Niagara Falls Travel Forum

hey,
strange question, i have been looking at sites for niagara tours such as maid of the mist etc. they are all priced in $ but it does not mention if its canadian or US we will be staying on the canadian side, do we use canadian dolars there and if we pop over to the US side use US dollars? thanx

I would guess that if it's a US company running the tour, they are quoting USD, and vice versa if it's a Canadian company. In any case, the point is fairly moot because the USD and CAD are trading at almost exactly 1:1 these days. So the cost will be just about the same either way.

Technically (and legally), you should be using USD while you are in the US, but in practice you may find that businesses right on the border are happy taking either currency.

Been a while since I was in Niagara Falls (Canadian side) but you could pay with either US or Canadian currency in Canada but didnt get change. (US dollar was much stronger than the Canadian dollar back then).

Cant imagine it having changed considering the 2 currencies are very evenly matched.

Col

There are two Maid of the Mist trips, which start from opposite sides. You finish where you start from. You get very wet, even with the plastic coverall.

Julie makes an excellent point about the currencies being pretty much par these days. In times past, when they were not, most businesses gave a very unfavourable rate (I might have been heard to emit the terms "rip-off"!). Now that things are par, I'll be curious to see what sort of rates border towns give. If it's any more than a 5% charge (think of it as a handling fee) then I would not use the other country's cash there.

In this day & age, it's so easy to use a credit card for most purchases and to withdraw foreign currency with an ATM card that I've rarely been caught not having the currency of the country I'm in.