Thursday, September 16, 2010

Bay of Fundy and Hopewell Rocks

Hopewell Rocks 003Today was a ride from Baddeck to Moncton, NB where we quickly set-up the motor home and rushed to see the Hopewell Rocks at low tide, what a sight, the tide was turning and coming in at around 7 P.M., the park closes at 5 P.M. so we'll go back tomorrow to see the high tide. We took advantage of the low tide and, as the locals say, "we walked on the ocean floor" till the  rangers asked us to leave. By the way, the van that you see Annie and I saw it all over The Cabot trail and on the way to Moncton.
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A Drive around Bras D'or Lake

Bras D'or Lake 013Today we were off for a drive around part of Bras D'or lake, we weren't given many sights, the drive was more of a drive down an access road to camps, could have been anywhere, the highlight of the drive was a short ferry ride on a cable ferry at the Little Narrows, a short ride that in itself was kinda cool. Without a bunch of look-outs to check we didn't use up much of the day so we then took to the lake itself aboard a 67 foot schooner the Amoeba, we sailed off the coastline directly in front of Alexander Graham Bell's house and we had a close-up of a Bald Eagle swooping down on a frozen herring our captain threw out for him. The end of the day took us to the Bell Buoy for lobster sandwiches, what a way to end the day.
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The Infamous Cabot Trail

Cabot Trail 001 Wow, we're on he Cabot trail, super ride and outstanding sights, I say trail but it is a road and some people do travel it with their class Cs. While in Pleasant Valley, the trail cuts in and out of the Canadian Park and has towns along the highway offering many services one which is whale watching, yup we went, in a Zodiac and saw allot of pilot whales, one fin whale and a couple of sharks, really cool. The trail goes around Cape Breton with allot of hiking available for those who have the time to explore.
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Truro to Baddeck

Truro to Cape Breton 005 The road from Truro to Baddeck was 166 miles long and was completed without any "events". For those that do not know, Baddeck is the gateway to the Cabot Trail and is located on Bra D'ors Lake and is the home to the Alexander Graham Bell Museum. We settled in at the Adventures East campground and quickly went to town and visited the museum, didn't know that Mr. and Mrs. Bell were interested in high speed boats, hydrofoils and flight and that they were affiliated with Curtis Wright in Hammondsport, New York where there is an air motorcycle museum known as the Curtis Wright Museum, been there and now will be going back.
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Sunday, September 12, 2010

Halifax and Peggy's Cove

Peggy's Cove & Halifax (6)Today Keith and Eleanor, friends of ours that we met in Bushnell,Fl. last winter, picked us up and gave us a ride to Halifax and Peggy's Cove for the day, what a nice ride and to have friends that can show us around, it doesn't get any better than that. We first had a great lunch of scallops and fries on the waterfront then it was on to the exploring, the day was filled with  on and off rain and Eleanor saying "if you don't like the weather, wait a minute and it'll change" she was right, Keith used to work in Halifax so it didn't take him long to show things that we wouldn't have seen otherwise, thanks to both Keith and Eleanor. I'm going to close by saying, nothing beats having friends show you around.
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Nova Scotia and the Tidal Bore

Day 1 Nova Scotia (4) Arriving at Scotia Pines Campground we were happy to see the large sites with a line of pine trees between each site, beautiful, we settled in and looked forward to the next days exploration. Our first full day in Nova Scotia we headed for Maitland, a small community that the campground operator suggested we visit, on our way we drove over a bridge and to our right we saw a look-out, it was the site of a tidal bore viewing. What's a tidal bore? a tidal bore is a wave action that literally reverses the flow of rivers flowing into the particular river, in his case the Shubenacadie River, when we first got there the river bed was showing and whatever tributaries flowed, they where a mere trickle, within an hour we saw a wave coming around a corner and make it's way up the river and got to a depth of maybe 20 t0 30 feet, we'll find out more tomorrow, and rafters were coming up the river carrying passengers up the river where a few minutes earlier there was only a river bed, awesome is the only thing I can say, you need to see it.
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Friday, September 3, 2010

Charlottetown, P.E.I and Rocky Point

Rock Point Lighthouse trip 011 Today started with a trip to the capital city and to another light houses.  The drive was relatively short, we had about an hour drive to the capital, spent some time there then went on to see some more light houses and beaches, both Anne and I are more interested in P.E.I.'s natural beauty and, of course, the light houses which usually offer spectacular views. You will notice that we took two pictures of some scenes as the haze lifted. Tonight, we are hunkering down for Earl.
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The North Cape Coastal Drive, P.E.I.

North Coastal Drive (40) This trip makes our journey of P.E.I. complete, as some locals would say, the trip gives us a "point to point" trip, the extremities of  the Island, don't get me wrong, there's still lots to see. Getting to the North Cape brought us to not only the extreme north end but to a wind farm that was able to power 12000 homes. The old lighthouse still stands and lots of fishing activity still goes on, not just a potato province here. On the drive home we took a detour, route 19, that would take us to the West Point light house, this light house had rooms for rent,cool hu? one could spend the night in a light house.Wait till you see Anne's churches.
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Points East Coastal Drive, P.E.I.

East Coastal Drive (12) Day 2 and we're off to points East, we parked the RV in Cavendish, central P.E.I. and ventured from there. The East Coastal Drive was at the top of our list along with many stops along the way, one such stop was the Sand Dunes, a Canadian National Park that sits on the banks of St Peters Bay, almost in the center of the East portion of the Island. We went for a nice walk on a floating foot bridge with a couple we met there at the park, if you see or do nothing else, walk the dunes, we did it in near 100 degree weather and it was worth it. From the Sand Dunes we had lunch at Rick's Fish & Chips, GREAT food, Anne had crab cakes and, you guessed it, I had the fish and Chips. Onward to the lighthouse, when we got to the eastern most point of the Island, we were greeted by an old light house that we  where aloud to climb, great views. The trip back gave us some great views of the Gulf of St Lawrence and we again made a stop at a National Beach but it was just that, a beach with beautiful red sands. P.S. Anne got allot of pictures of churches.
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Cavendish P.E.I. and Anne of Green Gables

Anne of Green Gables (4)
We spent the day visiting Cavendish only to find out that we were staying about three blocks from where L M Montgomery lived when she wrote Anne of Green Gables, we did visit the site  of where she was born, now only a basement, and we visited the Green Gables home where her stories were centered. A short ride down the road got us to the Anne of Green Gables museum, a house where Lucy Maude Montgomery lived while growing up and got married there too.  We finished off the day with a stroll along the beach right here in  Cavendish.
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Anne Of Green Gables Photos 

Houlton,Maine to Prince Edward Island, CA

Confederation Bridge To say that today was a "normal" travel day would be like saying a carnival ride was super calm, first of all, we left Houlton and got just over 100 miles and the gas monitor went off, not being one to distrust, we pulled over and I checked all systems after making sure we had no gas leaks, I'm pretty sure the culprit was the motor home exhaust  but get this, the refrigerator was off, I expected that but the water pump got turned on as did the water heater, haven't found the logic in the latter two as yet. We then proceeded to P.E.I., got to Confederation Bridge, did the crossing and upon hitting land we lost the fan belt, all was not lost, the fan belt broke in front of a convenience store whose owner  found us and went after a belt, now we need to install the belt, couldn't figure out how to install it so he called a friend who happened to be, and I quote, " the best mechanic on P.E .I., we're off with the lost of about an hour, not bad.
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Thursday, September 2, 2010

Averill,Vt to Houlton Me

Houlton Maine We started off for P.E.I.  today and made our way through New Hampshire entering Maine at Upton, near Umbagog Lake, on route 26 to Newry, Me and from there we drove route 2 to I-95  and our day's journey took us to the American border town of Houlton, Me and to My Brother's Place Campground, beautiful pull through sites with full hook-ups.  Even though our trip was uneventful we still had to negotiate many turns, many hills and allot of construction, that being said, we will come back here to visit the Houlton area again.