Last week, my boyfriend and I started what I hope is a new tradition–a between Christmas and New Year’s trip. As Christmas was such a huge deal to my mom, who passed away in 2021, I had this idea to honour her and create a new tradition. Unfortunately, the arrival of Omicron and snowy and icy forecast caused us to cancel our planned Lake Michigan circle tour in 2021. (Neither of us have had COVID, and we want to keep it that way.)

This year, the weather and COVID tried their best to deter us, but we decided to take a chance and go. (We’ve been back long enough to be able to say wearing our KN95s indoors helped us stay safe.)

On Monday, we set off on our journey. Our plan was to go to Niagara Falls, stopping in my hometown near Cleveland on the first night, spending two nights in Niagara, and coming back through southern Ontario and staying in Ann Arbor.

Well, the Buffalo blizzard caused us to change the itinerary. My friend from high school was recovering from COVID, so we didn’t even get to see her. Tuesday morning, we backtracked through Toledo to cross into Ontario at Windsor. It was my boyfriend’s first time in Canada, and I hadn’t been since 1998. 

It took about four hours to reach the falls from Detroit/Windsor, and we rested a bit before seeing the light shows at Niagara. We parked at the Casino, which is $15 Canadian at that time of night. The Falls were as beautiful as I remembered them growing up, though it was weird not doing the Maid of the Mist (closed in winter) or not seeing them from both sides of the river.

Wednesday we drove up to Toronto to see Casa Loma and check out High Park. We stopped in Hamilton on the way back, and that evening tried poutine, which was every bit as delicious as I imagined it would be.

Thursday we said goodbye to the Falls before hitting up the Floral Clock (very empty at 9 am on a winter day!), which was one of my mom’s favourite things about the falls. We then explored Fort Mississagua and Niagara-On-The-Lake before heading back.

We stayed in Ann Arbor and explored a bit of the campus. I found the Barnes and Noble, and we tried Shake Shack for the very first time. I recommend it.

We got back home on Friday. It was a good trip, and I want to explore Canada more and more. I have a goal of visiting all the provinces and territories. So far, I’ve only been to Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island. That’s a good start though! 

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