Frozen Niagara Falls Luring Tourists to Winter Spectacle

An icy Niagara Falls drew a small but hardy stream of tourists Friday intent on witnessing the extraordinary crystalline spectacle, if only long enough to click some photos.

Visitors look over masses of ice formed around the Canadian Horseshoe Falls in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Thursday, Feb. 19, 2015.

Weeks of sustained cold had visitors marveling from behind scarves and viewfinders at the waterfalls' glacial buildup and mist-encased trees and lampposts that looked as though they had been sculpted from snow.

"I come here every winter but this is the most magnificent," said Heather Ferrara of nearby Tonawanda, who, with her husband, Joe, braved a morning temperature of minus 7 that felt even colder near the roiling shore.

At Prospect Point, the brink of the American Falls faded in and out of a fog as if the falls were exhaling in the cold.

"The mist is more ice pellets," said Tony Lombardi of Mylan, Ohio, who shed his gloves to take photos while his wife, Amy, warmed up in their van. The Mylan, Ohio, couple decided to celebrate their 22nd anniversary at Niagara Falls after seeing the display on television.

It's a must-see, Lombardi said, squinting against the stinging spray, "in short bursts, for sure."

Source: AP