Niagara On The Lake

 Have you ever walked through the beautiful, buzzing, old streets of Niagara On The Lake, on a cold rainy day, licking your favorite ice cream in a crunchy cone ? 

Yes..? Cool..!

No..? You have to try when you get a chance? Or make a chance and try..! It's worth it..

Statutory Warning: Sour-tooth folks are advised not to go ahead with the reading.

Early fall time - Abhi had been getting a lot of IG stories on Dundas Peak on his feed. And as suggested by IG, we planned to explore the peak on a sunny Saturday. After the hike, we could spend the night with Abhi's cousin who's in Kitchener and then on Sunday we all could go to Aglonquin, and then back home. Plan is ready. Suitcases ready - packed with fall clothes, trekking shoes ready and kids too ready on time!! What's happening!! I wondered, but then didn't want to jinx it by asking out loud. :D

We started 'like' an adorable family of four. Half-way through, 'the adorable' got assigned a new meaning. The rear seat passengers started fighting over a toy steering wheel that one of them took from home, to play with. The front seat passengers were not so different - the driver had his own steering wheel, but started feeling jealous over the sleeping passenger. Eventually, the front passenger decided to become the referee for the rear ones, thereby waving white napkins(read as doves) at the driver too. 

We took a snack break at one of the Tims and restarted the journey. We reached Dundas Peak at around 3 PM. The parking lot was manned and we came to know about the naked truth that advanced booking was required and that their slots are full. What !!! The first part of the plan 'brought to you by IG' ended up as 'just another plan'. 

'Don't worry, we still have the rest of the plan and 2 more days. Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention, Monday was a holiday too. 

We spent the night with Abhi's cousin -  Paaru, her hubby Kannan, and his friend - Abhi.. Yeah, I get it, another Abhi..! While having dinner, we planned to wake up early the next day. But the dinner and the chit-chat after that extended very late and all of us slept till we 'can'. Abhi's biological clock is weird and it wakes him up at sharp 6:30 AM, no matter what. He will chill out in the snor-acapella rhythm, enjoy some IG/FB time. But when he gets bored after sometime, he wouldn't let us sleep. 

Anyway, by the time Kannan and Abhi(other one with a malfunctioning biological clock) woke up, it was half past 11. By the time we were ready to start from Kitchener, it was around noon. The sunny sky started giving way to its non-identical cloudy twin.

"There's no point in going to Aglonquin now. We will reach there by evening and it would be raining there" - Abhi(mine).

"Then, let's go to Niagara" - Abhi(other) 

Watch closely folks.. you're witnessing the 2nd part of the plan being trodden down by the rain.(Of course, not because we slept off). 

We remapped our course to Niagara On The Lake - the small, historic and beautiful town near the Niagara Falls. Adaptability is men's greatest virtue.. did someone say so? Even if not, it's true. :D But can men avoid nature with this virtue? Not at all.. We were welcomed by cold breeze and drizzle when we reached the town. We parked the cars.(PS: The town has metered car-parking all around the place.)

The boys had some snacks to eat and then we left for the buzzing streets. n number of people, from different nations, even continents(like us), swarming together, some actively window shopping, some carrying multiple shopping bags.. Some people are wearing the red ponchos from Niagara Cruise, some are wearing raincoats, some had umbrellas, big and small.., while we were just wearing early fall clothes.. But it didn't matter. Our first destination was the Cow's IceCream shop. The adults had icecream scoops and the boys had chocolate bars.(They can't eat cold icecreams as they're prone to sour throat, you might already know..)

The rain had no plans to stop, so we bought an umbrella from the next antique shop, and enthroned our elder son as its owner and got his affirmation that he will share it with his brother. It didn't go well as planned as both of them had little interest in being under same umbrella.  

As the winds gained speed, we decided to go back and get ourselves warmed up. Just on our way to the car, I noticed a building, it looked like a small museum with lots of jars in display. One by one, we had every one in the gang inside the building. It's the Niagara Apothecary - a museum curated by the Ontario Heritage Trust. Niagara Apothecary was opened in the 1860s and was open as a healthcare service provider till 1964. After that they redesigned the building just the way it was when they opened it the first time. Only the main hall was open to the public., but it was enlightening. They had old prescriptions, medicines, advertisements of some break through medicines, different instruments used back in the day for various medical purposes and so on. Abhi, Paaru, the kids and I were awed by the exhibits. While we stayed there asking different questions to the curator, Kannan & Abhi(other one) nicely scooted. The curator was a nice lady and she patiently explained us a lot of things, answered all the questions we had. I sent a handful of pictures to my sister, Sree. Being a homeopath, she was excited to see a lot of homeopathic medicines among the collections. We left the museum pondering over the past. 

 We had our dinner from a Kerala hotel near the Queens Express Way and said our goodbyes. The sweetness of the ice cream(for the kids -chocolate bar), the heaviness of the past lingered in our talks on the way back home. We cleaned up and changed into comfy, warm clothes as soon as we reached, and hit the bed. 

PS1: The cold that started the next day is a story for another time :D 

PS2: I had to change 'insta' to 'IG' as my GenAlpha son said, "Amma, only old folks say Insta..!!".