Our 2006 trip to the east coast of Canada
It was a dark and stormy night- just kidding- actually it was a hot sunny Friday as we left St. Thomas and although we didn’t realize it at the time, we were escaping from a blistering heat wave that followed us most of the way, but never quite caught up. We arrived at Al and Norma’s house about mid-afternoon and we all enjoyed a nice Fish and Chip dinner at a shop that has been in Woodstock since I was a little boy. It has changed owners, and names over the years, but it has always been in the same place and it’s always been a Fish and Chip shop. We stayed with Al and Norma overnight so we could get an early start on Saturday morning. Al thought that by leaving at 7:00am we could avoid the rush hour traffic in Toronto. As a result, we went through Toronto with very little difficulty and arrived at Jean and Warren’s house in Cardinal about 11:30am. Jean makes a very good pizza and we showed her how good it was by stuffing ourselves. Especially Norma. That woman can really eat. I’d much rather pay her board than buy her groceries. Anyway, we finished the pizza, had a short visit and left there about two o’clock headed for Quebec City.
Once we passed Montreal, the drive to Quebec City was pleasant. The terrain along the north shore of the St. Lawrence River is different from that on the south shore. Joan and I followed the south shore on our east coast trip in 1996 and found it to be mostly flat farmland. It was very picturesque nevertheless with all the farms looking quite prosperous. The north shore, on the other hand, has much more forest and rolling hills. We arrived in Quebec City quite late in the afternoon planning to stay the night in a place called St. Foy. I’m not sure how it happened, but we seemed to go right past that place, ending up in Quebec City. Al noticed an Old Quebec City landmark on the skyline that he recognized from previous trips and we made our way to it. We drove around the old part of Quebec City for a half hour, or so, and the most interesting thing I noticed at that time were all the sidewalk cafes located there, and since it was the height of the tourist season, they were all full. I was amazed at how many people like to eat outside. It was worse than Vancouver.
It was when we tried to find a motel in Quebec City that we remembered why we had planned to stay in St. Foy. While trying to find St. Foy again we discovered that Quebec City has more clover leafs per capita than any city in North America. It’s a good thing too, because every time we made a wrong turn there was another clover leaf right there to let us make another wrong turn. We invented a whole new sport we called cloverleafing and Al got really good at it. Al told us about a little town called Ste-Anne-de-Beaupre that had a large miracle producing Cathedral and some other interesting things to look at and since the excitement of cloverleafing was beginning to tell on all of us, we decided to look for a motel there. Al was a little tired of limping and I needed a new nose, so we thought we might just pick up a miracle or two while we were there. We did find a motel, but Al is still limping and my nose is just as bad as it ever was.
The next morning we went back to Quebec City for some more cloverleafing and to visit the old city again. This time we hired one of those horse and carriage tours that take you around the city with a guide who describes what is seen. Our guide spoke very good English and told us a great many things about Quebec City that I have forgotten. After all, it was 2 weeks ago. While he was describing the battle at The Plains Of Abraham, he did say something that stuck with me. He said that both General Wolfe and General Montcalm were among the first soldiers killed in the battle and he made the observation that they put the generals right up front in those days. It occurred to me that if they put the guys who start the wars right up front these days, there would be a lot fewer wars. Anyway, it was a very interesting tour and I’ll have to keep telling myself that because I don’t remember much about it except the city is really old and the horse had gas.
We had planned to take the bridge across the St. Lawrence, then travel up the south shore to Riviere-du-Loup, but during the tour, our guide told us about a road along the north shore to Ste-Simeon that would take us through some very scenic countryside. That route required us to take a ferry from Ste-Simeon to Riviere-du-Loup, but being adventurous old folks, already experienced in the difficult sport of cloverleafing, ferries hardly presented any challenge at all. The guide was correct of course, it’s a guide’s job to be right about such things, and it proved to be one of the more picturesque roads of the whole trip. On the way, we had to pass through Ste-Anne-de-Beaupre again, so we stopped there to take some photos of the miracle Cathedral thinking that might stimulate our much-needed miracle, but no luck.
The next point of interest was Montmorency Falls, not nearly as large as Niagara, but higher. The surrounding park is nicely kept; in fact while we were there, a whole busload of students arrived to pick up all the garbage that the tourists leave behind. A cable car runs from the viewing area to a large restaurant at the top of the falls. It didn’t seem to be running the day we were there, but it looks as though it would be a spectacular ride. Spectacular for everyone except me, for me it would be just plain terrifying.
Al and Norma conducted bus tours before they got too old. Al drove the bus, but I’m not sure what Norma did. I think she was the one who had to say things like, “Aw geez, lady, suck it up,” or “This is your motel for the night, if you don’t like it, tough.” I think she was supposed to say, “All aboard!” sometimes too, but Al told me most of time she just said, “Hey! You guys get back on the damn bus!” One of the places they took their passengers was a place called Marie’s. Marie’s is a small restaurant located on a very scenic road that makes a loop off the main highway. The road is very narrow and there are several villages located along it. The homes in the villages are built right out to the edge of the road with no sidewalks. Many of them have porches on their fronts with roofs that extend right over the edge of the road. Al told me that buses passing through had clipped porch roofs more than once. We would have liked to get some photos of the villages, but parking is a major problem there. Parking on residential porches is not allowed anywhere in Quebec. I think the road is the big attraction, but Marie’s is the only stop on the it, so it’s pretty famous as a tour bus destination and all the bus drivers who stop there have their picture taken for Marie’s collection. And a large collection it is. I don’t know how many pictures there are, but there must be five or six hundred at least. Before we left, we had to sample some of Marie’s fresh bread, which is baked in outdoor wood fired ovens. She spreads the bread with maple butter, which is very tasty, but I would have preferred some real butter on the bread before applying the maple butter, but one mustn’t complain.
Highway 138 to Ste. Simeon is a very scenic route, passing through small picturesque towns and villages along the way and we enjoyed it very much. Quebec is a very beautiful province. I have always wondered why we don’t see more Quebec license plates in Ontario, but I don’t think Ontario has anything to offer them that they don’t have at home. Then there is the language problem. It is one of the few things that made traveling in Quebec difficult for us. Although, I have to say that the people there treated us very well and the waitresses in the restaurants were great. As soon as they heard us say hello, they brought us English menus and did their best to speak to us in English. Only once were we unable to get an English menu, or meet a waitress who couldn’t speak English. They both happened in Ste-Simeon. We thought at first that the waitress was a little unfriendly, but it soon became clear that she was having just as much trouble as we were. With my vast knowledge of the French language I was able to determine that fromage meant cheese, (this I know because it’s written on every package of cheese I buy at The Real Canadian Super Store). Grill means pretty much the same in both languages so it wasn’t too hard to figure out how to order a grilled cheese sandwich. The fact that it turned out to be a toasted cheese sandwich is neither here, nor there. Don't get me wrong, I don’t mean to criticize the French cooking. Those guys can really cook! We had some of the best meals of the whole trip in Quebec. I had French Toast twice while we were there and it was terrific. But you would expect that, wouldn’t you? Just like you would expect to get a terrific Western sandwich in the west, but I had the best Western sandwich of my entire life in Quebec on our way home. The waitress didn’t speak English very well, but she tried very hard. I told her in my broken English that it was an excellent sandwich, and she said thanks in her broken English and I just hope she let the chef know in some language how much I enjoyed it. There was one waitress in Drummondville that I wanted to bring home. Joan said I could if I wanted to spend the rest of my life in a wheelchair, so I decided it wasn’t worth it. It was pretty close though. She’s probably still in Drummondville, I suppose, unless some other guy with a more understanding wife has come along and taken her home with him.
Meanwhile, back in Ste-Simeon we arrived too late to catch the ferry. We all felt that the next ferry, which wasn’t until about 10:45 pm, would make it too late to get a motel in Riviere-Du-Loup, so we decided to spend the night in Ste-Simeon. The motel we had in Ste-Simeon was probably the nicest location of any we stayed in. It was situated against a hill that rose up from the river and the buildings were tiered at different levels on the hill. Our building was located at the second level and our room overlooked the river, providing a view of Ile Aux Lievres, which is an island located in the center of the St. Lawrence River. We also had a good view of the ferry dock and we were able to watch the late ferry from Riviere-Du-Loup as it docked. It arrived after dark, so it looked very impressive with all it’s lights on.
The ferry ride the next morning was only about 75 minutes long, the weather was good and the passage was smooth. We had to be at the ferry dock quite early, so we were unable to have breakfast. Fortunately, the ferry company anticipated this and provided a very good breakfast. Al, Norma and Joan all had bacon and eggs, which they said were excellent. I myself abstained. If I’m going to upchuck on a ferry, I would like it to be as low keyed as possible.
Once we disembarked at Riviere-Du-Loup, it didn’t take very long before we were in New Brunswick. The first city of any size that we came to was Edmunston, which is the Capital City of The Legendary Republic of Madawaska. This is a fascinating story and a full explanation of it can be found at http://www.lizbekistan.com/news/madawask.htm. I can’t think of very much to tell you about New Brunswick, but you need to understand that the route we followed as we passed through it only covers a very small section of the province. Our route only took us through the most westerly portion, in fact, as we passed through The Legendary Republic of Madawaska, the State of Maine was on the west side of the river and New Brunswick was on the east. If the rest of the province is as nice as the part we saw, it is definitely a beautiful place. However, I do believe that at least fifty percent of all the trees in Canada must grow there. The highway follows the River St. John, actually crossing the river in at least two places that I remember. One of the crossings is at Hartland were the longest covered bridge in the world is located.
But before we arrived at Hartland, just a little south of St. Leonard we stopped at a community named Grand Falls. I suppose the community was named after the waterfall that is located there. The falls is not as grand as some, but it still has sufficient flow to generate electrical power. The brochures in the information building indicated that the waterfall almost doubled in width during the spring run-off.
It seems that most of the farms in the province are situated along the banks of the river. They presented quite a peaceful, pastoral scene as we passed them. Once away from the riverbank, however, the scene changes to one of heavily wooded terrain much like Northern Ontario. Judging from all the “watch for moose” signs we saw, although we didn’t actually see anything other than road kills, we had to conclude that a great variety of wildlife could be happy there, if they only stayed off the roads.
Hopewell Cape provided another interesting stop for us. The Rocks Provincial Park is located there, and clearly demonstrates how high the Bay of Fundy tides rise. The rocks are located just a short distance from the shore and when the tide is in, not much of the rocks protrude above the water. When the tide is out, the ocean recedes completely leaving the rocks free standing, rooted to the ocean floor. It’s quite a sight to see from above and even more impressive from below. There is a foot trail that leads to a set of stairs that in turn provides access to the bottom. The stairs appear to be about equal to a three-storey walk up, perhaps a little less. The park provides a shuttle bus that takes all the old folks down to the head of the stars. Actually, it will take anyone with $1.25 to buy a ticket. Once you reach the head of the stairs you are on your own. Unfortunately, that was as far as Al was able to go, but Norma, Joan and I went down the stairs to look at the rocks from below. When we left, Al was talking to the Park Warden, when we returned he was still entertaining her. The man is a chick magnet, no doubt about it. We were there about noon, which is the perfect time to go down to the bottom. Once you are there, you can walk a long way along the beach. This allows people to wander quite a distance from the stairs and if you linger out there too long and the tide starts to rise, swimming is your only option. Because of this, the park staff patrols the beach a little before the tide rising time to herd all the people who can’t read signs, or don’t have watches, back to the stairs. This whole thing is a little difficult to describe, but I hope the snapshots will help.
Our next destination was the Confederation Bridge to Prince Edward Island. The New Brunswick end is located not very far from Moncton. The weather was fine, so we had no trouble crossing the bridge. When we arrived on the PEI side, our first stop was the information center located just a short distance from the bridge. After getting what information we needed, we tried to drive through the tollgate that we could see, but proved to be impossible to get to. As we soon discovered, there is no toll to get onto the island, but you can’t get off, either by the bridge, or the ferry, without paying the toll. We hadn’t intended to spend too much time on the island this trip, so we just followed the Trans Canada Highway to the ferry landing at Woods Island. We made a few side trips down some secondary side roads that took us through some quaint seaside villages and a great many potato fields.
We arrived at the Woods Island Ferry just in time to be the second last auto loaded. This was a longer crossing than our first ferry ride, and a little rougher. Once again we were riding a ferry at mealtime and while the others had their lunch, I just concentrated on holding on to my breakfast. We disembarked at Pictou NS and followed highways 104 and 4 to Port Hastings on Cape Breton Island. On the way, we passed through New Glasgow, Antigonish and some other smaller towns. We found a nice motel in Port Hastings and the next morning we were able to get a reasonably early start on our Cabot Trail excursion.
Instead of going up to Baddeck to enter the trail, which seems to be the usual way, we took highway 19 that runs up the west side of Cape Breton along the coast. After we had driven a few miles it was obvious we had made the correct choice. The highway overlooks the ocean almost all of the time and runs through some very interesting small villages. Norma and Al’s daughter, Colleen, had asked them to bring home some real ocean rocks for her collection and at our first stop on the trail, a picnic area located on a beach about half a mile long, we found the perfect ocean stones, flattish in shape, but nicely rounded and smooth. I can only imagine how many centuries it took to grind them into that shape. We found a little gift shop on the way where I found a good selection of east coast music CD’s. Naturally, I had to buy a couple. After you enter Cape Breton Highlands National Park, there is nothing to stop for except scenery and there is sure plenty of that. It is arguably one of the more spectacular drives in the eastern part of Canada and the park provides 25 or so scenic turnouts for viewing and photography. It was quite late when we finished our Cabot Trail tour and I’m not sure where we stayed that night, but I think it was Baddeck.
The next day, we drove along the south coast of Nova Scotia for some distance then across country to connect with highway 102 near Truro. It was a straight run from there to Halifax, but we were quite late arriving there nevertheless. We took a motel there for two nights in order to give us a full day to look around Halifax. Most of our day in Halifax was spent on the waterfront. The part we visited is a long boardwalk that extends for a considerable distance along the wharf. It is rather like an open-air museum and there are many older ships moored there as well as some newer vessels and nautical memorabilia in general. There is also a ferry terminal there, and outside the terminal entrance, we found a young fellow sitting with a sign that said he was broke and trying to get back home to Newfoundland. I don’t know if there is a ferry from Halifax to Newfoundland, but I would guess there is. He looked quite forlorn sitting there with tears in his eyes, so Joan and I gave him ten bucks. He may have been a professional panhandler for all we know, but we like to think we helped a poor Newfoundland kid get home. We had lunch at a seafood restaurant recommended to us by Al and Norma’s son-in-law Mike. It was a pretty fancy place, but we just had fish and chips of all things.
Peggy’s Cove was our destination for the next day. Joan and I had been there in 1996 and Al and Norma had been there many times with their tour buses, so there was nothing there that we hadn’t seen before. It was still a very pretty place to view and to photograph. Al and I had plenty of time to view and photograph it while Norma and Joan spent 2 hours in the gift shop.
After Peggy’s Cove, it was along the coast to Lunenburg passing through more small, quaint fishing villages. If you are looking for small, quaint fishing villages, Nova Scotia is the place to go. Lunenburg is an interesting place. It’s not that small, but it sure is quaint. Many of the buildings are very old, but well maintained. It too is built on the side of a hill that leads down to the waterfront. It seemed to have about four main streets, all at different levels on the hill and all running one way in opposite directions. All the shops seem to exist exclusively for the tourist trade. That is probably because the place is crawling with tourists. It was standing room only on the sidewalks and after half-an-hour of trying to find a parking place we left, disappointed that we hadn’t seen the waterfront, but content in the knowledge that we had seen Lunenburg, sort of.
By then we had our fill of small and quaint, so we drove across to Bridgewater and took highway 10 across the province to the Bay of Fundy again. On that road, we passed through more of the mostly wooded terrain that reminded us so much of Northern Ontario. We spent the rest of that day driving along the shore of the Bay of Fundy, planning to watch the tidal bore at Truro. We arrived in Truro in time to book a motel called The Tidal Bore Inn, and go out for our evening meal. We had all seen the tidal bore before and it had been quite spectacular. Joan and I saw it at Shubenacadie with Judy in 1996 and it was quite a sight. You can actually pay to ride the bore in a rubber raft as it rushes up the river. Some folks actually rode surfboards on it. Al and Norma had a similar experience on one of their bus tours, so we were really excited about the prospect of seeing it again. It wasn’t going to happen until almost 11:00 pm, well after dark, but the motel operator assured us that the viewing area was well floodlit and we would have no trouble seeing it. It was well past our bedtime when we drove to the viewing site to join a few others who were already there. After waiting for about 20 minutes, we heard what sounded like lapping waves and a little white water began to appear on the opposite bank. Suddenly, a great wave about 3 inches high came rushing up the river and it began to flow backward. That was it. That was all of it. Disappointment hardly covers the range of emotions we felt. Norma was so disgusted she threatened to sue the Tidal Bore Inn. Sleep is important for old folks and we had just given up about an hour and a half of it to watch this spectacle. Apparently, you have to know your tidal bore locations and you can’t always believe the advertising. There are tidal bores, and then there are tidal BORES.
The trip was pretty much finished by then, except for the going home part. The next morning we left for Saint John, toured around that city for a while, then it was back through New Brunswick again. Again we traveled through Fredericton, Woodstock and Edmunston, the Capital City of The Legendary Republic Of Madawaska, and on through Quebec for some more of that great French cooking. This time we traveled through the flat farming country on the south shore of the St. Lawrence to Montreal.
We arrived back in St. Thomas about 6:30pm to find that our dog, Kaos, had been sick at the Doggie Day Care Centre and had spent 3 days at the veterinary hospital. He was better by the time we picked him up. We still haven’t got the vet bill, so I’ll probably be sick when we do. Thank goodness we have insurance on the little mutt.
That is my account of our 2006 East Coast Vacation as near as I can recall. I hope everyone remembers that Don takes snapshots not photographs. Of course, as usual, any facts I can’t remember, I make up.
Once we passed Montreal, the drive to Quebec City was pleasant. The terrain along the north shore of the St. Lawrence River is different from that on the south shore. Joan and I followed the south shore on our east coast trip in 1996 and found it to be mostly flat farmland. It was very picturesque nevertheless with all the farms looking quite prosperous. The north shore, on the other hand, has much more forest and rolling hills. We arrived in Quebec City quite late in the afternoon planning to stay the night in a place called St. Foy. I’m not sure how it happened, but we seemed to go right past that place, ending up in Quebec City. Al noticed an Old Quebec City landmark on the skyline that he recognized from previous trips and we made our way to it. We drove around the old part of Quebec City for a half hour, or so, and the most interesting thing I noticed at that time were all the sidewalk cafes located there, and since it was the height of the tourist season, they were all full. I was amazed at how many people like to eat outside. It was worse than Vancouver.
It was when we tried to find a motel in Quebec City that we remembered why we had planned to stay in St. Foy. While trying to find St. Foy again we discovered that Quebec City has more clover leafs per capita than any city in North America. It’s a good thing too, because every time we made a wrong turn there was another clover leaf right there to let us make another wrong turn. We invented a whole new sport we called cloverleafing and Al got really good at it. Al told us about a little town called Ste-Anne-de-Beaupre that had a large miracle producing Cathedral and some other interesting things to look at and since the excitement of cloverleafing was beginning to tell on all of us, we decided to look for a motel there. Al was a little tired of limping and I needed a new nose, so we thought we might just pick up a miracle or two while we were there. We did find a motel, but Al is still limping and my nose is just as bad as it ever was.
The next morning we went back to Quebec City for some more cloverleafing and to visit the old city again. This time we hired one of those horse and carriage tours that take you around the city with a guide who describes what is seen. Our guide spoke very good English and told us a great many things about Quebec City that I have forgotten. After all, it was 2 weeks ago. While he was describing the battle at The Plains Of Abraham, he did say something that stuck with me. He said that both General Wolfe and General Montcalm were among the first soldiers killed in the battle and he made the observation that they put the generals right up front in those days. It occurred to me that if they put the guys who start the wars right up front these days, there would be a lot fewer wars. Anyway, it was a very interesting tour and I’ll have to keep telling myself that because I don’t remember much about it except the city is really old and the horse had gas.
We had planned to take the bridge across the St. Lawrence, then travel up the south shore to Riviere-du-Loup, but during the tour, our guide told us about a road along the north shore to Ste-Simeon that would take us through some very scenic countryside. That route required us to take a ferry from Ste-Simeon to Riviere-du-Loup, but being adventurous old folks, already experienced in the difficult sport of cloverleafing, ferries hardly presented any challenge at all. The guide was correct of course, it’s a guide’s job to be right about such things, and it proved to be one of the more picturesque roads of the whole trip. On the way, we had to pass through Ste-Anne-de-Beaupre again, so we stopped there to take some photos of the miracle Cathedral thinking that might stimulate our much-needed miracle, but no luck.
The next point of interest was Montmorency Falls, not nearly as large as Niagara, but higher. The surrounding park is nicely kept; in fact while we were there, a whole busload of students arrived to pick up all the garbage that the tourists leave behind. A cable car runs from the viewing area to a large restaurant at the top of the falls. It didn’t seem to be running the day we were there, but it looks as though it would be a spectacular ride. Spectacular for everyone except me, for me it would be just plain terrifying.
Al and Norma conducted bus tours before they got too old. Al drove the bus, but I’m not sure what Norma did. I think she was the one who had to say things like, “Aw geez, lady, suck it up,” or “This is your motel for the night, if you don’t like it, tough.” I think she was supposed to say, “All aboard!” sometimes too, but Al told me most of time she just said, “Hey! You guys get back on the damn bus!” One of the places they took their passengers was a place called Marie’s. Marie’s is a small restaurant located on a very scenic road that makes a loop off the main highway. The road is very narrow and there are several villages located along it. The homes in the villages are built right out to the edge of the road with no sidewalks. Many of them have porches on their fronts with roofs that extend right over the edge of the road. Al told me that buses passing through had clipped porch roofs more than once. We would have liked to get some photos of the villages, but parking is a major problem there. Parking on residential porches is not allowed anywhere in Quebec. I think the road is the big attraction, but Marie’s is the only stop on the it, so it’s pretty famous as a tour bus destination and all the bus drivers who stop there have their picture taken for Marie’s collection. And a large collection it is. I don’t know how many pictures there are, but there must be five or six hundred at least. Before we left, we had to sample some of Marie’s fresh bread, which is baked in outdoor wood fired ovens. She spreads the bread with maple butter, which is very tasty, but I would have preferred some real butter on the bread before applying the maple butter, but one mustn’t complain.
Highway 138 to Ste. Simeon is a very scenic route, passing through small picturesque towns and villages along the way and we enjoyed it very much. Quebec is a very beautiful province. I have always wondered why we don’t see more Quebec license plates in Ontario, but I don’t think Ontario has anything to offer them that they don’t have at home. Then there is the language problem. It is one of the few things that made traveling in Quebec difficult for us. Although, I have to say that the people there treated us very well and the waitresses in the restaurants were great. As soon as they heard us say hello, they brought us English menus and did their best to speak to us in English. Only once were we unable to get an English menu, or meet a waitress who couldn’t speak English. They both happened in Ste-Simeon. We thought at first that the waitress was a little unfriendly, but it soon became clear that she was having just as much trouble as we were. With my vast knowledge of the French language I was able to determine that fromage meant cheese, (this I know because it’s written on every package of cheese I buy at The Real Canadian Super Store). Grill means pretty much the same in both languages so it wasn’t too hard to figure out how to order a grilled cheese sandwich. The fact that it turned out to be a toasted cheese sandwich is neither here, nor there. Don't get me wrong, I don’t mean to criticize the French cooking. Those guys can really cook! We had some of the best meals of the whole trip in Quebec. I had French Toast twice while we were there and it was terrific. But you would expect that, wouldn’t you? Just like you would expect to get a terrific Western sandwich in the west, but I had the best Western sandwich of my entire life in Quebec on our way home. The waitress didn’t speak English very well, but she tried very hard. I told her in my broken English that it was an excellent sandwich, and she said thanks in her broken English and I just hope she let the chef know in some language how much I enjoyed it. There was one waitress in Drummondville that I wanted to bring home. Joan said I could if I wanted to spend the rest of my life in a wheelchair, so I decided it wasn’t worth it. It was pretty close though. She’s probably still in Drummondville, I suppose, unless some other guy with a more understanding wife has come along and taken her home with him.
Meanwhile, back in Ste-Simeon we arrived too late to catch the ferry. We all felt that the next ferry, which wasn’t until about 10:45 pm, would make it too late to get a motel in Riviere-Du-Loup, so we decided to spend the night in Ste-Simeon. The motel we had in Ste-Simeon was probably the nicest location of any we stayed in. It was situated against a hill that rose up from the river and the buildings were tiered at different levels on the hill. Our building was located at the second level and our room overlooked the river, providing a view of Ile Aux Lievres, which is an island located in the center of the St. Lawrence River. We also had a good view of the ferry dock and we were able to watch the late ferry from Riviere-Du-Loup as it docked. It arrived after dark, so it looked very impressive with all it’s lights on.
The ferry ride the next morning was only about 75 minutes long, the weather was good and the passage was smooth. We had to be at the ferry dock quite early, so we were unable to have breakfast. Fortunately, the ferry company anticipated this and provided a very good breakfast. Al, Norma and Joan all had bacon and eggs, which they said were excellent. I myself abstained. If I’m going to upchuck on a ferry, I would like it to be as low keyed as possible.
Once we disembarked at Riviere-Du-Loup, it didn’t take very long before we were in New Brunswick. The first city of any size that we came to was Edmunston, which is the Capital City of The Legendary Republic of Madawaska. This is a fascinating story and a full explanation of it can be found at http://www.lizbekistan.com/news/madawask.htm. I can’t think of very much to tell you about New Brunswick, but you need to understand that the route we followed as we passed through it only covers a very small section of the province. Our route only took us through the most westerly portion, in fact, as we passed through The Legendary Republic of Madawaska, the State of Maine was on the west side of the river and New Brunswick was on the east. If the rest of the province is as nice as the part we saw, it is definitely a beautiful place. However, I do believe that at least fifty percent of all the trees in Canada must grow there. The highway follows the River St. John, actually crossing the river in at least two places that I remember. One of the crossings is at Hartland were the longest covered bridge in the world is located.
But before we arrived at Hartland, just a little south of St. Leonard we stopped at a community named Grand Falls. I suppose the community was named after the waterfall that is located there. The falls is not as grand as some, but it still has sufficient flow to generate electrical power. The brochures in the information building indicated that the waterfall almost doubled in width during the spring run-off.
It seems that most of the farms in the province are situated along the banks of the river. They presented quite a peaceful, pastoral scene as we passed them. Once away from the riverbank, however, the scene changes to one of heavily wooded terrain much like Northern Ontario. Judging from all the “watch for moose” signs we saw, although we didn’t actually see anything other than road kills, we had to conclude that a great variety of wildlife could be happy there, if they only stayed off the roads.
Hopewell Cape provided another interesting stop for us. The Rocks Provincial Park is located there, and clearly demonstrates how high the Bay of Fundy tides rise. The rocks are located just a short distance from the shore and when the tide is in, not much of the rocks protrude above the water. When the tide is out, the ocean recedes completely leaving the rocks free standing, rooted to the ocean floor. It’s quite a sight to see from above and even more impressive from below. There is a foot trail that leads to a set of stairs that in turn provides access to the bottom. The stairs appear to be about equal to a three-storey walk up, perhaps a little less. The park provides a shuttle bus that takes all the old folks down to the head of the stars. Actually, it will take anyone with $1.25 to buy a ticket. Once you reach the head of the stairs you are on your own. Unfortunately, that was as far as Al was able to go, but Norma, Joan and I went down the stairs to look at the rocks from below. When we left, Al was talking to the Park Warden, when we returned he was still entertaining her. The man is a chick magnet, no doubt about it. We were there about noon, which is the perfect time to go down to the bottom. Once you are there, you can walk a long way along the beach. This allows people to wander quite a distance from the stairs and if you linger out there too long and the tide starts to rise, swimming is your only option. Because of this, the park staff patrols the beach a little before the tide rising time to herd all the people who can’t read signs, or don’t have watches, back to the stairs. This whole thing is a little difficult to describe, but I hope the snapshots will help.
Our next destination was the Confederation Bridge to Prince Edward Island. The New Brunswick end is located not very far from Moncton. The weather was fine, so we had no trouble crossing the bridge. When we arrived on the PEI side, our first stop was the information center located just a short distance from the bridge. After getting what information we needed, we tried to drive through the tollgate that we could see, but proved to be impossible to get to. As we soon discovered, there is no toll to get onto the island, but you can’t get off, either by the bridge, or the ferry, without paying the toll. We hadn’t intended to spend too much time on the island this trip, so we just followed the Trans Canada Highway to the ferry landing at Woods Island. We made a few side trips down some secondary side roads that took us through some quaint seaside villages and a great many potato fields.
We arrived at the Woods Island Ferry just in time to be the second last auto loaded. This was a longer crossing than our first ferry ride, and a little rougher. Once again we were riding a ferry at mealtime and while the others had their lunch, I just concentrated on holding on to my breakfast. We disembarked at Pictou NS and followed highways 104 and 4 to Port Hastings on Cape Breton Island. On the way, we passed through New Glasgow, Antigonish and some other smaller towns. We found a nice motel in Port Hastings and the next morning we were able to get a reasonably early start on our Cabot Trail excursion.
Instead of going up to Baddeck to enter the trail, which seems to be the usual way, we took highway 19 that runs up the west side of Cape Breton along the coast. After we had driven a few miles it was obvious we had made the correct choice. The highway overlooks the ocean almost all of the time and runs through some very interesting small villages. Norma and Al’s daughter, Colleen, had asked them to bring home some real ocean rocks for her collection and at our first stop on the trail, a picnic area located on a beach about half a mile long, we found the perfect ocean stones, flattish in shape, but nicely rounded and smooth. I can only imagine how many centuries it took to grind them into that shape. We found a little gift shop on the way where I found a good selection of east coast music CD’s. Naturally, I had to buy a couple. After you enter Cape Breton Highlands National Park, there is nothing to stop for except scenery and there is sure plenty of that. It is arguably one of the more spectacular drives in the eastern part of Canada and the park provides 25 or so scenic turnouts for viewing and photography. It was quite late when we finished our Cabot Trail tour and I’m not sure where we stayed that night, but I think it was Baddeck.
The next day, we drove along the south coast of Nova Scotia for some distance then across country to connect with highway 102 near Truro. It was a straight run from there to Halifax, but we were quite late arriving there nevertheless. We took a motel there for two nights in order to give us a full day to look around Halifax. Most of our day in Halifax was spent on the waterfront. The part we visited is a long boardwalk that extends for a considerable distance along the wharf. It is rather like an open-air museum and there are many older ships moored there as well as some newer vessels and nautical memorabilia in general. There is also a ferry terminal there, and outside the terminal entrance, we found a young fellow sitting with a sign that said he was broke and trying to get back home to Newfoundland. I don’t know if there is a ferry from Halifax to Newfoundland, but I would guess there is. He looked quite forlorn sitting there with tears in his eyes, so Joan and I gave him ten bucks. He may have been a professional panhandler for all we know, but we like to think we helped a poor Newfoundland kid get home. We had lunch at a seafood restaurant recommended to us by Al and Norma’s son-in-law Mike. It was a pretty fancy place, but we just had fish and chips of all things.
Peggy’s Cove was our destination for the next day. Joan and I had been there in 1996 and Al and Norma had been there many times with their tour buses, so there was nothing there that we hadn’t seen before. It was still a very pretty place to view and to photograph. Al and I had plenty of time to view and photograph it while Norma and Joan spent 2 hours in the gift shop.
After Peggy’s Cove, it was along the coast to Lunenburg passing through more small, quaint fishing villages. If you are looking for small, quaint fishing villages, Nova Scotia is the place to go. Lunenburg is an interesting place. It’s not that small, but it sure is quaint. Many of the buildings are very old, but well maintained. It too is built on the side of a hill that leads down to the waterfront. It seemed to have about four main streets, all at different levels on the hill and all running one way in opposite directions. All the shops seem to exist exclusively for the tourist trade. That is probably because the place is crawling with tourists. It was standing room only on the sidewalks and after half-an-hour of trying to find a parking place we left, disappointed that we hadn’t seen the waterfront, but content in the knowledge that we had seen Lunenburg, sort of.
By then we had our fill of small and quaint, so we drove across to Bridgewater and took highway 10 across the province to the Bay of Fundy again. On that road, we passed through more of the mostly wooded terrain that reminded us so much of Northern Ontario. We spent the rest of that day driving along the shore of the Bay of Fundy, planning to watch the tidal bore at Truro. We arrived in Truro in time to book a motel called The Tidal Bore Inn, and go out for our evening meal. We had all seen the tidal bore before and it had been quite spectacular. Joan and I saw it at Shubenacadie with Judy in 1996 and it was quite a sight. You can actually pay to ride the bore in a rubber raft as it rushes up the river. Some folks actually rode surfboards on it. Al and Norma had a similar experience on one of their bus tours, so we were really excited about the prospect of seeing it again. It wasn’t going to happen until almost 11:00 pm, well after dark, but the motel operator assured us that the viewing area was well floodlit and we would have no trouble seeing it. It was well past our bedtime when we drove to the viewing site to join a few others who were already there. After waiting for about 20 minutes, we heard what sounded like lapping waves and a little white water began to appear on the opposite bank. Suddenly, a great wave about 3 inches high came rushing up the river and it began to flow backward. That was it. That was all of it. Disappointment hardly covers the range of emotions we felt. Norma was so disgusted she threatened to sue the Tidal Bore Inn. Sleep is important for old folks and we had just given up about an hour and a half of it to watch this spectacle. Apparently, you have to know your tidal bore locations and you can’t always believe the advertising. There are tidal bores, and then there are tidal BORES.
The trip was pretty much finished by then, except for the going home part. The next morning we left for Saint John, toured around that city for a while, then it was back through New Brunswick again. Again we traveled through Fredericton, Woodstock and Edmunston, the Capital City of The Legendary Republic Of Madawaska, and on through Quebec for some more of that great French cooking. This time we traveled through the flat farming country on the south shore of the St. Lawrence to Montreal.
We arrived back in St. Thomas about 6:30pm to find that our dog, Kaos, had been sick at the Doggie Day Care Centre and had spent 3 days at the veterinary hospital. He was better by the time we picked him up. We still haven’t got the vet bill, so I’ll probably be sick when we do. Thank goodness we have insurance on the little mutt.
That is my account of our 2006 East Coast Vacation as near as I can recall. I hope everyone remembers that Don takes snapshots not photographs. Of course, as usual, any facts I can’t remember, I make up.
posted by Don Edmiston at 3:29 PM
