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Jeff, Matt and I went to Canada over their Victoria Day Holiday. We actually were trying not to visit over Memorial Day and didn't realize it was Victoria Day until about two weeks before the trip! It wasn't too bad though. We flew into Toronto on Thursday May 15th via Midwest Airlines, drove to Niagara and visited the falls on the 1st day of the trip. Don't let the beautiful blue skys deceive you though, this was the only nice day weather-wise that we had. The next day, May 16th the business end of the trip started, and we drove to Darien Lake in Darien Center, NY for their media day and the opening of the Orange County Chopper Moto Coaster. Right now (2008) there are only two of these types of coasters in the country, the proto-type in Darien and the Pony Express at Knott's Berry Farm. It was cloudy all day, but it was kind of fun riding a completely new type of coaster and seeing the guys from the Orange County Choppers. This was also our first excursion over and back the US/Canada Border. It was very uneventful this first time in and out. The next day Saturday, May 17th we crossed the border again and headed to Pennsylvania, to Waldameer in Erie, PA. This was our longest drive at about 3 hours, however we were going to visit the grand opening of the longest planned coaster ever, Ravine Flyer II! It had been planned by the park since the 1990's and was finally built and running. What a great coaster, and if it will ever get written I am very excited about the story for this ride. It was a great little park too! On the way back from waldameer came our close encounter with the flying kind, aka a bird. None of us are exactly sure what type of bird it was before it hit our Rental car, but we were all pretty sure it's goose was cooked after it hit us. It also smashed the headlight, and made this the most expensive leg of the trip causing us a $800 damage bill from Budget Rental Car a few weeks later. Joy. Busted headlight and all we headed back into Canada for the last time and drove up for our final stop in Toronto, Canada. We stayed downtown for the last two nights, and had some free time to check out the CN Tower, and do some shopping while there. We spent most of our time though on Sunday at Canada's Wonderland for the supposed Behemoth Photo Shoot. Yes, it never happened as it poured, drizzled or was just plain cloudy nasty the whole day. Jeff had to make a second sonjourn up to Canada later in the summer to re-shoot it. Though it was a nasty day weather-wise we ended up having a lot of fun, and getting VERY soaked in the process (I had four layers of clothing on and each of them was wet all the way down), we rode about ten different coasters, and discovered what is truly a hidden gem in the Cedar Fair chain. Overall the trip was a lot of fun, even though the weather didn't reallyu work out for us well on the business side of things. Jeff and I also ended up heading back to waldameer later in the summer too to re-shoot that as well. Thankfully the bird didn't have any close relatives around. This was all of our's first trip to Canada, and Matt's first trip out of the country. Below are photos of the Niagara section of the trip. 
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