Day 9: The Hills are Alive

We left the Best Western in Niagara Falls this morning and I had a brief run-in with the general manager. When I looked at my itemized bill, I noticed that I was being charged $5.00 for each local call I made. He explained that local calls are free, but any call over 30 minutes was subject to a $5.00 charge and that this information was clearly printed in the hotel information. Well, I had called the front desk to ask about local calls and was told they were free. I believe it should have been the responsibility of the employee to inform me that there would be a charge for calls over 30 minutes. If I had known this, I would have logged off the net after 25 minutes and re-connected.

Anyhow, I told the manager what had happened and and that I did not intend to pay for the local calls since one of his employees gave me incomplete information. To make an already long story less long, he accused me of attempting to deceive him and of taking advantage of him. He walked away from me several times while I attempted to reason with him and he was incredibly RUDE. Not wanting to keep Mary and the kids waiting in the car any longer, I suggested we split the phone bill, which only cost me $15.00. Yet, there was a principle involved. All this to say, STAY AWAY FROM THE BEST WESTERN on Falls View in Niagara. The General Manager is NOT a nice man!

On with the show. Today was a big driving day. We bid adieu to Niagara Falls and set course for upstate New York. Our first stop was the Harriet Tubman house, located in Auburn, about halfway across the state. We arrived there only to find out that it is closed on Mondays. Grrr. So we took a few photos of the house, took the dog for a walk and stretched our legs before going on through Syracuse.

At this point, the terrain became more hilly and the colors of the leaves was brilliant! Fiery reds, oranges and bright yellow spotted the countryside. It was simply beautiful and it has continued as we head further East. We were going to bed down in Albany, NY for the evening, but decided to continue into Vermont. We found a nice little motel in Bennington (whose name I won\’t mention since the nice lady wouldn\’t give me a discount). Tomorrow, we will drive through Vermont covered-bridge territory to satisfy Mary\’s longing for \”the simple things\”. It truly is beautiful here. It reminds me of Chevy Chase in Funny Farm, without the lamb fries.