Monday, July 27 - to Lakewood

Last day, sigh.  Time for the "Best ......" List:

Best restaurant:  Norseman Restaurant at L'Anse aux Meadows NL
Best bouillabaisse: Java Jack's restaurant in Rocky Harbour NL
Best dessert:  blueberry crisp at the Acadian Village. NS
Best seafood chowder:  L - Bistro in Annapolis Royal. G - Maritime Inn in Antigonish NS
Best fish cakes:  Quebec City, down below the Frontenac, Q
Best crab: Norseman Restaurant NL
Best seafood pasta dish:  Rhubarb Restaurant in Indian Harbour NS
Best lobster: everywhere!
Best beer:  1892, a Quidi Vidi NL beer, full bodied reddish Amber.
Best hotel: Frontenac Q
Best 3 B&Bs:  Garrison House NS, Dove House NS, Victorian Inn, NS
Best 3 Re-enactments:  L-L'Anse aux Meadows, G-Port Royal, Acadian Village
Best hike:  Hirtle's Beach Trail (with J)
Best museum:  J C Williams Dory Shop in Shelburne NS
Best memory - L: standing on the very spot where Leif Erickson slept.
Best memory - G:  watching L'Hermione come into Lunenburg Harbour.
Best chairs:  the Adirondacks of all colors found EVERYWHERE in NL and NS! We even found two red ones out on a desolate hike in the far northern reaches of NL:

Here are some by our last motel in NS

And some behind a coffee shop in a fishing village.

Goodbye Nova Scotia and Newfoundland.  We'll be back!

Sunday, July 26 - Peggy's Cove and Indian Harbour

Peggy's Cove, a small fishing village just south of Halifax, is one of Nova Scotia's top attractions.  So we saved it for our last night in NS.  What a disappointment! Tourism has totally ruined what I'm sure was once a lovely quiet place.  Now all you see are cars and people.  We left after about 15 minutes.  Luckily our motel is down the road in Indian Harbour.  Here's the sign for the local pub:

Saturday, July 25 - to New Minas

G wants to rent a place for a month next summer in NS.  At breakfast we met a woman from D.C. who does just that.  She rents a cabin in Shelburne for a month every summer.  We compared travels and it was spooky how alike our tastes are.  Favorites:  Hobart (Tasmania), Venice, Shelburne, Annapolis Royal, libraries in any town.  We both dislike cruises.

We headed north on Hwy 101 toward New Minas.  We happened on a sea glass fair in Kentville.  We met lots of friendly local people who pick up glass along the shore and make jewelry and art out of it.  

It was a misty day so we looked around for things to do indoors which included a lovely Georgian mansion and a visit to a lovely pub where I had pan fried Fundy haddock -- a local specialty -- and a lovely Guinness, too.

This is Diane who sews big bags for carrying driftwood, etc. She was fun to talk to--she introduced us to her 11 yr old granddaughter who sold us her driftwood art.

      I'm fascinated by the huge tides in the Bay of Fundy.  I am less fascinated by these orange letters  but I don't know how to Change them.  Holy Smokes, now the margins are going nuts!I showed you a picture of the river in Digby at low tide yesterday.  This one taken on the Cornwallis River at 1 pm today is better:

Now here is the same river at high tide tonight at 8 pm.  Isn't that amazing?  It rose 39 feet in 6 hours.

Also amazing, the orange type has disappeared.  But the margins are still doing weird things.

 

:

Friday, July 24 - Annapolis Royal

We explored the area around Annapolis today.  First stop, Digby, known as the scallop capital of the world.  There were a lot of fishing boats in the harbor and every restaurant boasted about their scallops.  We settled on a place with outside seating overlooking the sea.  Their special was bacon-wrapped scallops in a maple whiskey sauce.  It sounded so awful we had to try it.  They were good!  And you could tell the scallops were fresh off the boat.  I don't know if I'll be able to eat Costco's frozen scallops again.

Next stop, Bear River.  Our map was incorrect (we found out later) and we explored half of Nova Scotia trying to find it.  It was worth it-- cute little artist colony where many of the buildings are on stilts because of the high tides.

P, J, C, and R:  Have a good time on your trip to Williamsberg and Jamestown tomorrow.  I'm sure you will be doing a blog (in the ancient Whipple tradition).  Or at least send me emails.  C:  check out the cannons for Grandpa.   J and R:  send me photos of flowers and haystacks.  P:  find out who went from Jamestown to Port Royal in NS and pillaged the trading post in 1613.  (And people complain about the Vikings!)

I took this at low tide.  At high tide the water will be as high as the dark mark on the rocks.   As a reference point, see G standing at top, by the two posts.  It's amazing how much the water rises.  And then at low tide there are giant mud areas.  The birds love that.

Thursday, July 23 - Annapolis Royal

After a nice breakfast at Garrison House, we headed downriver to the Port Royal Historical Site.  This is a reconstruction of Sieur de Monts and Samuel Champlain's fur-trading post.  I've heard of Champlain but not this de Monts fellow.  Turns out de Monts was the head guy--Champlain was merely his hired cartographer.  But Champlain has gotten all the publicity.  The French, under de Monts set up shop in port Royal in 1605--two years before Jamestown.

But then eight years later, when all the Frenchmen in the post had gone across the river to help with the wheat harvest, a ship full of Brits from Jamestown came, found no one at home, stole everything in the post and then burned it down!  The local Indians saved them from starvation until help came from France.

Now Canada has built this great replica.  G says this is the best historical site we've seen on this trip.  We found a couple of red Adirondack chairs overlooking the Bay.  Great place to eat our picnic lunch and chat with other visitors--most of them from farther west in Canada.  We see very few Americans.

Then we drove a ways down the peninsula and hiked to a pretty waterfall.  Delaps Cove Wilderness Trail.

When we got back to town we stopped at the Tidal Generating Station.  Western Nova Scotia is located on the Bay of Fundy, home of the world's most extreme tides.  They can rise 50 feet!  So it's a good place for generating electricity from the tides.  G can tell you all about it. Ask him sometime.

Back home we stopped at the grocery store and bought veggies and fruit for supper.  And now I'm sitting by the second floor landing because there's no wifi on the third floor in our room.  There are two chairs here in this nook so one of the second floor ladies stopped to chat.  She's about my age, traveling with two friends.  They are from Ottawa.

We had such cute teapots at breakfast:

Here is a picture of the Port Royal post:

Wednesday, July 22 - To Annapolis Royal

Annapolis Royal is a seaside town an hour north of Yarmouth.  It came highly recommended so we are going to stay here three nights.  It's one of Canada's oldest settlements, founded by the French in 1605, then destroyed by the British in 1613, then rebuilt by the French Acadians and back and forth for another hundred years.

We explored the heart of downtown:  Fort Anne, farmers market, the Royal Gardens, peach tart, and the local barber shop where G had a haircut.  Oh yes, we also stopped at the library--a favorite stopping point wherever we go.

All this tired us out so we went back to our lovely room at the Garrison House.  It's an old Victorian house across from Fort Anne.  G can look out our 3rd floor dormer window and check on the cannon in the citadel yard.  Being on the top floor our room has slanted ceilings (where G can bump his head,) lots of nooks and crannies and old creaky floors.  The wallpaper is that blue and white French scene type--I forget the name.  Really charming.  G doesn't do charming but at least he can see the fort.

The restaurant in our B&B is well know in Nova Scotia and lived up to its reputation.  I had poached salmon with yogurt and caper sauce.  So fresh the salmon almost leaped onto my plate.  G had scallops-also very tasty.  But best of all--very fresh veggies of all sorts, even beet tops, which I love.  I had just been talking with someone from Nova Scotia who was complaining about the lack of fresh vegetables being served in NS restaurants.  Usually you get canned peas or, worse, canned beans.  We skipped dessert as we both have gained about 10 pounds on this vacation.

This is Sandy.  She was selling hand-sewn items at the farmers market.  She's holding up an "adult clothing protector" fastened with one Velcro fastener.  She called it a bib. (Tsk, tsk)

The Annapolis Royal Gardens are fantastic!  They have over 2000 rose bushes.  And 40 different types of heather!  This is New Scotland, after all.  Here are roses and heather.

Tuesday, July 21 - Yarmouth

Well, Yarmouth isn't a dump, but it is a bit dull.  The folks at the Tourist Information Center were very nice, though, and not only found a couple things for us to do today, but also helped us book motels for the remainder of our trip.  I usually book rooms on the Internet, but since wifi is spotty here, it was easier to have them do it.

We went to le village historique acadien about a half hour out of town where we learned about the history of the Acadians.  As you probably remember from reading Longfellow's poem "Evangeline" in eighth grade (we did in Heimdal, North Dakota anyway), the British deported about 12,000 Acadians from Nova Scotia around 1755 and quite a few ended up in Louisiana.  I didn't know that many others went to New England and other places in the colonies.  I also didn't know that many who were deported were allowed to come back to Nova Scotia after a few years.

This Acadian historical seaside village employs many of the descendants of those who came back.  It was really interesting to hear their stories.  Since there were very few tourists, we could spend a long time talking to them.  Meanwhile, they also showed us various aspects of village life in the 1850's.

Here's a young man who spends 6 months lobster fishing and 6 months working at this village.  He's showing G how an old wooden lobster trap used to work.  During lobster fishing season he shows up at the dock at 1 am to head out to deep water where lobsters hang out.  During peak season he will get back home at 11 pm.  Probably won't even shower, he's so tired.  He's not married--he said most girls won't put up with his schedule ( to say nothing about his bathing practices.)

I like to see the different ways of stacking hay around the world.  This is called a salt haystack because it is found in the salt marshes. These stacks are raised above the damp ground.  They are shaped so that rain runs off. After the marsh freezes in the winter, the farmer can drive his hay wagon over the frozen ground to collect the hay.

Monday, July 20 - to Yarmouth

We left our comfy room at the Smugglers Inn after a simple breakfast of oatmeal with applesauce and berries next door at the Scuttlebutt.

I was glad not to run into the French lady staying down the hall.  Last night I went downstairs to wash a load of clothes but the previous user hadn't come to move their clothes to the dryer.  I took the other person's clothes out of the washer, placed them on the dryer (very neatly) and put mine in the washer.  A half hour later I came back to check on my load.  It was still washing so I was just standing around waiting when into the room flies a very irate French lady, smoke coming out of her ears.  She chewed me up one side and down the other.  "It is not allowed zat you should touch my clothes......."  And on and on for 10 minutes. I was speechless.  You would have thought I murdered her first born.  She said I should have gone to the front desk to have them find her--which made no sense because they close down in the evening and how would they know who was washing anyway.  I didn't point these things out to her.  I just kind of stared at her in disbelief and let her rant.  Man, I would hate to be traveling with her!  G is much more mellow.

Mellow man and I headed south for Yarmouth.  We stopped first in Liverpool at a cute little lighthouse where G got to blow the fog horn.  There we learned about Privateers.  They were legalized pirates, basically.  The British crown gave them permission to seize American ships.  But, no worries, we did the same to them.

The next stop was Shelburne, another frozen-in-time town.  The waterfront looks much as it did in the 1780's, without the Disney fakeness.  We visited a Dory shop where dories are still made.  I bought a dory whirleygig for my flower garden.  Our guide showed us the pointy thing from the front of a swordfish that a fisherman had to cut off when it came up through the bottom of his dory.  (4 ft long). Swordfish love cod so when he smelled the cod in the boat he stuck his pointy thing (scientific name) up through the soft pine of the dory and got stuck.  Luckily the fisherman carried a hacksaw so he sawed it right off.

Shelburne was populated by Loyalists who fled the U.S. after the Revolutionary War.  The wealthy Loyalists went back to England, but 10,000 poorer ones fled to Shelburne, Nova Scotia.   Black Loyalists came, too--but they were forced to live 7 km north of town.

We finally made it to Yarmouth by supper time.  Yarmouth looks like a dump. Wish we had stayed in Shelburne.

G blowing fog horn:


The dory shop:

Sunday, July 19 - Lunenburg

John flew back home today.  Wish he could've traveled with us longer--but he had to get back to work.  And to his tennis team.

G and I visited the Fisherman's Museum where we watched an excellent movie about the Bluenose, the tall ship we toured a couple days ago.  It was a fishing and racing schooner built in Lunenburg. The reason they are so proud of it is that it beat all the U.S. Schooners in the International
Fisherman's Race seven years straight in the 1930's.  Most of the U.S. ships came from Gloucester MA. Apparently there was a big rivalry between the two towns, both in shipbuilding and also racing.

After the Bluenose got old they sold her to a company out of Haiti, hauling sugar etc.   An old sailor who was very upset by the sale said,  "Then they whored her out to Haiti."  Bluenose sank off the coast of Haiti but in the '60's they built a new one, Bluenose II, so now everybody is happy.

We walked around Lunenburg in the evening.  This remarkably preserved town is rich with colorful Victorian style houses and businesses.  There must be hundreds of them--they go on block after block.  There was some serious money in this town in the 1800's.

Many homes have the "Lunenburg lump," a detailed dormer over the front door.

We were shocked to see how many deaths at sea were recorded on this memorial.  We noted so many last names that were the same.  In 1926 alone there must have been 5 from the same family.  They told us in the museum it was not unusual.  Fathers and sons fished together from the same boat and went down together.  At some point the town decided it would not be allowed to have so many from one family in the same boat.

Saturday, July 18 - Lunenburg

Edie, a friend from aerobics, told me about a special ship that was being built in France.  She and her husband visited the shipyard a year or two ago.  It's a replica of the ship built for Lafayette in the 1700's to sail to America and free us from the nasty Brits.  It's a long story, but one that interested G and me so we planned a trip to Nova Scotia to see the ship when it visits the U.S. and Canada.  The name of the frigate is Hermione, but the French consider frigates feminine and use the article "la" when talking about them.  Thus the "l" in front of the name: L'Hermione.  And of course the "h" is silent.  Now that we have that straight.....

L'Hermione sailed into the Lunenburg harbour to much horn blowing, cheering and surrounded by small boats of all kinds.  L'Hermione fired a few of her 32 cannons, which made all the dogs in town bark, it seemed.

After she docked, the crew lined up on the side and sang some lusty French songs for us.  It was glorious!  The only disappointment was that we would not be allowed aboard.  There was a party on board for important people, of whom we are not.

Here she is:  Sorry it's not a sunny day.  And sorry the sails aren't up.  But she is still beautiful.

There was another tall ship in the harbour--the Bluenose II.  Another long story, but basically it's a ship very important to Nova Scotians.  One lady got tears in her eyes telling me about the ship.  We did get to go aboard the Bluenose, so G got his fix.

We drove to Hirtle's Beach for a 3 hour hike in the afternoon.  J decided it was our best hike of the vacation--we all agreed.  It started with a long walk along a sandy beach, then through beautiful woods filled with ferns, then over some slate-like rock formations and back to the beach.  Here are the guys on the rocks:

 

Friday, July 17 - from the ferry to Lunenburg, NS

We drove off the ferry around 7:30 and headed south to Lunenburg, where the French ship, L'Hermione arrives tomorrow.

On the way south we stopped in Baddeck to visit the Alexander Graham Bell museum.  Bell was born in Scotland but when two of his brothers died of TB his family moved to Nova Scotia in search of healthier climes.  My grandmother tied of TB in Sweden and I wonder if that was partly why they moved to North Dakota.  That and poverty.

Bell was a fascinating man.  I had no idea how much he did for deaf people, or of his interest in aviation--and dozens of other things.  But he didn't like the telephone.  He hated to speak on one.  He said it was the biggest nuisance known to man.

We got to Lunenburg late afternoon and checked into the Smuggler's Inn.  Lovely old hotel in the heart of downtown Lunenburg.  Great room, great a great clerk with hints on where to eat, hike, etc.  She said we could drive a ways down the coast to try to find L'Hermione--she is reportedly hanging out at some cove, waiting to make a grand entrance tomorrow morning.  But we were tired of driving so just wandered around town awhile and then early to bed.

I didn't take any pictures today but here's one left over from Newfoundland:  the lupines!
In places the road is lined with them.

Thursday, July 16 - to the ferry

Mystery solved!  Turns out that "Basil," our host at the Cloudberry Inn, is a fisherman.  I guess that's why he doesn't know how to run a hotel.  Both G and J had nice talks with him and he told his story.  Fishing was the main occupation in Newfoundland until the 1990's when the cod population dropped to 1% of what it had been centuries before.  So a moratorium was put on cod fishing.  This was devastating to the small communities along the Newfoundland coast.  You can still see the effects.  In towns where there is no tourism draw, the houses are old, small, and run down.

  Like the others, Basil was a cod fisherman.  About 10 years ago he bought the Inn, but only opens it during the summer.  There is no business in the winter, he says.  G asked him why he doesn't open for hunting season.  "Oh, the #*€& hunters, they are more trouble than they are worth."

Basil thinks they should lift the moratorium.  He says the cod are back:  "I can jig a thousand pounds a day, just like I used to."  I certainly hope he can go back to fishing soon!

It wasn't always easy to understand Basil.  The accent here in Newfoundland is really unique.  I guess because they were isolated for so many years.  We can usually understand most of what they say to us, but when they talk to each other it's harder to decipher.

We had a long drive south to the ferry.  It rained most of the day--perfect timing.  Our one other rainy day was also on a travel day.  We stopped in Rocky Harbour for lunch.  J had a moose burger and I had roast moose.  It was ok.

 We had a cabin reserved on the ferry because our trip was from 11pm to 6 am.  Newfoundland time is one half hour ahead of Nova Scotia's (weird, eh?) so we gained a half hour on this trip.

Here is one of our favorite Newfies:

This is Riley.  He's very sweet and very drooly.  I'm sure he and Helge were related.  His owner says he's only 8 months old and already 120 pounds.  She expects him to reach 160.  He saw another dog and took off, dragging his owner.  Steve, you can relate to that.

Wednesday, July 15 - L'Anse aux Meadows

It all started when Eric the Red murdered two people.  As punishment he was banished from his village in Iceland so decided to move to a big island to the west.  In order to entice others to move there with him, he named it Greenland.  It worked.  After awhile there were about 500 Norsemen living in Greenland.  But they badly needed wood.  So they sailed farther west and found Laborador and Newfoundland.  Eric got sick so he sent his son Leif Ericson (get it?  "Eric's son" = Ericson) to build a settlement in the very northern part of Newfoundland--which they called Vinland.  From there they could get wood and other supplies needed in Greenland.  This was about the year 1000.

That's the place we visited--and the reason we came all this way.  The settlement is now called L'Anse aux Meadows and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  We spent the entire day exploring the settlement and the surrounding countryside.

Completing the Circle is the theme of the site.  The first humans were in Africa. From there they spread to Europe and Asia. From Asia they spread to North and South America. When Leif Ericson met the Native Americans in Vinland, the circle of the globe was complete.  I liked that concept.

We ate at the Norseman Restaurant near the village.  We all agreed it was 4 star quality.  My crab was excellent.  The beer was good, too.  I think it was called 1892.  Brewed in Newfoundland.

Here is G looking in the longhouse at the Norse site.  (The guides  kept emphasizing that they were Norsemen, not Vikings.  Vikings raided, pillaged,  etc. These guys supposedly didn't take anybody's land.  The Native Americans in the area might not agree)

Here is J trying out a broad ax.  The Norse fellow looks a bit worried. 

 

Tuesday, July 14 - Rocky Harbour to L'Anse aux Meadows

Well, Paul, if the Vikings came to Newfoundland for faster wifi, they were sorely disappointed.  I haven't posted for three days because of lack of coverage of any sort.  I'll try to remember what we did on Tuesday.....

We headed along hwy 430 toward the extreme northern tip of Newfoundland where the Vikings settled around the year 1000.  We were booked at The Cloudberry Inn.  Sounds charming, eh?  Wrong.  It turned out to be a combination of Fawlty Towers and Artos Motel in Harvey, ND.  (I've changed the name of the motel because G doesn't want to give bad press to the owner)

The place was a dump and the owner/maid/cook/wood chopper/receptionist was strange and very unorganized.  Or maybe just overworked!  He showed us our rooms but they had no sheets or towels so he scuttled off to finish the laundry.  A bit later he asked J if he wouldn't mind giving up his room as he had double booked it by mistake and the woman was demanding "her" room.  J, being the easy-going guy he is, said Sure, that would be ok.  So J ended up bunking in our room.  Well, the story goes on and on and soon G, J and I were in stitches.  I fully expected Sibyl to yell out "Basil!"

We escaped to the nearest town, St Anthony, for a delicious supper at the Lighthouse restaurant.  Then we hiked the Tea House Trail up the hill behind town for a view of the bay and the sea.  Across the bay was an iceberg!  Strange to see an iceberg when the weather is so nice.  Even here, not far from Greenland, it was in the upper 60's today.

Monday continued

I'll try again to get the pictures to load:

G and J hiking in woods
Lupines
G and L with tacky moose
Moose poop

Couldn't get the tacky moose or lupines to load so you get the green plants instead.  The little white flowers are a berry plant I forget the name of.  There are lots of berries everywhere--or there will be in a couple weeks.

Monday, July 13 - Rocky Harbour

G and J and I headed north from Port aux Basques on Highway 1 (shades of Iceland).  At first it looked rather desolate.  The few trees along the road were stunted or dead.  It did't look promising.  But that soon changed.  There were lush forests, lakes, sea views, mountains -- even a ski resort.  We drove for three hours to Deer Lake and then turned off on highway 430 which is called The Viking Trail.  After another hour we arrived at Rocky Harbour.

Rocky Harbour is at the edge of Gros Marne National Park which is one of the most picturesque parts of Newfoundland, we are told.  Plus it has lots and lots of moose.  They tell us there are 110,000 moose in Newfoundland-- with about 6,000 in Gros Marne.  I see a lot of them on the restaurant menus but so far we haven't seen any in person.

We went on two hikes in the afternoon - one in the woods (looking for moose) and one along the shore. Then we visited a wildlife museum where we saw a dead moose and finished up with a wonderful supper.  Meals in NS and NL haven't been too exciting (except for the lobster).  But here in Rocky Harbour (population 900) we have found a gem--Java Jack's Cafe. G and I had the bouillabaisse something something.  We call it fish soup.  Outstanding!  J had a vegetarian tart--kale, quinoa, and lots of veggies on a crust.  He really liked it.

I'm attaching all the photos at the end here because they make my margins go nuts.  But sometimes the pictures go nuts, too.  Here's what I'm hoping to attach:  (Mind, they may not show up in this order, if they show up at all.)

G and J hiking in woods
Lupines- these lined the roads for miles!
L and G standing with a tacky moose because they can't find a real one.
Moose poop. - this may be the closest we'll come to a moose.

Nope, it's not going to happen.  Can't get the pictures to load.  I'll try tomorrow.  Maybe the Vikings will have a faster wifi.

Sunday, July 12 - North Sydney NS to Port aux Basques NL

I'm publishing this a day late because we didn't have wifi last night in Port aux Basques.

Helene served us and a couple from British Columbia a nice breakfast at Aaron's Dove House. (Mm mm sweet strawberries!) We exchanged travel stories and agreed that Nova Scotia is the place to be if you are a pedestrian.  Not only do they stop if you are in a crosswalk, but they stop if you are jaywalking.  Life is a bit slower here.

Here a picture of our B&B and a shot from our sitting room overlooking the sea.

After breakfast we caught the Marine Atlantic ferry sailing for Port aux Basques, Newfoundland.  It's a six hour trip plus two hours loading and one hour unloading--so it's an all day affair.  I dreaded going because I get seasick and it's boring and the food is usually awful.  This trip actually wasn't too bad as the sea was very calm.  But the food was still awful.

We checked into St Christopers inn at Port aux Basques--along with 4 bus loads of tourists 😕. J and I took a walk around the town and harbor.  We were on the dock, admiring a pretty sailboat when an old fellow drove up to us and asked if we wanted to buy the boat.  He was kidding--just being friendly.  He went on to tell us a long story about the guy who bought the boat, etc. I like Newfoundlanders already!

and now I quit because the margins are going nuts on this STUPID BLOG!

Saturday, July 11- Enfield to North Sydney

J arrived at the Halifax airport in the morning. Oh, how good it was to see him!  We headed out immediately for North Sydney where we will catch the ferry tomorrow for Newfoundland.

We drove northeast from the airport toward Cape Breton, a gorgeous island of mountains and lakes that makes up the northern part of Nova Scotia.  We didn't make it to the mountains, but we traveled along the Bras d'Or Lakes Scenic Drive until we got to Baddeck and we couldn't stand it any longer.  We had to stop for lobster.


From there it was a short drive to North Sydney where we are staying at Aaron's Dove House B&B.  It's a lovely old Victorian owned by Blair and Helene.  Blair filled us in on the history of North Sydney from the coal mining days to present day tourist haven.  He told us Nova Scotia is officially Canada's warmest province.  That's not saying much, I hear you say.  Well, I can attest to what he said.  We've been here six days and every day has been lovely.  Well, except for one when it rained a little.

We walked along the shore to Munro Park, where the U.S. Navy established a seaplane base
during WWI.  G did his daily artillery inspection.



Queen street, the street we are staying on, is lined with beautiful old homes from the 1800's.
I can just imagine the ship captains' wives watching out the bay windows for the whaling ships returning home.  Here's one:

Friday, July 10 - Antigonish to Enfield

Antigonish has held Highland Games since 1863, except for a few years during WWI.  This year they go on for seven days.  We attended Games in Scotland a few years ago and it was a one or two day affair--nothing near the size of this one.

First off this morning were the kids' events like the caber toss and foot races.  I don't know if the video of the caber toss will work for you.

Then around noon the teenagers' events started.  Here's the stone throw.  It's kind of like shot put but they throw a field stone that's not very round, and , of course, you have to wear a kilt.

The cabers for the caber toss are the telephone looking poles lying on the ground.

The adult events are this weekend so we wont get to see them.  We had a good time wandering around the area watching the various events and looking at the booths.  I bought a ring made out of an antique spoon (they are Scots, after all) and G got a bit of tartan to wear on his new cap.

Sales tax (or whatever they call it here) is 15%.  They say it's the same all over Canada. Another financial tidbit--they no longer use or accept one cent coins.  They have a one dollar coin, called a loonie and a two dollar coin called a toonie.  We need to get rid of our pennies, too.

We are picking J up at 7 am at the Halifax airport tomorrow so we are staying at an airport motel tonight.

Here are some Nova Scotia wild flowers:

Thursday, July 9 - Antigonish, NS

We are staying at the Antigonish Victorian Inn.  Cynthia, our host, served waffles with locally grown strawberries for breakfast.Their strawberries are much better than ours.  Small and sweet.


Then we went for a hike on the Antigonish Landing Trail.  I made G leave his jacket at home.  (See Slovenian blog)

Today is the first day of the Highland Games in Antigonish.  It started with a street fair:  music, ice cream, lobster dinner, strawberry shortcake, kilts and lots of plaid stuff.

Then we drove to Cape George and Ballantynes Cove where they catch blue fin tuna that weigh 1,000 pounds.  The Japanese come here and buy them for their sushi.  Then on to a cute little fishing village, Arisaig, where we saw lots of lobster traps and a light house with maple nut ice cream inside.

In the evening we went to a Ceilidh where we heard a couple bagpipers, a fiddler, a fantastic baritone who sang in Gaelic (he could have given Bing Crosby a run for his money!) and a young boy singer with a haunting breathy voice.  The Ceilidh was held outside at the Heritage Museum.

A great day.

Wednesday, July 8 - Halifax to Antigonish

We woke up to a misty gray Halifax. Our stay in Canada has been so sunny and warm--it's rather nice to have a change.  We need to rest up -- and cool off!

Halifax has such a rich history--and a rather squabbly one, it seems to me.  There were squabbles with the natives, the Mi'kmaqs (I don't know how you pronounce that apostrophe), with the French, of course, and with the U.S.  I guess that sounds pretty much like our own history.

But Halifax settled down and played a huge role in the two world wars.  It was mostly because the Halifax harbor is one of the greatest in the world (along with Sydney, Australia).  It is very deep at low tide, ice free in winter, is very sheltered, and is close to Europe.  Thus it became crucial during both wars for sending supplies and troops to Europe and also for sheltering convoys.

We left Halifax around noon and drove north on highway 104 to Antigonish, a small town on the coast across from Prince Edward Island.  To pronounce Antigonish, just slur over the first three syllables and come down hard on "nish."  I think you've got it!  We are staying at the Antigonish Victorian Inn, in the Garden Room.  I'll take a picture tomorrow.  It's raining now.

We ate supper in the garden, between showers.  Getting tired of restaurants, we stopped at the grocery store for some veggies, fruit and a jar of pickled herring.  Yum!  On the way we were confused by a blinking green traffic light.  We wanted to turn left but didn't dare because all the other cars stopped and we didn't know who should go first.  We asked someone at the store and were told that a blinking green light is like a green arrow.  It means everybody else has to stop and let you turn.  They are very polite drivers here.

Sorry I don't have any pictures of the drive today.  There were beautiful thick green forests along the entire route.  So very green.  A mixture of hard and softwoods.  We saw very few houses along the way, but the few we saw were very well kept.  It's the same in the towns--all neat and tidy.

I'll leave you with a picture of the hostas at the Halifax Public Gardens.

Tuesday, July 7 - Halifax, Nova Scotia

Quiz:  Who won the War of 1812?
Answer (according to Canadians):  Canada!

We were visiting an old cemetery in downtown Halifax today and saw this sign, "why aren't we Americans?"

It commemorates the sailors who "died to save Canada from invasion and annexation to the United States."  We were walking around the cemetery, minding our own business, when a woman suddenly pointed out the grave of some admiral and said, "He's the one who burned Washington DC during the war of 1812."  We hadn't been talking to her and don't know how she knew we were Americans.  strange.


Everybody has been very friendly and pleasant in both Quebec and here in Nova Scotia.  They just want to be sure we know who won the war of 1812.

They also bring up, but don't seem to resent the fact that Patrick Roy played for and now coaches the Avs.  Actually, I guess we stole the entire Nordiques team, right?  Roy was born in Quebec City but even there (when we were trying to talk to someone who spoke little English) if we said we were from Denver, they would smile broadly and say "Roy" and "Avs!"

We are staying right on the harbor in Halifax.  G and I walked along a great boardwalk for a couple miles beside the sea -- past battleships, one tall ship (that seemed sorta short), lots of restaurants featuring lobster, and musicians of all sorts.  Here's a cute one:

In exchange for visiting all those artillery sites in Quebec, G agreed to walk up the hill to the Halifax Public Gardens with me.  Very nice-especially the trees.  Here I am, among the leaves. 😊

Monday, July 6 - Quebec City to Halifax

We had a scrumptious breakfast at the Frontenac, overlooking the Terrace and the St Lawrence River.  The smoked salmon and the apple compote were especially good.  After breakfast we headed for the airport.  It was hard to leave Quebec.  It's one of our favorite cities in the world (I know, I always say that)

Quebec must have hundreds of cannons!  Each one inspected by my favorite cannoneer: