Colored Clouds

Splendor of Niagara at night

Maid Of The Mist

Having visited umpteen cascades in the west, a visit to Niagara which is only about 240 miles from my place was definitely on the cards.. We had to make it before winter set in.. coz we didn't want to freeze in no mans land (neither US nor Canada)...

Also, the first time ever I got so close to any international border .. so much so that pedestrians are allowed to cross through the border...

And a beautiful bridge separating the two countries...for most ppl who drive to cross the border

...and in between is a special gift from US to Canada, as a token of appreciation of a long lasting friendly relationship (unlike our neighbors).. Its this view.. of US falls from Canadian side (as seen from the Maid of the Mist boat ride...

The USP of this falls is not its height or width but the sheer rate at which water is pushed down.... more than 200,000 cu feet per second!!!

and to top it all .. u get an easy access point to a top view of the falls to check out how the falls is formed... which is also rare in most other falls I have seen..

and not to forget .. the ever lasting rainbow at the falls to add to its beauty...

Welcome Fall

Late this year ... nevertheless, its coming .. its almost here .. the "fall colors" have started appearing and here are some pics from the first appearance!

Not the best photographs .. most of them are shot during a drive.. and btw .. some of them are shot by my dad too!!! donno exactly which ones.

The Rainier Cascades

The cascades of Mt Rainier are unique as most of them are found right next to the road or some of them are actually right below the wheels of your car. I am also planning a visit to the Northern Cascades National Park, but the scary part of the plan is that no water fall in that place seems to be accessible without a 3 mile hike through slippery rocks making it practically impossible to cover more than 2 of them over a weekend inspite of the park itself being home for more than 30 cascades.

Up here, we could easily stop over 5 of them as we drove up hill towards Paradise Point (Most popular view point on Mt Rainier). Most of them are not called with names .. or to be frank I do not know them ;) The first one is here:

The next was the most surprising one! As I drove through the road, we could hear a distinct sound of water gushing through some place.. looked all around.. simply could not find any water fall anywhere around.. surprisingly no tourists around too! After we drove about 1/2 a mile more... we found that we were actually driving above this fall :)

This is the cutest one .. about 20-25 ft... but really cute.. sorry about the poor clarity.. it was a desperate attempt to get the effect of a smooth surface of water in the pic .. with manual settings and slow shutter speeds.. this way i found out how shaky our hands are at the age of 25 ;) the next time I shoot this.. I'll have a tripod!

This is the most popular falls in Mt Rainier..called "NARADA" falls.. yes its an Indian name! Did u know it means "uncontaminated" or "pure" ? I felt embarrassed enough to find this out from a board in a remote corner of US ! Anyways.. unfortunately for us..the trail to Narada falls was closed due to a fresh landslide.. The best we could see was this

The best snap I could take without a tripod was of another cascade nearby: