Another image from my trip a few years ago, or should I say a 3 image set.Combined in Photomatix, but very mild tonemapping, trying to get a fairly realistic look. Then used luminosity masks and tonal adjustments using Photoshop CS6.

Nice image... I took it into LR4 and added +30 Clarity & vibrance... In Nik Color efex Pro I added structure to the river and the highway leading into town... In CS5 I mask the trees, center left, and inhanced the fall colors with a -2 exposure, -5 gamma, the added saturation at +10... If you did not want us to rework your image please let me know and I will immediately remove... Jim

I don't have issues with the initial processing. The image has a realistic appearance and doesn't seem to need more work. To me the issue is composition. Having the horizon line bisecting the image rarely works. I think the image would be much better with at least halfa of the sky cropped out.

I agree, it looks realistic.
Needs more of a crop to focus areas of interest.
Corrected horizon, slight adjustment for lens distortion.
Pulled back highlights, set black point.
Added slight vibrance and clarity boost.

Scott

Good the realism part is there, it was more the processing I was interested in, but that last version looks good.
But the fact its an HDR, and that it looks pretty realistic, is a good sign, at least for me, as you have said in the past that the images I had were flat looking. So I'm making progress.
BTW this was taken on the Canadian side, but you probably already know that anyways.

I knew it was the Canadian side. Been there several times. But where did you shoot from? Looks pretty high up.

I liked the original as presented. Never noticed the horizon at all until it was mentioned. I would probably preserve the clouds in the original. That is probably how it looked in person.