McDougall's
2002 Nova Scotia
Vacation Page
Let your mountains dark and dreary be
For when I am far away on the briny ocean tossed
Will you ever heave a sigh and a wish for me?
(from the song "Farewell to Nova Scotia")
We arrived in Nova Scotia via one of our favorite means of entry by taking the Saint John, New Brunswick to Digby, Nova Scotia ferry. The Digby waterfront was a bit nicer than the last time we had visited, and we enjoyed our first of many bowls of SEAFOOD CHOWDER shortly after arrival. Seafood, fish, and lobster chowders abound in Nova Scotia, and though there are many variations, we have yet to find better elsewhere!
Our typical vacation enthusiasm was unfortunately doused by a spate of unusually hot weather. Neither of us are big hot weather fans, which is why a typically cooler area such as Nova Scotia is attractive to us for our summer vacation. With temperatures exceeding 30 degrees celsius (90+ degrees farenheit), we curtailed our planned outdoor activities a bit. On each of our first two days in the province we visited "wildlife parks," which feature animals that are native to Canada. The sleeping raccoon pictured above to to the right seems to echo our sentiment about the hot weather. He is one of the many denizens of the government-run Shubencadie Wildlife Park. This was our second visit to the park, and we were impressed with the improvements made since our last visit. Lots of new, large enclosures with more and better living spaces for the critters.
Our other main activity during phase one of "mainland" Nova Scotia was a return visit to the Ship Hector and its interpretive center in Pictou. When last we visited, the hull of the ship was being built. As you can see from the picture to the right, it's now much further along. The ship is a reconstruction of the historical vessel that brought the first Scottish settlers to New Scotland (Nova Scotia). It was still very hot and humid-- BLAH!
Cape Breton Island, separated from mainland Nova Scotia by the Canso causeway, is our favorite area of the province. As a matter of fact, it's one of our favorite places in the world! The island is exceedingly beautiful, featuring scenic sea coasts, highlands, and some large and lovely lakes. A big part of its attraction to us is the portion of the island that has a strong Scottish heritage and history. This heritage makes the island one of the last remaining strongholds of traditional Celtic music.
On this trip, we stayed in areas that we had merely passed through or stopped at during past trips to Cape Breton. Our first two nights were spent in the Mabou area, which is situated along the southwestern coast of the island. The Mabou communities are within an area that has some of the strongest Scottish roots in North America, and retains a Celtic music tradition that is heavy on the fiddle with piano accompaniment. On our first night, we attended the local square dance/ceilidh in West Mabou, but weren't very outgoing and did not participate in the dancing or strike up conversation with the regulars. We left around two hours in, as the place was getting really crowded and the heat level was rising. At the least, we got to hear some great music in one of its purest forms and most traditional venues. We also did some limited outdoors stuff while in the area, including a short hike from Mabou Mines, passing the scenic and cow-inhabited vantage point displayed above left. The beautiful sandy beach offered a perfect opportunity to wade into the refreshing waters a bit, but alas we didn't think to bring swimwear! The Mabou area is really beautiful, and has a lot to offer for nature lovers, beach goers, and traditional music enthusiasts. Day two found us at one of our "planned" destinations-- the 10th annual Kintyre Farm Scottish Concert in Judique. Of course, we arrive just as fiddling legend Buddy MacMaster is finishing up!! We found our spot in the shade (another HOT day), and enjoyed some good Cape Breton style traditional music despite the wild and wooly shuffling of the performers on and off the stage. We'd have liked to heard some of the musicians a bit longer, but the format of the concert is to provide relatively equal performance lengths regardless of the performer. On our second evening we swung by the RED SHOE PUB, but just missed the music session that took place in the late afternoon to early evening. It's a cozy little place, with a draft beer selection of Keith's, Keith's, or Keith's!
While in Mabou we took a short ride up the coast to one of our regular spots, the MacDougall monument just outside of the village of Inverness. The monument sits in an open field high atop the waters of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. This is where we became engaged on June 20, 1997. The monument/cairn is dedicated to the early MacDougall settlers of the area, and as you can see from the picture below the monument on the left, its location offers up some pretty sunsets! While in the Inverness area, we were happy to partake of our traditional dinner stop at Jingles, and enjoyed a tasty pizza that was good as ever!
Departing Mabou, we knew our next two nights would be a bit up the coast in Cheticamp. After stopping in Inverness once again for breakfast, we decided we just HAD to take a drive around the Cabot Trail (Nova Scotia has designated a number of routes as major tourism drives/trails, and the Cabot Trail prominently features the Cape Breton Highlands National Park). As usual, we chose to take the route counter-clockwise, starting at Inverness, cutting down to Baddeck, then up through Ingonish, Cape North, and Pleasant Bay on to Cheticamp. The weather was starting to cool a bit, but was still unusually warm. Our first stop was at a hiking trail called "Middle Head," which runs through a narrow peninsula behind the posh, ritzy Keltic Lodge in Ingonish. The trail thankfully offered up some nice, cooling wind-swept spots, and provided some nice views of Cape Smokey and Ingonish Beach. The end of the peninsula, perched high atop the waters, is a great place to take a break and relax for a spell. After we had finished and grabbed a bite of lunch, we continued driving along the Cabot Trail towards Cheticamp. Much of the northern portion of the Cabot Trail runs through or abuts the Cape Breton Highlands National Park, a scenic treasure sometimes described as the Scottish Highlands in miniature. Many outstanding overlooks are situated along the roadway, but alas, with the weather being hot almost all areas were thinly veiled by a vantage-reducing haze! The picture at left is about the best we could do under the circumstances, and does not come close to doing justice to the breathtaking views that are offered. For anyone going to Nova Scotia, the Cabot Trail and the National Parks are must-sees, though you should be prepared for some winding driving that features some steep inclines that can be a little intimidating to some.
Late in the afternoon we arrived at our base near Cheticamp, the Pilot Whale B&B in Saint Joseph du Moine. We were greeted by our friendly hostess, and led to our nice room in the basement. We were happy to be facing two nights in a queen sized bed after two cramped nights in a double (we're used to a king at home!). From the start we were made to feel at home, more so than any other place we stayed on the vacation. Our first evening in the area we had dinner at a place that features some Acadian-style dishes (the Acadians are people of French descent who were early settlers of many areas of Nova Scotia before being largely evicted by the English. . . many Acadians moved on to another strongly French-influenced area in North America-- Louisiana!). Pat's cod fish cakes were quite tasty, but Stacey was disappointed with her choice which ended up being very much like the "fish chowder" they started with-- lots o' potatoes and a teeny-weeny scratch of fish! Afterwards we shared a tasty sweet and tart slice of a Nova Scotia standard, strawberry-rhubarb pie. After a wonderful night's sleep, we were greeted for breakfast by the super cute and bubbly Nicole, who cooks up some top-notch bacon! Breakfast was great fun, as we met both Nicole and a very personable Connecticut family that was also staying at the B&B several nights. We all shared stories of what we'd done so far, talked about the area, and had lots of laughs comparing the difference between the pace of life in the hustling and bustling USA versus most areas of Nova Scotia. The Connecticut folks-- Mary Ann, Jack, and Alice, were of like mind to us, and together with Nicole we had a great time poking fun at such typical US mannerisms as cell phone addiction, the lust for luxury vehicles and humongo SUV's, and NIMBYism.
Day two in the Cheticamp area was a full one, in which we ran out of time to do all the things we had hoped. We were able to pay a return visit to the Little Pond Stables to enjoy a nice trail ride similar to the one we took while honeymooning in Nova Scotia just over four years ago. Unfortunately, the ride was crowded, and had to be a little more limited and less personal than the last time we were there. After a late lunch we took a whale cruise with Whale Cruisers Ltd. out of Cheticamp, with our hostess on the cruise being another attractive young lady (Pat says they seem to grow them pretty in the area!). The only other whale cruise we had taken in Nova Scotia was in a fog-prone area called Brier Island, and which produced a whopping ZERO whales, so we were a little skeptical (knowing our luck, or lack thereof, they could be spotting them all day until we came aboard!). It therefore came as quite a shock when whales were spotted near a sport fishing boat not long into the cruise, and soon thereafter we found our own couple of pods of pilot whales and had them swimming all around the boat for around an hour! Pat had soon used up the entirety of the two plus rolls of 35mm film he brought along, while Stacey did her best to try and snap some decent shots using the slooooow and zoom-limited digital camera. Of course, the whales didn't start to get playful and really start breaching the water until all the 35mm film was gone (they didn't get very far out of the water and were hard to catch doing so anyway)! While Stacey had seen whales before during a cruise in Massachusetts, this was Pat's first experience, and it was a good one! A larger but more elusive minke whale showed up a bit later, after the consumption of the film. Overall it was a terrific cruise, which also allowed for quiet relaxation as the boat motored back to port over the increasingly choppy waves, with a little bit of a drizzle moving into the area. Dinner consisted of some local cheese and bread in the car, while parked at Lighthouse Point on Cheticamp Island.
In the morning, it was time to pack up for the always sad departure from Cape Breton Island. The kitchen and breakfast area was a little more crowded, with our original hostess and a traveller from Montreal added to the previous morning's cast. We did learn that Mary Ann, Jack, and Alice would be departing Nova Scotia on the same ferry as us several days hence. After breakfast we bid our regretful adieu, and started on our trek back to mainland Nova Scotia, realizing that vacation was quickly winding down.
We've always found it very hard and heart-wrenching to leave Cape Breton Island, and this time was no different. We knew we had a couple more nice stops ahead of us, but the realization that we'd soon be heading back to the workaday world and land of perpetual traffic was setting in. Before we left, we had hoped to have a look at the Celtic Music Interpretive Centre in Judique, but found that they don't do tours while their Wednesday morning instructional sessions were taking place. Having a relatively long drive ahead of us, we were unable to wait around until the first available tour at 1PM, so we had to be resigned with coming and touring it another time. Driving on, our departure from Cape Breton via the causeway was accompanied by our usual moaning and gnashing of teeth!
After a bit of a drive and a stop for lunch, our first mainland destination in this phase of the trip was a return visit to Taylor Head Provincial Park near the village of Spry Harbour. Taylor Head offers a nice, uncrowded trek through a diversity of sea-bound landscapes, especially for those seemingly few who are willing to do both the Spry Harbour and Headland trails circuit. This trail combination, which traverses some lengthy rocky coastal areas where proper footing is a care, takes at least three hours. Three hours doesn't seem like much, but to thirty-something folks like us that have been too sedentary for too long, as we reached the end at the parking area the experience offered both a sense of accomplishment and a realization that we need to get in better shape! The rocky area pictured at right, which was strewn with thousands of tiny shelled creatures clinging to the rocks, is just one of the pretty coastal views offered along the trail. It was interesting to note that we didn't come across one single person after we opted to take the more lengthy route along the Headland Trail. After the hike, we headed southwest along the coast to our next night's accommodations in East Ship Harbour. We were the only visitors at the place we stayed, which was very nice and attractive, but featured a hostess that didn't seem particularly suited to welcoming guests into her home and B&B. After a disappointing dinner at a nearby restaurant, we walked down to the water just at the tail end of the sunset, and got to see a few osprey diving into the water with large splashes before we vacated due to the tiny, pesky mosquitoes.
In the morning we enjoyed a spectacular and creative breakfast, and found that our hostess seemed to be a very lonely person. Unfortunately that area of Nova Scotia doesn't draw as many tourists as they'd like, and places like where we stayed often have many vacancies. Setting off, we passed through Halifax, but didn't have time to stop and visit as we had done in the past. Our next destination was Lunenburg, which proved to be the opposite of the area we had just stayed, and appeared to be bursting at the seams with tourists. We had stopped by the town once or twice in previous visits, but never experienced crowds like we saw this time around. We had already planned to take one of the short sailboat cruises that are offered at the Lunenburg government wharf, but were too late to get a ticket for the last cruise of the Bluenose II, which is a reproduction of the legendary schooner Bluenose of the early 20th century. As such, we went with our backup plan and took an hour and a half cruise on the 48' wooden ketch Eastern Star, operated by Star Charters. Our first sail on an authentic wooden sailboat was wonderful, as Pat got to assist in raising sail, and the uncrowded conditions made for a relaxing and enjoyable sail. We were able to get some good shots of the Bluenose II, including the one above to the right, as it embarked about a half-hour later. After lunch we headed back up the coast a bit to our overnight destination, and one of our long-time favorites, the village of Peggy's Cove. I think we've visited Peggy's Cove every time we've gone to Nova Scotia, and it seems to be more and more popular and crowded each year. This time around we actually booked a night in one of the rare B&B's situated in the village itself. This offered the opportunity to enjoy one of our favorite activities-- "rock-hopping" from the upper village parking lot along the boulder-strewn coast, around to the lighthouse TWICE. Our first trek along the coast, during which we've traditionally run into only a person or two until very near the lighthouse, was late in the afternoon into the early evening. The day was very overcast, and the eyesore of the BIG parking lot just up from the lighthouse was thronged with buses and cars. We had to wait quite a while to get a few "people-free" photos of the lighthouse, and were all the more happy and satisfied at our less- travelled route to the lighthouse! Afterwards, on the way to dinner, we paid a late dusktime visit to the nearby monument erected in remembrance of the 229 passengers and crew who lost theie lives in the wreck of Swissair flight 111. The tragic jet crash occured just under three months after our last visit to the area during our honeymoon. The quiet coastal setting of the monument, overlooking the site of the crash on the horizon, is a touching testament to the victims, their families, and the people of the area who did their best to lend their help and comfort in the aftermath of the tragedy.
The picture of the lighthouse with the blue sky and waters was taken during our jaunt to the lighthouse the next morning. We discovered the buses arrive quite early, and unfortunately couldn't get any wide view photos without other tourists in the shots. Other advantages of the "long way around" to the Peggy's Point Lighthouse are the fun of the rock-hopping and the variety of beautiful coastal views. Stopping to sit and take the time to view and enjoy the interaction of the ocean and the rocky coastline is another opportunity not to be missed. We finally made a late morning departure out of the village, and began heading down the coast towards our final night's accommodations in Yarmouth, where we would catch the ferry the next morning. Along the way we stopped for a hike/walk along another scenic coastal area called "The Hawk" on Cape Sable Island. Billed as one of the best birdwatcher's spots in Atlantic Canada, the landscape is virtually wide open, with a little bit of scrub vegetation here and there, and virtually no trees. The tidal pools, seaweed-strewn beaches, and rocky strands that are islanded by the shallow waters attract many varieties of bird life, including the tiny plovers pictured at right. Our last stop before heading for Yarmouth was at a Canadian institution-- a local Tim Horton's donut shop. The tasty donuts there blow away the ridiculous sugar-saturated Crispy Cremes that we're stuck with in Maryland!
After a bit of last-minute souvenier hunting in the town of Yarmouth (which seemed a whole lot more akin to a town in the USA after the places we'd been on the trip), we had one last Nova Scotia night's sleep before departing on the long ferry for Portland, Maine in the morning. We at least looked forward to running in to our Connecticut friends once more, and weren't far along in the cruise before we met up. After we each shared some more stories about our vacation experiences, we gladly exchanged e-mail addresses for future dialogue. The two of us then did some walking around the deck of the ship as best we could, now being accustomed to daily exercise as a result of our vacation activities. We whiled away the 11 hour or so ferry trip reading, catching a bite in the snack bar, hanging out on deck, and finishing up spending some time along with Mary Ann, Jack, and Alice partaking of the assorted entertainment in the ship's lounge. We even joined in the "single card, match all numbers, $1,000 cash prize bingo game," cajoling our Connecticut friends into doing the same. Our card did miserably, but theirs proved exciting, as they were only two numbers away when two others won the game. And here we were just WAITING for them to win and give us 50% for all of our encouragement and support!!! As we neared port and went to our cars together, it was humorous to find we were parked just two cars apart. We agreed to meet up at a nearby restaurant of which they spoke well, and made it through customs without much delay. Their dining choice, though it wasn't much on the eyes, was terrific. Stacey had one her favorites, country fried steak, while Pat enjoyed a seafood casserole and some of the tasty curly fries that Alice highly recommended. The three of them really made the end of our trip much more bearable and fun, each having a great sense of humor and being very personable. Afterwards, it was off to our overnight stay in Manchester, New Hampshire before the flight back home, the dark, rainy weather and construction-impacted road giving clear notification that the vacation was at an end! In any event, it was a terrific trip during which we experienced some places and things we had missed in the past, did a few things we had never done before, had a whole lotta great seafood chowder (and excellent english muffins in Yarmouth-- a long story!), and met some terrific fellow travellers and Nova Scotians. Farewell to Nova Scotia!
