(The flower filled main street)

We left Fort George at lunchtime and went on to visit Niagara on the Lake. We had noticed that the town centers we have visited so far in Canada are generally deserted and most of the activity takes place in the shopping centers and malls on the outskirts. Not so for Niagara on the Lake – it was full of people walking, shopping, having lunch or just drinking coffee.

(Maybe they came from Cork?)

We found a place to park at the Prince of Wales Hotel (established in 1884) and took a short walk to a beautiful little cafe called Balzacs.

(Too hot to sit outside)

Now that we’re back in Ireland it’s difficult to imagine walking on a hot sunny afternoon but thinking about our trip brings it all back. On that day I was really looking forward to wandering around the town doing some window shopping, maybe some real shopping but we were only able to manage a couple of streets before the heat was too much. We spent the next hour in the air-conditioned cafe looking out the window!

(The history)

On the way home we stopped off to fill the hire car with petrol and thought it might be interesting to note the price… so we took a picture of the pump. A reminder of something my Dad loved to do. Whenever we travelled away from home my Dad would frequently stop into petrol stations (you might remember he had a petrol station) – not for the petrol – to check if their prices were any lower than his. He didn’t have a camera so he kept all the information in his head. I’m not sure if he changed his prices when we got home or if it was just a hobby.

(We got the regular (cheapest!) petrol and were very happy)

Anyway, as you can see from the picture the price of a litre of (regular) petrol in Canada is $129.90 and that means  €102.96 – nice eh? We couldn’t bring any home though because they have a lot of restrictions about carrying petrol in your luggage…

(Busy and pretty)

Cloudy and hungry in Greystones, Mairead.