Niagara Falls

We only spent 1 night in Rochester but felt like we explored the main things in Palmyra. We loved our experience there and were really happy that we could also pop over to Canada to view Niagara falls. Another stamp in the passport :-)

It only took about 1 1/2 hours to drive from Rochester to Niagara and it was a beautiful sunny day. We almost didn't need our coats, except when you're close to the waterfall it got a little chilly. 

From researching our trip we knew we wouldn't be able to do a Maid of the Mist tour on the river due to the weather. Though we weren't expecting to see it on the bank like this...

When you're really close it gets quite misty and therefore hard to get decent shots...at least with our ordinary camera :-)

The pic below is looking out towards the New York side of the falls. 

Will had a lot of fun just walking around and taking everything in. He was a big hit when we had lunch in a restaurant overlooking the falls. The waitresses were all gushing over how cute he was. Can't really blame them though!

Even though we couldn't get right in the action it was still an incredible sight to behold. I had read a lot about viewing Niagara and remember something that said from the Canadian side you see the best views of the falls but the US side you "feel" the falls. I think this summed it up well. The Canadian side was definitely the most spectacular to view but when we crossed back over the border and went along the viewing platform etc you could really feel the power of the falls. 

We had been trying to teach Will how to look through the viewfinder since we came across them in LA an NYC. He finally started getting the gist of it. 

After a good amount of exploring it was time to head to Buffalo for our flight to Washington DC. We almost had a major delay but were very lucky that the airline were able to find a replacement pilot (the original one got really sick apparently). 

Palmyra

At a ridiculously early time on Monday 25th March we checked out of our gorgeous New York Hotel. Check out was a bit sketchy though as no-one was answering phones or were at the front desk downstairs. Being the control freak I am I started panicking. Pete basically ordered me to go sit on the lounge with Will and wait :-(
Trusty Pete and Sim managed to find someone and get us all sorted - including removing the extra 50 odd bucks they wanted to charge us for the mini bar stuff we hadn't consumed.
The trip to the airport in the taxi was really quick and we were checked in quite quickly too.

We were all feeling a bit melancholy as we just weren't ready to leave New York City. However, I was looking forward to going to Palmyra and visiting a very significant place in the history of our church. More on that to come...

The flight was an hour as we were still in New York State. We picked up a very roomy SUV and loaded into the car for the trip to Rochester (about 25 mins from Palmyra). We were all so exhausted from our early start as you can see below :-)

 It had snowed a lot more in Palmyra than New York and it was lovely to drive through the countryside, surrounded by snow.

Our motel was quite impressive considering the pittance it cost to stay! We unloaded out gear and popped around the corner to a diner. It was one of the typical chain diners all over the US, complete with bizarre items on the menu. 
I'm happy to say none of us tried the bacon desserts - though Pete was intensely curious about what it would have been like.

I really enjoyed my pancakes and scrambled eggs and we loved that the entire meal cost about 25 bucks for the 4 of us. 

We then made our way to Palmyra, with Will quickly falling asleep in the car. Driving into Palmyra we noticed it was eerily quiet and a bit of  dead beat type place. We saw a lot of dilapidated buildings and trailer park homes. We got the impression that it is a struggling community, mostly farmers and little industry. Yet, you drive along and suddenly see one of beautiful church Temples and churches...complete with picturesque scatterings of snow!

Pete and I decided to visit the home of Joseph Smith (a modern day prophet who restored our church in 1830). He is someone we as members revere and honor greatly. Sim stayed with Will in the car for this visit which allowed Pete and I to take our time. 

The original homestead was destroyed but everything has been replicated as best as possible and it's interesting to see how people lived in the early 1800's. 

I think these shots are from Joseph Smith's families second home...

We then took a walk through the sacred grove. This is the place where Joseph Smith received instruction from our Heavenly Father to restore our church. It was cold and the trees bare, but there is no doubting this is a special place. It had a haunting kind of feel to it...

There is a lovely video that talks about the history of our church. Feel free to take a look here. 

We got back to the car after a fair while and Will had only just woken up and was watching The Lion King with Uncle Sim. We had heaps of time to wander back into the sacred grove with Sim and Will joining us this time which was really nice. 

I felt so grateful that I could visit this special place with my loved ones. 

By the way, the band-aid you see on Will's chin is due to him getting carpet burn playing on the hotel floor in New York City. He kept picking at it so we stuck a band-aid on :-) 

We drove into the township of Palmyra to visit the Printing Press where the Book of Mormon was published. We had a lovely sister Missionary take us on a shortened version of the tour. Winter is a very slow season in Palmyra so we didn't have to wait anywhere and had each place pretty much all to ourselves. I'd love to come back during summer when they hold the Hill Cumorah Pageant. Apparently the small town makes enough money in that week to sustain them throughout the year. 

The tour was really interesting and we got to see and touch a lot of the materials. Will loved those parts of the tour. Apart from occasionally bolting away, he was pretty good. Sim and I had a lovely experience at the end of the tour reflecting on our childhood and growing up in the church. I can't remember what the Sister Missionary asked us but it stirred up a lot of emotions in both of us. 

Our last stop for the day was to the Hill Cumorah Visitor's Centre. We didn't do a tour as such but looked around and watched a lovely video presentation about the family. This one featured a fair amount on Father's which struck a chord with Sim and I again. It was nice to leave the cinema room and just chat to the Missionaries who volunteer there. There was a lovely older couple and 2 sister Missionaries. Will flirted like crazy with the sister Missionaries and stole a muesli bar from one of them! Cheeky boy!

We enjoyed seeing the Christus statue and Will was particularly fascinated by it, exclaiming "Jesus, Jesus." The photo below captures the awe and it perfectly sums up our uplifting experience in Palmyra.