July 24-28, 2003: Judy and Ted Visit Dallas
	July 4-6, 2003: A Trip to Ruckman Haus in San Antonio
	Return to Index for 2003

While I was on a business trip to Buffalo, I had the opportunity to do some sightseeing. I walked around downtown Buffalo during one lunch hour, and I also made a trip out to Niagara Falls on the afternoon before my evening flight home to Dallas.

Downtown Buffalo

My small class took a long lunch break each day, and this gave me an opportunity to do some sightseeing downtown. For example, right in front of the LepCorp Offices was a small park- Lafayette Square. Here, I found the Buffalo War Memorial. There were usually quite a few people milling about here, many of them buying their lunches from street vendors and then sitting on the memorial steps to eat. At the base of the memorial were inscriptions and statues on each side for the major conflicts memorialized here.

Just west of the building in which the LepCorp offices were located was Main Street, which I think was the main shopping street downtown. There is a streetcar that runs along Main Street from end to end; for most of its length, Main Street seemed to be a pedestrian mall. There was an enclosed shopping mall across the street from LepCorp's building, and, in my wanderings through it at lunch, I came across a store named "Simply Buffalo." At first I thought it would be a store selling Buffalo, NY, souvenirs (for the city, the football team, and such) but I found, to my surprise, that only a third of the merchandise in the store was Buffalo souvenir stuff; all the rest was buffalo-themed stuff. There was oodles of the kind of stuff that Fred and I look for in gift shops and museum stores on our trips- pictures, clothing, china...all kinds of stuff. On my second lunch hour, I spent the entire time in the store, loading up on stuff that Fred did not have. I found so many really nice things that I ended up giving it to Fred in dribs and drabs over the next few years.

Down at the end of Court Street was the Buffalo City Hall and Niagara Square. The City Hall was a huge, very beautiful art deco structure, with lovely detailing all over the outside of the building, as that last closeup shot will show you. Just beside the obelisk in Niagara Square, I came across an odd sculpture- a gigantic "buffalo nickel" (or at least that is what it looked like). As it turned out, buffalo nickel sculpture was actually placed there to commemorate the Roswell Park Cancer Center, which, apparently, is one of the premier cancer research facilities in the country.

The entire square was another pleasant place to wander about, and the plantings were also done quite well, as this mass of coleus gives example.

Niagara Falls

Niagara Falls State Park is about twelve miles northwest of downtown Buffalo, and it was pretty easy to get to on my last afternoon here. It is quite the resort area, with the town of Niagara Falls catering to the thousands of tourists that visit daily (all kinds of shops, restaurants, and other attractions).

I found a parking place quite quickly and just hoofed it over to the park itself. The park is on the eastern side of the Niagara River, and Ontario, Canada, is on the other side. In some of the pictures of the falls that I took, you can see the city of Niagara Falls, Ontario.

As you can see in the aerial view, there are two main falls- Niagara Falls, which is closer to the observation area, and Horseshoe Falls, which is the other main set of falls slightly to the southwest. I took a number of very good pictures, such as this one, that shows Niagara Falls in the nearground with Horseshoe Falls in the distance. Many of the shots I took were looking in this same general direction, either from the viewing platform out at the edge of the gorge below the falls, or from the park area and observation platforms alongside the falls.

Two of the more interesting shots were taken from the walkway alongside the Niagara River above the falls. One of them was taken looking upriver at the bridge to Goat Island. Another shot, taken from further along the walkway, looks downriver towards the falls. I think this second shot is interesting because while you know what's coming downriver, you can't really see it, and from the gap between the water and the buildings of Niagara Falls, Canada, in the distance, you have to deduce that there are some pretty incredible waterfalls in between.

The rest of the pictures I took really don't require much explanation, so I have just put thumbnails for them below. You can see the full-size images by clicking on the thumbnails:

I left Niagara Falls to drive to the Buffalo airport to catch my flight home. On the way, I drove by a diner right by the airport, and happened to capture one last image of Buffalo.

	July 24-28, 2003: Judy and Ted Visit Dallas
	July 4-6, 2003: A Trip to Ruckman Haus in San Antonio
	Return to Index for 2003