cuz of their mistake. This room had an extra living room with a TV, a microwave, and a breakfast table. The regular deluxe would have just had 1 TV, and a refrigerator. Here are some pix

Breakfast Table

Living Room

Bedroom…these pics are actually the night after Z and I slept in them

Although the pic has the 2 bed apart, we actually pushed the 2 beds together for the night. So we ended up sleeping on 2 Queen Sized beds, pushed together. The biggest bed I’ve ever been on, I stretched out as much as I could and no part of me went over the side. It was awesome!

We spent the night doing some touristy stuff, we walked by Niagara Falls around 10PM and we saw this beautiful fireworks show.

(not a stock photo)

We visited their crappy wax museum and went to some Dave and Buster type places…

We also went on this giant ferris wheel called the sky wheel. I got on thinking nothing of it. As I started to go up, I remember just how ABSOLUTELY TERRIFIED I AM OF HEIGHTS. I was like, clinging to the chair asking myself “what was I thinking doing this?”. My imagination always starts to run off with me…what if we get stuck, what if the carriage I’m in breaks off…

Pics from the skywheel…unfortunately, the landscape shots didn’t come out great cuz it was night, and so dark. So this is the minigolf course just below the skywheel

Saturday July 7
We went to Perkin’s restaurant for breakfast. It was really good and cheap, WAY BETTER THAN IHOP.

Afterwards, we went to a chocolate factory for a small tour. And after that, we visited some wineries.

Unfortunately, on our way to one of the wineries, the Google Maps/GPS told us to go on this unfinished road. We turned on it thinking it’d turn into an actual road….and it just turned into MUD.

This is a pic…of me doing a 3 point turn, in the middle of nowhere

We went to Peller Estates Winery which was huge and very touristy. The wine tour we had was great, the lady talking about wine told us all about WINE, which was different than usual guides talking about their individual wine products. So we learned a lot!

Peller Estates Winery

We ate dinner at Outback Steakhouse…and then went back to the Dino Golf Course to do 18 holes, followed by the skyweel again, this time during the sunset.

We ended up staying at a Motel-6 this night. It was…….not nearly as nice as the Wyndham Garden. We wanted to go cheap cuz we wanted to save money…for shopping :)

Motel 6 Sheets!

Boy was it cheap. I don’t think I’d ever to a super cheap motel again. While guys can tough it out, girls do NOT like it :S

Sunday July 8
Spent most of the day going to a few malls in the US.
I bought 3 $10 t-shirts, 1 $45 Banana Republic shirt…which I got 50% off. And $57 Nike shoes. What’s awesome is that tax is so low, the shoes were only $54…$3 tax. $3!!!

We also hit up Walmart and Target…

Night Sunday July 8
There were 4 really bad things that happened to us this night.

1. We got hit with customs. Our guy was really tight and we ended up getting 13% dinged on the $260 we bought. Our friend, who bought $200 worth of stuff…got away paying nothing. So unlucky.
2. Through no fault of our own, we realized that some of the wine we purchased had been forgotten in our friend’s car…all day. Wine must be kept in cool conditions or it will spoil. Guess what 24 hours in the trunk of a car did? Yep. We opened up the wine we bought and it was vinegar. $100 (2x$50 bottles) absolutely wasted. Sighhhhhhh. T___________________T
3. I was on the 401 and we were running low on gas. Like, 1 bar. Something happened with the car (I shifted it into TOO low of a gear) and the car slowed down like crazy…but I didn’t know why, and thought it was that we ran out of gas. I pulled onto the emergency side and coasted downhill, on the 401, in neutral, thinking our car was out of gas. That wasn’t it, and I was able to regain my bearings and drive off. Still, I was completely rattled afterwards…but I still had to drive home because Z can’t drive manual yet.
4. As Z and I are heading up the elevator, to our condo, all we can think is “what else can go wrong tonight?”. We step into our condo and the first thing I check is if my hamster, Monica, is still alive. SURPRISE SURPRISE she’s not in her cage O_______O. As we start to wonder…what happened, we see these little dust bunnies on our kitchen floor. Um, those weren’t there before. We also go to the washroom and notice one corner of it is littered with hamster poo and like…just a big mess of tiny stuff.

   We start to realize that it’s been 2.5 days since we’ve been gone. The hamster, having no food or water, has likely crawled into some corner…and died. Ugh. Just what we want to do, come home from a 3 day trip, at midnight, and start looking for a dead hamster. Or, in worse case scenario, not find it and start to smell it days later.

   As Z and I start to lift everything on the ground onto the bed, Z sees her. Monica…just crawling out of a corner…like it’s no biggie, looking all cute and curious. Meanwhile Z is freaking “OMG OMG OMG I SEE HER THERE SHE IS OMG OMG”

   So I take her and put her back in her cage. She goes to the water and literally drinks water for 5 minutes.

   We’re still wondering: How did she survive for 2.5 days?

   As I start to clean up little hamster poos and messes, I see these small red beans in her “nest”. Red beans? Where did she get these? It turns out that about 2 years ago, Z spilt some red beans all over the kitchen floor. Although we cleaned all of them that we could in sight, some must have gone under the stove. This is why we saw all these dust bunnies on the kitchen floor. Monica had gone under the stove to get these red beans, while dust bunnies attached to her. As she went back to her “nest”, they fell off. She must have taken about 4 or 5 red beans to her nest.

   It was quite incredible. And absolutely hilarious that Z spilling red beans TWO YEARS ago is probably the reason the hamster didn’t die of starvation.

   Anyways, all is well and good. Monica is back in her cage. I’ve cleaned two spots that had hamster poo. I pray there aren’t more…but WHO KNOWS >_< Ick.

Niagara was fun. I think Z and I are going to go back to the US in Sept or something to do some more shopping. :) Excited!