Barbara and I set out on our Nova Scotia trip Friday morning at 6:00 A.M. We followed Route 2 through Vermont, past Mount Washington and the White Mtns. in New Hampshire, along the Androscoggin Valley in Maine to enter Canada at Calais/St. Stephen. We listened to Calvin Trillin reading some of his hilarious essays, some sea chanties and finally a new book by Peter Mathisen so it didn't really feel like that long a drive (13 hours). Perfect weather also helped. On to Moncton, New Brunswick where we spent the night in the nicest Hampton Inn I have ever been in. It was nice to have really good beds! Let me also say that every single person we have encountered since arriving in Canada has been over the top friendly and helpful.
We headed south into Nova Scotia in gorgeous sunny weather which is predicted to last throughout our trip. It reached 70 degrees today. I said it would be ironic if I got a sunburn here on the North Atlantic. Most of you know how badly I react to heat and too much sun. After checking in to our hotel we drove to Dartmouth and took a bus into downtown Halifax for lunch in the Harbor. There are about a million people in the Province of Nova Scotia (which means New Scotland in Latin, although the Latin name for Scotland the country is Caledonia...I will have to look this up) and almost of them live in Halifax and the surrounding county. Anyway, we both love cities and would live in one if it was feasible.
We sat outside near the boardwalk and ate fish cakes (haddock, salmon, potatoes, onion and celery) with a pineapple-ginger chutney and chicken souvlaki with tzaziki sauce. Our plan is to eat as much seafood as possible while we are here. Alas, I forgot to take a picture of our beautiful lunch, but here's the wine.
After breakfast we boarded a small tour bus - this is the first Maritime Provinces tour by Gate 1 Travel and there are only 14 people, plus our guide Karen and driver Stephen. Barbara found this tour company and they coordinated our self guided trip to Costa Rica last October.
We are heading north through the Annapolis Valley, land of orchards and vineyards toward the Bay of Fundy. This area is the best farming land in the Maritimes and has over a million apple trees. It's famous for ice wines. The Bay of Fundy has highest tides in the world, pushed in and pulled out by the gulf of Maine, one hundred billion tons of seawater moves through twice a day.
We drove to the Hopewell Rocks national park to get an idea of the Fundy tide effects. The eroded rocks called Les Demoiselles by Samuel de Champlain, are former cliffs eaten away by the tidal waters. The worldwide average tidal sea level rise and fall is about 3 feet. On an average day here
I did not expect to get a sunburn here in the Maritimes, but I managed it today!
After lunch we headed to Prince Edward Island, crossing over the eight mile long Confederation Bridge. This bridge, built in 1975, replaced a ferry that took 75 minutes and disgruntled some island residents who worried they would be overrun with mainlanders. It is the world's longest bridge over water that freezes solid.
PEI is uniformly flat and most of it is farm land. The highest elevation here is just under 500 feet above sea level. There is only sandstone, no other rocks on the island, all were brought over or were ballast on sailing ships. The island is 140 miles long and from 4 to 40 miles across. The soil is red because of high levels of iron oxide and, while fishing and farming are traditional occupations, tourism is catching up fast. It's flat and scenic, with a cool breeze, great for bicycles.
We had a delicious mussel and lobster feast in downtown Charlottetown. It looks like a fun little city. We'll explore tomorrow. Here are the stairs going up to our restaurant, Peake's Quay.
By the way, lobster was poor people food in the olden days. No kidding, they were so plentiful that everyone in the colonies could afford them and many despised them. I have a friend in Maine who knew a woman who would not put her lobster shells in the trash, but buried them so her neighbors would not know she had been reduced to feeding lobster to her family!
This is a bright little city of about 35,000, the provincial capital, great
for walking because it is so flat. The waterfront on the Gulf of St.
Lawrence is full of seafood eateries and boutiques, galleries and pubs.
This is where Canada was born, a confederation of maritime provinces.
In my youth I was a big fan if funky jewelry, but have become plainer
and plainer over the years. However, one of my sister's raisons d'être
is interesting jewelry. She was very happy shopping and found two pairs cool earrings by a Montreal designer. We sat down at a street cafe, the
John Brown's Richmond Street Grille where we had lovely lobster BLTs
and sweet potato fries with Malbec and a Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon.
Our theory about the place was that they hired the waiters for their
eye appeal. They were very obliging when I asked them to let me put
their photo on my blog. Canadians! Uniformly cheerful, polite and
helpful.
Oh, right. I'm sure you also want to see the food. Barbara is on a quest, by the way, to find the best lobster roll since the one she had at the Roosevelt hotel on he epicurean trip to New York last fall. The BLT was a contender.
Epicurean |ˌepikyəˈrēən, ˌepiˈkyo͝orēən|
nouna disciple or student of the Greek philosopher Epicurus.
• ( epicurean )a person devoted to sensual enjoyment, esp. that derived from fine food and drink.
We headed back to Nova Scotia via the ferry from Wood Islands, PEI to Caribou, NS, then over the Canso Causeway to Cape Breton which at 217 feet is the world's deepest causeway and the only way onto Cape Breton (except for by air). I have to say that on every leg of this trip we are surrounded by spectacular scenery. I had limited success photographing out the window of the bus, though.
We stopped for lunch by the causeway: fish cakes with beans, lobster roll and blueberry pie. All the food photos? It's a thing. Plus, I told Kristin my hairdresser I would post them - she was mesmerized by the food on my Charleston blog which begins here (so was I alas, and I gained a few pounds!)
After lunch we visited the Alexander Graham Bell historic site in Baddeck on the shores of the Bras D'or Lake. Bell and his wife Mabel escaped the heat and burden of fame in Washington, DC where the had settled after Bell's invention of the telephone. They chose Baddeck because it reminded "Alec" of his home in Scotland. Bell's endless invention, his work with the deaf and general enthusiasm are fascinating. I can't do him justice but here is an overview. He was also a very interesting looking man - I would like to time travel and photograph him!
We settled in to the Gisele Auberge (Inn) in the little fishing village at Baddeck. After dinner (yes, it was delicious, no I forgot to photograph it - smoked salmon and home made two-mushroom soup - this place has a four star restaurant attached) we headed to the pier for a sunset sail on the schooner Amoeba with Captain John and crew Philip and Patrick.
More good looking and friendly Canadians who let me photograph them for this blog.
The tourist season really opens in a couple of weeks and Philip and Patrick are learning the ropes. We sailed around Bras D'or, past the tiny lighthouse and the many acres of lakeside hills owned by the Bell family and their descendants. Captain John is an eagle whisperer who called down no less than four bald eagles from their rocky perches to dine on fish he threw into the water for them. My pictures of the eagles picking up the fish are not great (I love my Canon G-10, but it is not that great for action shots, being slow to focus unlike an SLR), so the birds were out of the frame before the shot. Oh, well. I do make a decision not to bring my big camera rig on vacation.
Fun fact: Bras D'or a salt water lake is the deepest glacial lake in the
world, 942 feet at its deepest point. It was a bit nippy on the boat,
but they are well prepared, with blankets for anyone who needs one.
We headed out in the morning to the Cape Breton highlands, following the Cabot Trail. OK, I don't remember learning this in school, but John Cabot was an Italian, born in Genoa or Venice - unclear. Cabot journeys of discovery were under the patronage of Henry VIII (hence the English name, I suppose) and he sailed to Newfoundland and Cape Breton in 1497. He is thought to have led the first expedition to the North American mainland since the Vikings landed in Vinland in the eleventh century.
The group picture of our tour family was taken by French Mountain on the Cabot Trail. We passed through sun, fog and a little rain climbing up, then down the winding road. Here are more photos, because, honestly! How could I leave them out?
After lunch we drove to Cheticamp, a fishing village settled by French Acadians. In 1755 the Acadians were expelled from Cape Breton by the British and scattered all over the globe with a big group of the survivors of the trek landing in Louisiana, then a French territory. The Acadian/Cajun culture has flourished there ever since. And many displaced islanders sneaked back into Cape Breton where their descendants live now. Alas, the famous hooked rugs of Cheticamp were not to be seen as one of our tour stops was closed (it's early for the tourist season, so we wandered over to St. Pierre church, built 1893. The stone was dragged by horses over the frozen bay from Cheticamp Island. Stone masons and laborers came from Montreal to help local parishioners who built the church. Masons were paid $2 a day, laborers 50 cents. The very French Canadian interior was as brilliant as a wedding cake. I have never seen organ pipes decorated like the ones here (hence the photo).
The lobster season began last week and it will be over by July 13. The price at the beginning was $4.50 per pound, but has since dropped to $4 because of a bumper crop expected in Maine this year. We happened to pass White Point Cove just as they were unloading, weighing and selling the day's catch. Only the perfect dinner lobsters go to restaurants, those with missing claws or other "defects" are cooked, de-shelled and bagged to be sold for other uses. Think lobster rolls, lobster Newburgh, lobster bisque, etc.
Famous for its fortifications, Louisbourg house the Governor's apartments, barracks, houses, pubs, shops and warehouses. The fishermen lived outside the walls, but burned their homes and came inside in cases of attack. The fortress was wrested from the French in 1745 by the New England colonists, regained, then taken by the British in 1755. When the British established their capital in Halifax, they abandoned Louisbourg and, to keep the French from returning, razed the walls and destroyed buildings. The ruins remained until 1961 when Parks Canada began to rebuild the fortress to its original condition with historically accurate methods and materials, using the detailed records found in Montreal and Paris. It is a work in progress, but the walls are complete and many houses and buildings have been restored. Well worth a visit.
Here are a few images from inside the Governor's apartment. There is a very lovely chapel and I also like the folk art Madonna. The Governor's bed looks good, but no doubt it was filled with questionable straw and many pesky critters.
I was thinking, as I often do when contemplating the hardships faced by pioneers, that I would never have survived 17th or 18th century life. It's unlikely I would have been born a noble person, since very few people were. The 90% who were not rich faced physical hardship I can hardly imagine. Besides the disease, lack of hygiene and starvation THEY ALL WORE WOOL CLOTHES YEAR ROUND! Those poor European bastards had no idea they would be facing blazing heat, mosquitos and black flies in the New World, much less relentless wind and cold in the winter. A visit here on a hot day, or to the wonderful Plimoth Plantation in Massachusetts will give you a visceral appreciation for the fortitude of all those colonists.
We walked to dinner at the Old Triangle Irish Ale House with a few of our intrepid tour sisters. Nova Scotia and Cape Breton are famous for Celtic music, but it is a little early for the full-fledged Ceilidh onslaught. We did hear a wonderful band tonight, though, and the pub was hopping. Even my purist Uilleann pipe-playing son Anthony would have been happy.
I hoped they would cover Whiskey in the Jar, but alas, no.
Wind and rain last night, pelting against the windows of our hotel room. I have to say a few words about the Radisson in downtown Halifax - WOW and wow! How we ended up here on a bus tour is beyond me. Maybe because the tourist season is still a couple of weeks away? Situated two blocks from the harbor, this hotel was remodeled a few years ago and is like a modern art gallery. The rooms we are in are suites with gorgeous, spare, arty furniture and fixtures. We almost wished we could lounge around the hotel this morning instead of getting back on the bus. However, once we got to Peggy's Cove we were very happy we came and I was even happier that it was a foggy, windy day. I got a nice infusion of northern gloom, crashing surf, cool dampness, etc. The landscape around the cove is lichen-covered, rocky and barren, with scrubby wind-stunted pines and beach grass. There are huge boulders strewn everywhere, churned up by retreating glaciers.
We clambered over the rocks around the lighthouse, taking pictures because you just can't help yourself. The Peggy's Cove lighthouse is one of the most photographed sites ever. As a former national judge for the Professional Photographers of America, I cannot tell you how many (mostly gorgeous) images of this spot I have seen in my 30 years of entering, observing and judging photographs. The other thing we have been thankful for on this whole adventure is that we came before the tourist season really revs up. We've had leisurely access to the sites we have visited and our guide Karen, a Halifax native, assures us the crowds in the summer and early fall are legendary.
Next stop, the Public Gardens in Halifax. One of the things I like best about real cities is good parks. This one does not allow dogs, which is fine with me. I own and mostly like dogs, but having dogs in a city park can be disturbing. I think a dog park next door to a people park is a great idea. Or walking a dog on a leash and cleaning up after it could work in a city park… don't get me started. I am a crank, I know. Public garden/park surrounded by tall buildings… yum.
