Friday, November 16, 2018

Great Times In The Maritimes


Mike is more gregarious than I; he is always eager and willing to be a part of a group. So when FROG Bob mentioned he would like to do a trip to the Canadian Maritimes, but could not find an opportune time to schedule it, Mike and our friend Guy volunteered to take on the responsibility of planning and leading a trip to eastern Canada.  Unfortunately, due to health issues, Guy and Lil were not able to join us on this adventure, but were certainly with us in spirit.
Peggy's Point Lighthouse at Peggy's Cove, NS
The most photographed lighthouse in Canada

Mike has the perspective that “everything will be just fine” whereas, after nearly thirty years of teaching, I fret about the possibility of what could potentially go wrong and feel responsible for people in my “care”.  Mike assured me these were responsible adults and seasoned RVers, and, fortunately, he was right.  (I can’t believe I just put that in print.)  Our fellow travelers were a pleasant group who meshed well together.  From comments that we received both during and after the trip, I think I can speak for the group when I say that we did, indeed, have Great Times in the Maritimes.

"What could go wrong?"  Well, you could be attacked by a giant
lobster.  Yvonne in front of The Gables restaurant, where we enjoyed
a delicious dinner, on both this trip and our trip two years ago
Kiwanis Oceanfront Camping, St. Andrews, NB as seen from the deck of the Jolly Breeze
FROGs (Forest River Owners' Group members) from fifteen U.S. states and one Canadian province rendezvoused in New Brunswick, in the lovely town of St. Andrews by the Sea.  It is easy to see why this picturesque spot was a favorite of the wealthy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.   Our first three days together were spent at Kiwanis Oceanfront Campground.  As the name implies, this delightful campground is literally right across the street from the ocean, or more precisely, Passamaquoddy Bay, an inlet off of the Bay of Fundy.  Close by are the grand historic Algonquin hotel and the multi-award winning twenty-seven acre horticultural masterpiece, Kingsbrae Garden.

At each of our six stops, Mike had planned some type of group activity and, in some cases, a meal, as well.  Our adventure for this stop was a whale-watching tour aboard the tall ship Jolly Breeze.  Because of the size of our group, half were booked on the morning cruise and the other half on the afternoon voyage.  We had decided that Mike would accompany one of the tours and I would accompany the other.  My assignment was the morning cruise, and we left the wharf in a jovial mood.   Breakfast was served on board, and about half-way to the area where there were reports of whale sightings, the engine – a new diesel that had been installed only two years earlier – quit.  All attempts to restart it were unsuccessful, and the owner came out in a small boat to change the “motherboard” in the computer that controlled the engine’s electronics.  Still nothing.  The naturalist on board was doing her best to keep the passengers entertained with viewings of the various sea creatures carried in a salt-water tank on the ship.  The company then dispatched a Zodiac to tow the Jolly Breeze back to port.  As we neared the wharf, it was finally determined that a blown 37-cent fuse was the culprit.  The tour company’s owners could not have been nicer.  They offered three options:  Re-book those who wanted to go out on the tall ship for the following morning, book anyone who wanted to go on their Zodiac tour that afternoon (the Zodiac trip is actually $25.00 per person higher, but they offered it at the same price) or refund the cost of the tickets.  Mike’s group sailed aboard the Jolly Breeze that afternoon.  They encountered no mechanical problems, and sighted and followed two humpback whales.
Our whale-watching cruise was aboard the tall ship Jolly Breeze
FROGs on deck
More FROGs on deck
And still more FROGs on deck
(this photo courtesy of Georgette B.)
When the vessel broke down, the on-board naturalist kept the passengers
occupied with a "show-and-tell" of some of the marine creatures carried on board
And finally, on the afternoon cruise, "there she blows"
(this photo courtesy of Georgette B.)
Two Humpback whales spent about 20 minutes swimming near the ship. 
It was a thrilling sight.      (this photo courtesy of Georgette B.)
We stopped to watch the seals on this rock island.  At low tide, the top of
the rock is exposed, and the seals sun themselves. At high tide, the rock
is completely submerged and the seals swim around until the next low
tide, but no natural predators can get to them here.
You can't be a pirate on the Jolly Breeze without
a tattoo. Many of the FROGs sported face paint,
courtesy of one of the ship's crew
On several evenings – two in St. Andrews - we gathered around a campfire.  An added bonus was that one of our travelers had brought along a high-powered telescope.  We had the opportunity to see craters on the moon, the moons of Jupiter and the rings around Saturn.  Fascinating!  Thank you, Dan.
Gathered around the fire on our last night in St. Andrews.
Prince Edward Island was our next destination.  We crossed the Confederation Bridge and made our way to the Cavendish area, the setting for Anne of Green Gables, made famous by author Lucy Maude Montgomery and her red-haired pigtailed heroine, Anne Shirley.
Construction of the bridge began in October 1993 and was completed in May 1997,
at a cost of $1.3 billion Canadian.  The bridge is 8 miles (12.9 km) in length.  Before
its official naming, Prince Edward Islanders referred to the bridge as the "Fixed Link"
 On a beautiful Saturday evening, the group met at the Confederation Center in Charlottetown for a production of “Anne of Green Gables”, the longest-running musical in history. 
The original "Green Gables" house in which Lucy Maud Montgomery lived has been
torn down. This replica is period-authentic, down to the furnishings and some of the
pieces of jewelry that Montgomery mentioned in her book, Anne of Green Gables

Beautiful flowers bloom all over the island
FROGs visit around a picnic table at Sunset Campground on PEI
Sunset Campground, our base on PEI, is only about two miles from Prince Edward National Park.  People had the opportunity to drive through the park to view the dramatic red cliffs or walk along long stretches of sandy beaches.  On Sunday afternoon Mike and I wandered into the small town of North Rustico and came across a flea market, which added to the “local” feel.  One structure in that tiny town is the Doucet House.  Built in 1772, it may be the oldest Acadian dwelling in the province.
The red color of the soil on Prince Edward Island
is due to the high iron-oxide content
Prince Edward Island is located in the Gulf of St. Lawrence,
and is sometimes referred to as the "Garden of the Gulf"
The island is known for its red sand beaches, and is renowned for great seafood, like
lobster and mussels.  We spotted Jim & Sue and Dan & Leslie walking along the beach. 
The island was discovered by Jacques Cartier in 1534, but was not settled permanently
until the 1700's. The first settlements were around the harbor at what is now Charlottetown. 
Fishing boats in the harbor at North Rustico
Stacks of lobster traps. The lobster trap was invented in 1808
by Ebenezer Thorndike of Swampscott, Massachusetts
Fertile farmland abounds on Prince Edward Island.  The island produces
approximately 25% of the potato crop grown annually in all of Canada.
A group dinner at the restaurant Chez Yvonne featured simple, hearty entrĂ©es including fish and chips, seafood chowder and salad, or pan-fried haddock.  We had eaten here on our previous trip to PEI, and just like the first time, the restaurant did not disappoint.
Sunday evening dinner at Chez Yvonne, Sept. 2, 2018
Sunday evening dinner at Chez Yvonne, Sept. 2, 2018
Sunday evening dinner at Chez Yvonne, Sept. 2, 2018
Crossing the Confederation Bridge again, we headed toward our third Canadian province, Nova Scotia, and its capital, Halifax.   A bus tour of Halifax, complete with a tour guide in full Scottish regalia, included a walk through the city’s Public Garden, a visit to the Citadel, and a very interesting stop with a walking tour through Fairview Lawn Cemetery, where 121 of the victims of the RMS Titanic disaster are buried.   (Twenty-nine others are buried in Halifax:  nineteen in Mount Olivet Catholic Cemetery and ten in Baron de Hirsch Jewish Cemetery.)  Our tour guide, John James, provided details about, and in some cases, pictures of, the men, women and, in a few cases, children buried in Fairlawn.  Forty-two of the graves in Fairlawn contain the bodies of unidentified victims; the gravestones simply are numbered with a number that was assigned consecutively as the bodies were recovered.  In the days after Titanic sank, searchers recovered the bodies of 337 of the 1,514 people who were lost that night.  119 were subsequently re-buried at sea.  209 bodies were returned to Halifax.  59 of those were claimed by relatives and taken to be buried elsewhere, and 150 bodies were buried in Halifax.
Waiting for the bus to begin our tour of Halifax
John James, out tour guide, in his kilt, talks to the group at the entrance to Fair-
view Lawn Cemetery.  He now wears a FROG pin on his kilt, courtesy of Mary F.
While many of the headstones are rather simple markers installed in 1912,
some families paid for and placed individual, personalized stones.  Everett
Elliott, a member of the crew, stayed at his post and was lost with the ship
 and "...showed once more to all the world how Englishmen should die."
A floral display in the Public Garden commemorating the 200th anniversary 
of Dalhousie University, one of the oldest universities in Canada.
A replica of the Titanic, floating in one of the lakes in the
Public Gardens, makes a great perch for this Blue Heron 
The bandstand was built in 1867, designed by Halifax architect Henry Busch.
It is used for free concerts on Sunday afternoons during the summer
The Halifax Public Gardens are Victorian-era gardens formally
established in 1867, the year of Canadian Confederation
The 78th Highlanders, a ceremonial re-enactment
unit, stands guard at the Citadel in Halifax
FROGs outside the entrance to the Citadel, overlooking Halifax harbor.  The Citidel
has never been under siege, and this group surely isn't going to be the first to attempt it.
Over the following couple of days, our travelers had time to visit places of interest to them. A number of us chose to visit Peggy’s Cove and take snapshots of the most photographed lighthouse in Canada. Nearby was the Swissair Memorial, a monument honoring the victims lost in the crash of Swissair flight 111 off the coast of Nova Scotia on September 2, 1998.   A bit further from Halifax, the city of Lunenburg, a UNESCO site, offered a variety of shops and restaurants situated on a pretty harbor.
Near Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia
Along the coast of Nova Scotia, between Peggy's Cove and Lunenburg
Monument honoring the 229 lives lost on September 2, 1998, when Swissair
flight 111 crashed en route from JFK in New York to Geneva, Switzerland
Leaving Halifax, we headed east to Cape Breton Island and the “must see” Cabot Trail.  We used Bras d’Or Lakes Campground near the town of Baddeck as our base.  The Cabot Trail offers some of the most dramatic views in the Maritimes along the 180 mile circular drive.  In Baddeck, the Thomas Edison Museum showcased the highly diverse interests of this brilliant man.  Attending a ceilidh – a “gathering” or what is sometimes referred to as a kitchen party, allowed our group to enjoy some very talented musicians and experience some regional culture.   Day trips offered opportunities to visit Sidney to see the world’s largest fiddle, or to explore the largest reconstructed fortress in Canada, the fortress at Loiusburg.  Our favorite venue, about an hour from Baddeck, is the Scottish Highland Village Open-air Museum where costumed re-enactors immerse you in the immigrant experience from 1740 to the 1950s.  Of course, one cannot leave the east coast without experiencing a famous “lobster supper,” and our FROGs did just that.
View of Bras d'Or Lake from our campground near Baddeck
Kidston Island Lighthouse on Kidston Island, at the entrance to
Baddeck harbor, taken from the Thomas Edison Museum
View of a portion of the shoreline of Cape Breton Island, taken along the Cabot Trail

Shoreline along the west side of the Cabot Trail, just south of the town of Cheticamp
St. Peter's Catholic Church in Cheticamp.  It is said that the steeple
is so tall that fisherman use it as a navigational aid.
This is not a painting, but a hooked rug depicting the Crucifixion of Christ. It is on display
at the Museum of Hooked Rugs and Home Life in Les Trois Pignons in Cheticamp.  
With a very short window to complete roadwork, repairs are
constantly being done on the Cabot Trail.
The lighthouse at Neils Harbour on the Cabot Trail.  (There is also
a pretty good fish restaurant here called the Chowder House.)
St. Peter's Roman Catholic Church, in Ingonish Beach, Cape Breton.
Built in 1913, this church is now 105 years old.  
Bras d'Or Lake, taken from the Highland Village Museum at Iona, Cape Breton
Eleven historic structures depict the lives of the Gaelic people from their
origins in Scotland (in this 1740's stone and sod home pictured above)
to their arrival in the new world, and up through the early 20th century 
The barn, originally built near Iona in the mid-nineteenth century, was disassembled
by hand, moved here, and re-assembled.  It is built with hand-hewn beams
The most modern home in the village is the beige one, facing us.  It would
date to about 1900 The two buildings to the right of the house are the white
schoolhouse (circa 1917) and the gray store (circa 1920)
Costumed re-enactors in each building tell stories and give you a picture
of what life might be like during the time period depicted by that building
The working blacksmith shop still uses the same tools and techniques that
would have been used in blacksmith shops from the late 1800's to the mid-1900's
The star of the show at our "down East lobster supper"
Lobster, seafood chowder, and buckets of mussels
A brief stop in the small town of Pictou, Nova Scotia gave our group the opportunity to tour a replica of the ship Hector which brought the first settlers from Scotland to the shores of mainland Canada in September of 1773.
FROGs gathered in the lobby of the Hector Heritage Museum,
awaiting our tour.on a chilly morning.
Replica of the ship Hector that brought 189 Scottish Highlanders to Pictou in 1773 
Hector was an old ship, and in poor condition when she made the 1773 crossing, which
took 11 weeks, including a 2 week delay when she ran into a gale off of Newfoundland
The Museum of Industry in Pictou County houses the
oldest working steam locomotive in Canada
An exhibit of quilting in Nova Scotia
Mobile Industrial Arts Classroom from the early 1950's
We had been very fortunate to have had warm, dry days, with only a few overnight showers during most of our trip, and so it was not terribly disappointing – nor surprising – that we left Pictou, heading to our final destination, in a light, misty drizzle.

Saint John, New Brunswick, was the last stop on our journey.  The group activity here was a bus tour of the city, with a stop at the old City Market; a photo stop on a peak overlooking the harbor; driving tour through downtown, several residential neighborhoods, and the City Park; and a stop at the Reversing Rapids.  At low tide, the St. John River empties into the Bay of Fundy, causing a series of rapids and whirlpools.  At high tide, the water rushing out of the bay into the river actually causes the river to flow backwards (upstream) for a distance of more than 80 miles.
Interior of the City Market, St. John, New Brunswick
FROGs pose for a group picture on a hilltop overlooking the harbor in St. John, NB
Mike and Yvonne in front of the Reversing Rapids, St. John, NB
Our group gathered for a farewell dinner on our last evening to share stories and discuss future adventures.  The next morning, following a continental breakfast, the FROGs went their separate ways.

Farewell Dinner at Lily's Lakeside Dining in St. John, NB, Sept. 13, 2018
Farewell Dinner at Lily's Lakeside Dining in St. John, NB, Sept. 13, 2018
Farewell Dinner at Lily's Lakeside Dining in St. John, NB, Sept. 13, 2018
Farewell Dinner at Lily's Lakeside Dining in St. John, NB, Sept. 13, 2018
Farewell Dinner at Lily's Lakeside Dining in St. John, NB, Sept. 13, 2018
Farewell Dinner at Lily's Lakeside Dining in St. John, NB, Sept. 13, 2018
Farewell Dinner at Lily's Lakeside Dining in St. John, NB, Sept. 13, 2018
FROGs gather to say farewell on a bright, sunny morning in St. John, NB

We always enjoy new adventures and we hope that this first-ever FROG Great Times in the Maritimes caravan gave our travelers the opportunity to go home with fond memories and a few of their own new Road Stories. 





If you would like to see more pictures of the Canadian Maritimes, below are
links to three blogs that we wrote following our initial trip there in June, 2016







1 comment:

  1. Wonderful Yvonne! You have captured our trip beautifully! It was a great adventure of sightseeing and meeting new friends! You and Mike were a joy to have as leaders! Looking forward to meeting up on the road again,
    Dennis and Barbara

    ReplyDelete