Day 9: Saturday August 15, 2026
We had intentionally left the window shades open, so despite yesterday’s long day and late night, I was awake pretty early and got to watch some of the sunrise over Niagara Falls. That was an experience I hadn’t even thought of that was pretty awesome.
After some time just watching the falls, we started getting ready for the day. Once ready, our first stop (after taking some pictures of our hotel, obviously) was Turtle Jacks for breakfast.
We really enjoyed our breakfast at Turtle Jacks. I had a breakfast sandwich with potatoes and it was fantastic. I don’t remember what Nick had, but I know he also really enjoyed his breakfast. We would eat here again without hesitation.
After breakfast we headed back to the room briefly to finish getting ready for some touristing. Then it was back out to find the incline railway.
The incline railway goes between the fallsview district where our hotel was and the falls. It cuts the walk time dramatically. And, because I had bought a pass for the day for the attractions, the incline railway was free for us to use.
Because we hadn’t received our physical pass yet, the incline railway operators just looked at our confirmation and let us on. Once it started moving, we were down at the Table Rock Visitor Center in just a couple of minutes.
We headed inside to turn our digital confirmation into an actual pass and make reservations for attraction time slots. I had bought the plus pass, so we made reservations for White Water Walk, Niagara Takes Flight, Journey Behind the Falls and the Power Station at night. We were given our times, a map, and our passes, and then given directions on where to get the bus that would take us to White Water Walk.
We headed back outside for our first up close views of the falls. Woah!
Then it was off to catch the north bound bus, which showed up just a couple minutes later. Just like the incline railway, use of the bus system was included in our pass. The pass is absolutely the way to go for exploring Niagara Falls, if you want to do multiple attractions on the Canadian side.
The bus ride to White Water Walk was probably 20 minutes. Along the way, we passed Clifton Hill. I fully expected Nick to ask if we were going there. Instead he told me we should stop at Bird Kingdom on the way back to the falls district. Of course…
We got to White Water Walk a solid half hour before our scheduled time but we had no problem scanning in, and we were in an elevator down to the boardwalk within a couple minutes of stepping off the bus here.
White Water Walk is a boardwalk along the rapids within the gorge. It really was incredible and it was well worth leaving the main falls district to see. Nick had had no clue what this was before we went (I’d seen videos on social media) and he enjoyed it just as much, if not more than I did. It was definitely worth getting the plus pass to go here too.
Once we returned to ground level we headed across the street to wait for the bus. We probably waited less than 10 minutes.
As we approached Bird Kingdom, I checked the time. Since we had initially budgeted extra time anyway and also been so early for White Water Walk, we had ample time until our next scheduled attraction, so we hopped off the bus at this stop and headed inside. I’m not a bird fan, but Nick is. This attraction is not part of any Niagara parks passes, so we bought tickets and headed inside.
Bird Kingdom is apparently the largest free flying bird aviary in the world. It was definitely good sized. We were there for close to an hour. We were both impressed, even though I really don’t like having birds flying around me because I’ve been used for target practice a few too many times, and Nick managed to annoy a bird enough that the bird sounded like a car alarm. Lots of birds and a pretty well done setting. Is it high on my list to return to? No. But, it was worth the visit.
Once we finished checking out Bird Kingdom, we waited for the next bus, which came along probably 5 or 10 minutes later.
We got off the bus around Queen Victoria Place and walked back to Table Rock Visitor Center so that we could take some pictures along the way. This was a perfect choice. Great views, with a lot less mist than over by the visitor center. We also were able to confirm our thoughts that we really weren’t interested in doing the boat to the falls.
When we got back to Table Rock Visitor Center, we grabbed some lunch in their food court. I had a chicken sandwich and Nick had a burger. It was chaotic and Disney level pricing (but with Canadian to American exchange rates!), and the food wasn’t anything special, but it did the job.
After lunch, we headed upstairs to Niagara Takes Flight. This was another one I was excited about and it didn’t disappoint! This was basically the Niagara Falls version of Soarin and it was really well done. We both enjoyed it. And I got to Disney nerd a bit when we had to pull on the yellow safety strap.
We had gotten through the Niagara Takes Flight line very quickly, because they had needed a party of two to fill in empty spots, allowing us to skip a fair amount of the line to enter after check in. So, we had a fair amount of time to kill before our final daytime attraction time slot. So we headed downstairs where we did an initial browse of the very large souvenir store. Then we waited until about 15 minutes before our timed entrance and scanned into Journey Behind the Falls.
Journey Behind the Falls was by far our least favorite of the Niagara attractions that we did. It was one line and mass of humanity after another. You stand in line for quite awhile before squishing into an elevator down to the tunnels. You get a quick viewpoint (where you join a line for pictures before you even know what the line is for) out a hole in the wall of the backside of water, and then time on a platform next to the falls. Unfortunately for us, nature took us not doing the boat tour as a challenge, and the water was really blowing at the platform. The ponchos they gave us are thinner than the garbage bags we use at home, so they didn’t stand a chance. Then you join a long line to squish back into an elevator with everyone else that is soaked, to return to the visitor center. Did we have fun? Yes. Would we prioritize doing this attraction again? Nope.
Thoroughly drenched, we ditched the poor excuse for ponchos in the recycling bin and headed back to the souvenir shop where we bought a few souvenirs. Then we headed back to the incline railway for the quick trip back to our hotel.
Back at the hotel we changed out of the soaked clothes and enjoyed the afternoon views of the falls. It really was a beautiful day.
A little before 6, we headed back to Table Rock Center, specifically to the Table Rock House Restaurant. I had made reservations here months ago, after finding out that the food was really highly rated, and it was the closest restaurant to the falls.
We were seated immediately after check in, and ended up with a decent view of the falls. And we loved everything about our dinner here. We both had different local hard ciders. I had the braised short rib, which was outstanding. Nick got a steak and garlic mashed potatoes and he loved his meal as well. Service was excellent too. We would eat here again without hesitation and we would absolutely recommend it. It’s pricy, but honestly, the price fit the meal, and when the currency conversion happened, it was a bargain for what we got. We were both very glad I had made this reservation.
After dinner we walked over to the Power Station for the Tunnel at night experience. This experience was equal parts confusing and worth it. Confusing because we had been told that if we went at night we would experience a laser show. Was there a little lights effect thing going on? Yes. Laser show, however is a stretch. That being said, even though the museum was technically closed, we were able to see a decent amount of that and it was really well done. And the tunnel? Way less crowded than Journey Behind the Falls, and just far enough away from the falls that we could legitimately enjoy the view while also getting a good view. We’d go back here. And we’ll tell my in laws to go here in the day time, and allow a good chunk of time to visit the museum.
Tunnel experienced, we headed back to the hotel after a full but really good day. We enjoyed the views from the quiet of our room, marveled at the crowds down below, and did some packing before we eventually crashed for the night.
