Review: GoToBus bus tour of Niagara

We went a bus tour to Niagara Falls (from Boston, MA). We booked the tour via GoToBus.com; the tour itself was operated by Sunshine Travels. I took this tour with my parents, and here's a summary of our experiences.

Quick Summary:

• Overall, the trip was nice. Among the good things...
• Ease of searching for tours & making a reservation via GoToBus.com
• We were able to cover Niagara comfortably in 2 days. The logisitics were planned well, and we were mostly on schedule in every place.
• Since, someone else was driving, I could spend some quality time with my folks.
• The price of the tour was very reasonable (esp because of the buy-2-get-1-free offer)
• Among the things that I didn't like...
• The quality of the hotel was pretty bad.
• Attitude of the tour-guide when pushing everyone to pay for the "optional" attractions & service-fee wasn't good. 

Detailed version:

The first thing to note is that GoToBus.com is not a tour operator...they connect you to various tour operators & make it easy to make a reservation. So, your experiences could vary quite a bit based on which company organizes the tour (our tour operator was Sunshine Travel; they are based in Boston).

1. Booking the tour: We booked the tour online (at http://www.gotobus.com/ ). This wesbsite is pretty easy to use. The website has detailed information about the tours (including detailed itinerary, exclusions, customer-reviews, points-of-pick-up, optinal attractions, etc). I had to call their customer service a couple of times -- there wasn't a long hold-time, and the reps were very helpful. The process of booking the trip itself was a breeze. The Niagara tour that we chose had a buy-2-get-1-free offer -- so, the price was pretty good. BTW, GoToBus has a policy of not revealing the tour operator before you book the tour.
2. Pick-up location:  We were scheduled to be picked-up at 7:45am from a "Service area" on I-90. Being from the west-coast, I didn't know what "service area" actually meant -- I called up GoToBus to get it clarified (though their response wasn't very clear). After reading online, I figured it was some sort of a "rest area" on the freeway -- which turned out to be correct (except that "service areas" tend to typically have a food-court & a gas-station). The pick-up was in the parking lot of the "service area/plaza" -- in the parking area specifically meant for buses (it's hard to miss this once you are in the service area)
3. Pick-up on the day of the tour: We got a call at 7am from the bus driver saying that he was running about 10 mins late. At around 8am, two mini buses arrived. The tour description said that the tour will be in a luxury coach (with an on-board toilet) - -but, I guess they switched to mini-buses since the number of people of the tour was somewhat lesser. The mini-buses seemed comfortable, but didn't have an on-board toilet. The mini-buses worked out better for my parents, since it was a little more easier to get in/out of the bus. One of the drivers of the mini-buses was also the tour-guide. He gave instructions in both English & Chinese. His English was a little hard to understand, but was manageable. Among the passnegers -- there were 3-4 of families from India & Europe; the rest were Asian. 
4. Journey to Niagara: We stopped every 2 hrs or so, at service-areas for bio-breaks/lunch/snacks. Most of the service-areas had some coffee shops, one or two fast-food places (McDonalds was fairly common, Burger King, Dunkin Donuts, Pizza Gino's were among the other ones that we saw). Typically, there was at least one or two decent vegetarian choices (eg: Veggie burger, veggie Pizza, etc). My folks had packed some food from home, and they ate that.
5. Optional attractions/excursions: During one of the stops, the guide told us that we need to pay $65/passenger towards the entrance fees of the "optional" attractions & the service-fee for the driver & the guide. $65 was on the higher side (since the website listed only 3 paid-attractions that would cost about $40 total). With this, the guide/driver would make a pretty decent "service-fee" (abt $25/passenger on a tour that costs $155/passenger). When one of the passengers said that they would prefer to not see the paid attractions - the guide was pretty upset (I guess because he wouldn't get the service fee). I was a little annoyed by the attitude of the guide in pushing everyone to pay for the "optional attractions".
6. First attraction (Thousand Islands): Our first paid attraction was a boat ride around the "Thousand Islands". I wasn't expecting much at this place....but it turned out to be a cute place. We enjoyed the boat ride.
7. Reaching Niagara: We reached Niagara at around 8pm. The drive + breaks + stay at Thousand Islands took a total of 12 hours. The first stop in Niagara was at a mall/food-court (right opposite the Niagara Falls state-park) for dinner. There was one Indian restaurant at this food-court, and we ended up having naan & curry. The food was mostly OK.
8. Night view of the Niagara Falls: We had a brief stop-over to see the night-view of Niagara falls. It was a little too cold & raining. This stop-over didn't seem very useful.
9. Stay at the hotel: We reached the hotel at around 10:30pm. It seemed like a 1 or a 2-star hotel (I think it's called "America's Best Value Inn" or something similar). It was a run-down hotel with interiors that needed updates. The room was pretty basic & had 2 queen beds with a TV. It was my first ever stay at a 2-star hotel & I wasn't too excited about it. We realized that the toilet wasn't working -- so, we were moved to a different room. The hotel offered free breaskfast (muffins, toast, cereal, etc). The quality of this hotel was my biggest complaint of this tour.
10. Visiting the Falls: We reached falls at around 9am. The second paid attraction was the IMAX movie -- we went to the movie, while a few other passengers went to "Cave of the Winds" (this was not part of the tour; so these folks had to arrange their own transporation). After the movie, we took a ride on the "Maid of the Mist" (this was the third paid attraction). The guide had our tickets ready...so, we didn't have to wait in line. After the ride, we got a chance to spend some time in the area around the falls, and do some shopping at the gift-shop.
11. Lunch: We had to come back to the same food court for lunch. This time, we decided to try Idly-Sambar at the same restaurant. To our pleasant surprise, the idlis were very nice & soft (better than at most Indian restaurants in the Seattle area). We ran into a group from NY, who had booked their trip on GoToBus (but the tour was operated by a different company) -- they had extremely good things to say about their tour (they stayed at a decent Holiday Inn).
12. Journey back: We left Niagara at around 6:45pm. We requested the driver to drop us at a different service-area (that was not part of the itinerary), and he agreed.