So, after leaving Donna Hayes’s office, Wanda took us to lunch. It was fun to watch a real Toronton behind the wheel. Traffic is an integral part of the city life. It made me glad that I live in the country. I’ve forgotten the name of the restaurant, but it was in a very upscale Mall, not far from four amazing high rise apartments that look like small-scale Chrysler buildings (you know, the iconic NYC image).

Our lunch mates were waiting with our table, which was good since we were late. Here is the adorable but very quiet Megan Long, Superromance editorial assistant. (I love this shot. She is so cute. But that orange light above her head looks like a water balloon someone is about to drop. Sorry about that, Megan.)

Also waiting, was Victoria, who had to dash off before dessert and thus missed getting her photo taken again, and Executive Editor for Harlequin Books, Birgit Davis-Todd. Birgit is one of the kindest, most inclusive people I’ve met in this company–and that’s saying a lot because everyone is very friendly and nice. At RWA San Francisco, she came up to my signing table to tell me she’d just read about “the swoo” and knew the moment she saw it on the back jacket copy of my January book that this was pure Debra Salonen. I nearly swooned.

Our wonderful hosts we very concerned that we got onto the 401 before rush hour, which begins around 3 p.m. Since we were anxious to get to Niagara Falls before dark and didn’t relish sitting in a parking lot on the freeway, we jumped in our trusty rental car and made tracks. We could feel the bottlenecks closing in behind us, but we made it out of Toronto unscathed, and just as we hit vine country (honestly, there are vineyards all over the place) it started to rain. A cold gusty wind blew us straight to our hotel.

The Crowne Plaza was absolutely everything we’d hoped it would be–and more. Thanks to a fabulously kind desk clerk named Kiley (love the name, picture it one of my upcoming books :grin:) we wound up in a king suite with this view from our windows:

Once the rain stopped, we walked along the river and located the Maid of the Mist boat launch, where we planned to go the next morning. We gaped in a mixture of awe and horror at the carnival-esque atmosphere behind the hotels where every fast food restaurant chain and hokey tourist trap in the U.S. has set up shop. We didn’t linger. Instead, we went back to our hotel for a fabulous meal at a window seat overlooking the falls–just as the lights came on. Amazing.

We loved Niagara Falls. Cross one more thing off our bucket list.

Deb