8/15/15 Nova Scotia and Cape Breton Island, Canada

We are almost caught up on our travel updates (only one location behind after this email). 

We loved Nova Scotia (including Cape Breton):  the scenery, the people, the food and the history.  Lots of interesting places to go, things to learn (lots of fabulous museums), and do.  We were there for 14 days, and we could easily have been there another 14 days and not been bored.   

Our first stop was Halifax, the Capital, and on the southern island.  We visited the immigration museum; Halifax was Canada’s Ellis Island; well over a million immigrants came to Canada through there.  The immigration policies of Canada paralleled those of the US in the same time periods.  Today, Canada welcomes people from everywhere if they can meet their work requirements (yes they do have those – imagine that).  They strongly emphasized, many times, that any unauthorized stay over 90 days is illegal and would be dealt with accordingly.  

While near Halifax, we stayed overnight in Chester with our Caribbean cruising Halifax-native friends, Richard and Marni Dube, who filled us in on some of the things not to be missed.  We crossed paths with them frequently during our 4 years in the Caribbean so it was great seeing them again.  They still have their Beneteau 423 at the yacht club in Chester, a great recreational harbor with a focus on sailing.  We saw a lot of recreational sailboats here; lots of beautiful bays and inlets to explore in protected waters - great sailing/boating communities.

Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia

The south island is the most inhabited, with lots of farmland and fishing villages. Interestingly, the fishing season is set by each locality/province.  Although this is a full lobster season in Maine, the lobster season in Nova Scotia is during the winter (Burr), and the scallop season had just ended. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lunnenburg Hisstoric Wharf

Our favorite fishing villages:  Peggy’s Cove, Lunenburg which is UNESCO historic site (very picturesque), and Digby, the scallop capital. Our scallop lunch in Digby was the best!! Most of the Digby scallop fishing fleet was in the harbor because the scallop season ended the day before we were there.  We got to talk with several fishermen and observe the impact of the huge tides.  The pilings for the wharf were over 45-50 feet high; at low tide the fishermen climb down ladders along the wharf.  One of the fishermen gave Linda 12-15 scallop pearls (small but very unusual).   

 

 

Scallop Boats, Digby,  at Low Tide

Of course, every island has lot of lighthouses, and Nova Scotia is no exception.  Here the lighthouses are rather short since they mostly sit on high cliffs on rocky points.  All have been automated and are not in great shape, so only a few are very picturesque.  Historically, before electric power, the weights and chains used to drive the light in a circle were often hung outside and down those same cliffs.   At least the light keepers didn’t have to walk up so many stairs.  Some have been restored and are beautiful.  Our favorite was in Liverpool; the local city has done a great job of showing the history of the light, including a video interview with the light keeper’s son (teenager at the time).  The light was on the third floor of their “home”.  Liverpool was the harbor/homeport for privateers (government authorized pirates) and during the war years, it was a very busy place indeed, also building sailing ships for the privateers and the worlds navies.    

The north shore of the southern island of Nova Scotia is the southern shore of the Bay of Fundy, with the same red water from the eroding cliffs as you go further up the bay.   One hundred BILLION tons of water daily flow into and out of the Fundy Basin every 13 hours, which is more than the combined flow of the worlds fresh water rivers.  We stopped at Burntcoat Head, which, according to the Guinness World Records, is the site of the world’s highest tides – 58 feet, not in storm tides.   

Grand Pre’, an agricultural community on the north shore, is historically interesting.  The area was originally settled by the French, who built dykes and reclaimed the rich soil from the daily flooding of the tides.  The Acadians, as they became known, were somewhat pacifists, and tried to remain neutral through the many wars:  The French and Indian War (England vs France – the Indians helped the French), the American Revolution (Halifax was a major outpost for the British), and the Seven Years War (locally between the French in Louisbourg and the English in Halifax, both in Nova Scotia).  Unfortunately, the Acadians gave some food to some French soldiers, and the English started the “Great Deportation”.  Thousands of Acadians were deported so that the English wouldn’t have to worry about them.  After deportation, the English burned the villages and the fields.  Many went back to France, but many ended up in Louisiana USA (and other US locations), and are the base of the Cajun culture there. Our memories were refreshed about Longfellow’s poem “Evangeline” as we toured Grand Pre’.  Today, Grand Pre is a beautiful agricultural area, even with a few wineries (the white wine was a little sweet for us, but the red was ok).    



Scottish Highlanders, The Citadel, Halifax



 

The historical battles between the English and French were visible everywhere in Nova Scotia.  The most interesting were the two forts:  Fort George, also known as The Citadel in Halifax, was the English settlement and harbor, while Fort Louis (now Louisbourg) on the north island, was the French settlement and fleet.  These are not too far apart, but you only had sailing ships and horses to travel to the fight. 

 

French Soldiers, Louisbourg, NS

 

 

 

The Canadian government has done a fabulous job restoring both forts, and both have re-enactors in them to give you the flavor of the mid 1700s.As English speaking visitors, we were very welcome in the “English”  Citadel, but looked at a little sideways by the “French” soldiers at Louisbourg.  Based on some of the Canadian politics, perhaps some of the French/English rivalry is still ongoing?   

 

 





 

 

The north island, Cape Breton Island, is very different from the southern island.  The area is glaciated and is composed of many fingers of land intertwined with long narrow lakes and arms of the seas.  The largest inland sea in Canada, Bras D’ Or Lakes, is salt water, with many inlets out to the ocean, but only two large navigable ones.  Most of the Cape Breton (CB) people live around the lake area.  

 

Cape Breton Island

The major CB economy is now fishing and tourism, but used to include mining.  At one time, Sydney Mines had over 12,000 people working in the coal mines.  The coal veins started on land at the surface, but eventually the miners followed the coal seams hundreds of feet underground and out 8 miles out under the sea.  It took the miners over 30 minutes on an electric train to get to the work area.  During the 60s, the mines started closing, and the miners had to find work elsewhere.  In the 1960s and 1970s, the government used the Louisbourg fort restoration to keep the displaced coal miners employed. It took major retraining of the miners for the skills and many years necessary for the beautiful restoration project.  Most of the previous coal miners now work elsewhere for weeks on end (Alberta oil, for example) and come home occasionally.   

 

Plant Fossils on Coal

The CB coal was made from decaying plants during the Carboniferous age (that’s Mississippian and Pennsylvanian geological Periods for those who might care).  During that age there were early plant forms including seed bearing cones, ferns and fern trees.  While mining, the miners found tons of fossil impressions in the coal.  After the mines closed, a geologist educator took on the task of getting samples of all the plant fossils during that age and now has an extensive museum (Canadian Government owned) with thousands of excellent, intact fossils (The Fossil Center in Sidney Mines).  We met the curator and he gave us geologists a great private tour, including some special samples in his lab.    

Bob is an amateur ham radio operator.  While on Cape Breton Island he was fortunate to make radio contact with a local man.  In subsequent talks during the week we were there, we found out that he is Bobby Ropper, an 82 year old retired coal miner – his family came to CB in 1750.  Like many of the miners, although the work was hard and dangerous, most say they would go back to mining if they could (who would have thought so?).  For over 30 years Bobby has been singing in an internationally acclaimed chorus of retired or former coal miners known as “Men of the Deeps” (he is the oldest and longest/founding member).  While we were at the Miners Museum in Glace Bay, we bought one of their CDs; Bobby is a soloist and also plays the harmonica. (Google “The Men of the Deeps”) When Bobby found out we had gotten one of his CD, he was thrilled that we liked his music.  He is another new ham friend on the road. One of his many great stories to Bob is that he had recently lost his second wife (she was 102) - he is a talker and often timed out the repeater station.   The Cape Bretons’ are a hardy people.   

While on the southern part of the island, we also visited the Alexander Graham Bell museum.  He spent most of his time at Baddeck NS.  It turns out he invented lots of things beside the telephone:  he built man-carrying kites, an early version of the biplane (1909) while partnered with Curtis, the first hydrofoil boat that did well over 55mph; and even early versions of underwater diving modules.  We also visited the site of the Marconi wireless where the first wireless transmission across the Atlantic occurred (the furthest east Marconi could go to build the needed structures, with an unobstructed “line of sight” to Europe.  While driving around the southern half of Cape Breton, we stopped at the easternmost point of our RV travel (so far, maybe we will drive to Newfoundland).  Thanks to GPS, we have a photo of the longitude.    

Cape Breton Complex Geology

The northern part of the Cape Breton Island is somewhat mountainous marching right to the sea; the scenery is spectacular.  Every curve on the Cabot Trail shows a grand new vista.  The geological forces here were huge; Bob loved it. According to his geology map, some of the rocks here are the earliest rocks known – Precambrian of the Canadian Shield and over 4 Billion years old.  The geology is very complex (lots of geologic forces over time), with much much younger rock often sitting right on very old rock (what happed in between?).  The area is mostly protected wilderness and includes some old growth forests.  The rangers were telling us that they have to find a way to manage the moose population, which is now endangering the boreal forest.  (hunting maybe, by the aboriginal Indians or ordinary hunters?) Apparently, the local Indians, the Mi'kmaq will have a say in how that evolves.  We stopped at Meat Cove on the northern tip of CB; this is the most northern point in our 2015 RV trip (we will be further north in Jasper National Park next year).   

We stayed in a national park in northern Cape Breton…everything you would want - lots of trees, privacy, and large campsites.  We actually got to do some nice hikes and have campfires at night (of course with S’mores made with dark chocolate so they were “healthy” J).  In Nova Scotia, we met a lot of locals camping; they set up camp for the summer in a nice place close to home and come weekends.  Their response about our comments about camping so close to home was “why not, you paid a lot of money to camp here from Florida” - Touché’ .   We met a lot of local fishermen and retired miners (the fishermen were not working - it is off-season for scallops, lobster and haddock). We learned a lot of history and culture from the locals we talked with.  BTW, we met a lot of Floridians who spend their summers in Nova Scotia and Cape Breton – not a bad idea for the future????

Some Impressions: 

·       Beaches on Nova Scotia are mostly rocky with cobbles.  There are a few sand beaches, with mostly pink sand from the eroding feldspar/granite.

·       Hard working people, mostly of Scottish, English (Wales), and Irish heritage.  Gaelic culture is alive and well – especially in the music – lots of good fiddling.

·       Some interesting new foods:  hot lobster sandwich and “Poutine” (French fries with gravy and cheese curd – actually quite good).

·       Finally got some good weather – some nice warm sunny days, but it still cools off quickly at night.  The campfires felt good.

·       Put our toes into the Atlantic…it is COLD.  Don’t know how the kids can swim in it.

·       One day the wind blew 20 – 30 knots all day, the waves were crashing along the coast.  Can only imagine what being in a lighthouse during a hurricane or a northeaster would be like.

·       Nova Scotia is larger than you think when you look at the map with great distances between things…takes a long time to tour around and see everything.

·       We have no satellite on our motorhome so we had NO TV in Nova Scotia and Cape Breton. Also, no internet or phone service at our camp sites, and very poor internet in coffee shops and internet cafes.

·       No phone service about 70% of the time…..communication never land.

 
Sorry if this email is a little long, but NS and CB are awesome and there were so many interesting things to discuss.

Our next stop/report:  Prince Edward Island, Canada and then on the upstate New York and the great lakes.

 

Bob and Linda