Peggy’s Cove in a better light

 

Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 – Pier 21 was opened as an immigration centre in 1928 to handle the large number of predominantly European immigrants coming to Canada.  We were expecting so much more from this museum, but it fell dismally short of telling the immigration story in Canada. Pier 21 was closed in 1971; a lifespan of only 43 years so there wasn’t a lot of history to work with.  Couple this with the fact that many of the displays and interactive kiosks were not functioning only added to our frustration.  The museum is located next door to the cruise ship dock and seems to depend heavily on this traffic from the ships.

We had planned to spend the full day here but we were out within an hour.  The weather was clear so we decided to try Peggy’s Cove one more time.  The sun was just starting to burn off the fog when we arrived and we were able to get some half decent pictures without getting soaking wet in the process.  It truly is the quaint fishing village that it is portrayed as. Now if they could only do something with all these damn tourists!!

 

Maritime Museum–Titanic and the Halifax Explosion

Saturday, July 27 – Day 39

We make a point of getting an early start today as we have found that getting a parking spot in the harbour area of Halifax is almost impossible.  We were able to get a spot right next door to the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic.  The museum does an exceptionally good job of telling the stories of the numerous shipwrecks along the coast of  Nova Scotia, which is often called the “Graveyard of the Atlantic”.

It has been 101 years since the sinking of the Titanic on April 5, 1912 and since the movie came out a few years ago, it has created a new generation of interest.  The museum tells the story of the recovery operation and how Halifax served as the base of operations in the recovery effort.  Among the artifacts are this pair of shoes recovered from a young boy who was buried in the Fairview Cemetery in Halifax.  For many years his identity was unknown as was indicated on the gravestone.  In recent years however he has been identified as Sidney Goodwin. He was the youngest of eight children in a family, all of whom perished that night. 

Many of the markers in the Titanic area of the Fairview Cemetery have no names, just the number that was assigned when the body was recovered. As each body was recovered all the possessions were put into a small canvas bag with a corresponding number and a description of the person was entered in a journal.  Some of the bodies were identified through this system but a great number never were…their last time on earth as a number.

This system was used 5 years later during the Halifax explosion of 1917.  Briefly; a French munitions ship was struck by another ship in the harbour.  The impact created sparks that ignited benzene being carried on the deck; it also disabled the ship which drifted towards a pier.  The fire attracted many people to watch at the harbour front.  When the fire reached the cargo of TNT, the ship was ripped apart and everything within a square kilometer was leveled by the blast.  Five other ships in the harbour were totally destroyed; a piece of shrapnel is still to this day embedded in the wall of St. Paul’s Church, almost two miles away. The shockwave from the explosion shattered windows into the faces and eyes of many people who were watching from their homes.  A tsunami was created in the harbour that wiped out an entire Mikmaq Indian village. The blast was the largest man made explosion before the detonation of the nuclear bomb.

Quite obviously, Halifax is no stranger to disasters.

Halifax–The Citadel

Wednesday, July 24 – Day 36

The Halifax Citadel sits on a hill (which has been cut down by 40’ from its original height) dominating the harbour area of Halifax.  When you look over the walls you can easily see why this site was chosen as a defensive position for the protection of the harbour.   This fort and a number of smaller installations around the harbour made this a formidable obstacle for any potential invaders.  The fort was rebuilt several times between the 1760’s and 1800’s, before the current design was adopted in about 1820.  The present Citadel was handed over to the Parks Canada in the 1950’s and they have done an incredible job of reconstructing the fort using much of the existing stone and using techniques utilized during its construction. 

Costumed interpreters are everywhere and at first we thought that they were actual military training units: we found out much later that this was not the case. Mostly students trying to earn enough money to go back to school.

I couldn’t resist putting in this shot.  The guard was supposed to have eyes forward, but I saw him checking out a young girl as she passed by.

 

The web site for the Halifax Citadel National Historic site is:http://www.pc.gc.ca/lhn-nhs/ns/halifax/index.aspx

We had purchased Canada Parks Discovery Passes when we went to the Carlton Martello Tower back in Saint John, NB when we first started touring Atlantic Canada.  We thought that they were quite pricey at the time at almost $70 each; but they have definitely paid for themselves with all the the National Historic Sites and National Parks we have visited on this trip.  The passes are good for a year so we can still do some touring till the end of July 2014.

Halifax–Peggy’s Cove

Tuesday, July 23 – Day 35

We left Cape Breton, under beautiful sun shine skies this morning, but by the time we got to Halifax the clouds and drizzle/rain had started…another experience getting setup in the rain.  We chose a camp ground about 20 minutes north of Halifax called the Woodhaven RV Park in Hammonds Plains, Nova Scotia.  The Wi-Fi here seems to be fairly reliable. 

We had the best part of the afternoon remaining so we set out for Peggy’s Cove, which was only 43 km away.  Now, all the pictures that I’ve seen of Peggy’s cove show a bright sunny sky and a calm cove which clearly shows the reflections of the boats at dock in the harbour area.  Well here is the proof that it is not ALWAYS so picture perfect. We could just barely see the lighthousee through the driving rain, from the Sou’wester Restaurant.  Not quite a gale, but it almost turned my umbrella inside out a couple of times.

On our way we passed the memorial to Swissair Flight 111, which crashed near Peggy’s Cove in 1998, killing all 229 people aboard.  The cloud and rain just added to the somberness of the memorial.  The inscription on the left side of the picture reads, “In memory of the 229 men, women and children aboard Swissair Flight 111 who perished off these shores September 2, 1998.  They have been joined to the sea and the sky.  May they rest in peace.”  The face of the right side monument forms a sight line to the crash site and it reads, “In grateful recognition of all those who worked tirelessly to provide assistance in the recovery operations and comfort to the families and their friends during a time of distress.”  The people of Peggy’s Cove had opened up their homes to the families of the Swissair victims during the recovery operations.  It makes my complaints about the weather seem kind of trivial, now.

Cape Breton Miners Museum

Monday, July 22 – Day 34

We decided that we would stay and extra day in Cape Breton to take in the Miners Museum in Glace Bay.  We couldn’t get an extra day in the Cabot Trail Campground but we were fortunate enough to get a site in Adventures East just down the road.  After we had setup there, we were on the road to Glace Bay, Nova Scotia.  The town of Glace Bay was put on the map by Rita MacNeil who came from this area.  What captured our interest in the museum was when she appeared with a group of miners, “Men of the Deeps” who performed with their hardhats and miners lanterns.  It was really quite moving.  (Link to You Tube – A tribute to Rita taken from an appearance with the Men of the Deeps.)

Nova Scotia has a long history of coal mining.  It was first discovered by sailors from Fortress Louisbourg who dug it out of exposed seams along the shore near Glace Bay. 

There is an introductory film produced by the National Film Board quite a few years ago (I’d guess late 60’s) about coal mining conditions in Nova Scotia.  Even for a conservative, pro-business person like myself, I’ve got to concede that conditions for the miners were pretty poor.  Actually they were appalling.  Young boys of nine years were routinely employed to work in the mines.   Men were paid for how much coal they were able to deliver to the surface not how much time they spent in the mine nor how much rock they had to remove to get at the coal seam.  The miners had to pay for the timber used for “cribbing” the ceiling and walls. It wasn’t until the early 50’s that the union negotiated that no one under 16 could work in the mines. 

This is a “bull wheel”, basically a large pulley used to haul men or coal to the surface.  The promotional picture of the Men of the Deeps website shows them sitting on this same wheel with the Atlantic Ocean in the background.

 

The highlight of the day is going into a “simulated” coal mine.  The shaft only goes down about 50 feet, but the constantly dripping water and the four foot high chambers gave you a “bit of a feel” for what it would be like to work in an old coal mine.  Our guide for the tour was Abbie Michalik. Abbie is a hale, 75 years old and started in the mines at age 16, learning the business from his father.  He had worked under ground for 50 years, before the mine closed permanently. He told us some pretty chilling stories about mine explosions and collapses.  Especially poignant was after a collapse, the coroner asked for a volunteer to go back into the mine to help in the identification of bodies – Abbie volunteered and helped bring the bodies of his friends to the surface.

  Janet asked Abbie if he had “black lung”, and he told her that he had some but it wasn’t bad; he attributed his good fortune to chewing tobacco and spitting a lot which he claims helped to clear his lungs.  Almost all of the miners suffered or died from black lung.

All of the underground guides are former coal miners and it is sad to think that within the next decade or two, we will lose this “collective memory” of coal mining in Cape Breton.  A must see if you are visiting Cape Breton!

Fortress Louisbourg

Sunday, July 21 – Day 33

We drove from our campground to Fortress Louisbourg located at the north-east end of Cape Breton Island.  The Fortress played a pivotal role in the French occupation of North America in the 1700’s. The fortress was a busy centre of trade and a source of salted cod fish for the homeland.  It was besieged and captured twice by a superior British naval force and was razed after the last capture.  The current fortress was rebuilt on the stone foundations and bastions of the original.  It seems that the French were meticulous about keeping records of even the most mundane aspects of everyday life. 
 
A shuttle bus takes you about 1 km from the visitors centre to the actual fort and other than the  tourists everyone is in period dress.  Costumed interpreters were everywhere throughout the grounds.  We were greeted by a guard at the entrance to the fortress, who challenged us in English and in French before we were allowed to pass through. 
As is typical of the Lewis’s, we were there for most of the day and caught one of the last shuttle buses back to the visitors centre.

From Ma Bell to Mary Ann Falls

Saturday, July 20 – Day 32

We took our time today as it was only about a 10 minute drive from our campsite to downtown Baddeck, Nova Scotia.  We arrived at the Alexander Graham Bell National Historic Site shortly after 10:00 AM. Everyone remembers Bell for his invention of the telephone, but he also developed or improved upon the gramophone and the hydrofoil for boats; he was also involved with the first flight of an aircraft in the British Commonwealth.  It was on frozen Lake Bras D’Or, near his home in Baddeck, NS, in February 1909,  that the Silver Dart was flown.  He was also a teacher of the deaf and invented several hearing aid devices. 

Bell came to the Baddeck area in 1885, to escape the summer heat in Washington, DC and built his summer “home” here the following year. Beinn Bhreagh was the Scottish name that he gave his retreat, meaning “Beautiful Mountain”.  (The family home is still maintained by his heirs and is not open to the public.)  He had already invented the telephone and was wealthy enough to devote his time to other interests.  He was considered a bit of an “eccentric” by the locals because he would often be seen flying tetrahedron kites or trying some new hydrofoil watercraft. The museum has a large number of personal photos and inventions made by Bell and you get a good feeling about the person, that Alexander Graham Bell was.

We spent about 2 1/2 hours in the museum and returned to our trailer for a quick lunch and we were off once again on the Cabot Trail – we were told that we should do the trail from both directions to get a better perspective of the scenery and Cape Breton National Park.  So with that thought in mind we set out once again.  We stopped at many of the scenic lookouts that we saw yesterday in the rain but it was much nicer to actually see something today. 

We had heard about a waterfall (Mary Ann waterfall) on the east side of the park which we understood was only a short distance off of the main Cabot Trail, so we decided to drive there.  We proceeded down a single lane dirt track that had not been graded for some time.  The ridges in the”road” sent the rear-end of the truck skittering across the roadway…the posted maximum speed of 30 Km/hour was optimistic.  It took us close to 1/2 hour to travel the 7 Km.  At the end of the road we had another .2 Km hike to the falls.  This was taking on the trappings of a full fledged expedition.  Janet opted-out and left me to go it alone.  The down hill incline of the path helped get me there fairly quickly. When I went down the final 39 steps I came upon “party central” – there were about 2 dozen kids there drinking and diving off the rocks – in general just having a good time. 

The old man crashing their party didn’t seem to bother them. 

The hike back to the parking lot gave me considerably more exercise.  We finally got home around 7:45.  Janet is getting less and less tolerant of these day long excursions.

The Cabot Trail

Friday, July 19 – Day 31

We headed north out of “Baddeck Cabot Trail Campground” around 9:30 this morning, we took a lunch with us as we expected to be out approximately 5 or 6 hours.  The trail is a 300 Km. loop road in the northern part of Cape Breton Island and includes Cape Breton Island National Park.

Just after we got onto the trail we saw a bag piper at the Gaelic College, we’d like to think that he was piping us in, but realistically he was just practicing. He sounded pretty good.  As good as bag pipes can be.  The east side of the island has a lot of Scottish names that are unpronouncable to most humans.  The scenery along the coast is spectacular and we spent lots of time taking pictures at the scenic overlooks.

  As we were taking pictures at one overlook we came back to our truck to find this guy pecking at the rear window.  He was obviously fending off a rival that he saw in the reflection.  He kept this up for a good 10 minutes – totally oblivious to us and a number of other sight-seers, who were taking more pictures of him than of the scenery.  Even when I got into the back seat he didn’t want to give up the fight.  Crusty old bird!

We continued around the loop till we got to the cut-off to Meat Cove…don’t ask me how it got its name.  We took this road approximately 30 Km. the last 8 Km of which are gravel, up and down hills and valleys till we finally arrived at the most northerly community in Nova Scotia.  There are a few houses and a store that sells gifts and ice cream to the tourists.  There are a few hiking trails that lead off  from here and other than a stony beach there is little else.  I got my feet wet where the Gulf of St. Lawrence meets the Atlantic Ocean.

 

By this time it was already close to 3:45 and we were only 1/2 way around the loop.  The whole east side was waiting for us.  This side of the island has its own spectacular views as well.  To me this is a classic picture of the Cabot Trail, although normally I have seen it photographed in sunshine…sorry, not today!  A light rain had started shortly after we left Meat Cove and continued more or less until we got home.  The last few hours we gave little attention to scenery as we were anxious to get home.  As it was we did not arrive there until 7:30; 10 hours after we had left.  We will try to get back along this coast again before we depart the island.  This seems like a nice area with lots of tiny fishing villages and a distinctly French Acadian flavour.

  

Prince Edward Island–Anne of Green Gables & Cavendish

No trip to PEI would be complete without a visit to the Cavendish home of Anne of Green Gables and it’s author, Lucy Maud Montgomery (LMM).  Like the novel, the Green Gables National Historic Site is a work of fiction.  The building has been re-built and refurnished to the period while the barn is a total reproduction.  But don’t tell the bus-loads of tourists who flock there from around the world.  The tour of the Green Gables house was a shuffle-line from room to room, upstairs, downstairs and then out.  Having said that, the grounds do give you a feel for the setting of LMM’s “Anne of Green Gables” books. 

The best part of this side trip was a visit to the Cavendish Post Office where Canada Post has done a good job of telling about Lucy Maud Montgomery’s life here.  Apparently LMM’s family “the McNeill's” , were the postmasters there and LMM would work at the post office.  The post office “supplied” her with the necessary paper to write her novels and she was able to send the manuscripts to publishers at no cost!  She also explained that, had she not been able to do this she may never have had her works published and it saved her the embarrassment of having her many rejections public knowledge.  The post office also hand cancels post cards and letters here with a special LMM cancellation.

We went a little further down the highway to visit Prince Edward Island National Park.  It is located along the Gulf of St. Lawrence where I dipped my feet into the water.  The shoreline is quite steep in places and finding a sandy section of beach isn’t that easy.  The red sandstone cliffs that we saw coming over the Confederation Bridge extend around to this side of the island.

 

On our final day in Charlottetown we finally got to visit the Lieutenant Governor’s house. On the tour we actually got to go beyond the double grand staircase.  We were standing in the bedroom that, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, (that will be William and Kate to most of us) slept in during their tour in 2011.  Sorry no pictures were allowed on the second floor as it is a private area!

PEI–Orwell Historic Village–East Coast Scenic Drive

 

The Orwell Corner Historic Village is about 25 minutes east of Charlottetown on the way to the Wood Islands Ferry Terminal.  The village consists of mostly original buildings with a few reconstructions.  It captures the essence of rural village life in the mid-1800’s in PEI.  Once you pass through the gates of the visitors centre they do a pretty good job of blocking out 21st. Century technology.       The interpreters that we saw did not wear any watches nor did they have modern eye glasses that would spoil the setting.  The blacksmith was “sweating it out” by the forge making decorative hooks to be sold in the the visitors centre, while the women were giving demonstrations of the many useful articles for sale in the general store.

As it was a slow day, one of the farmers cornered us and proceeded to tell us about every piece of farming equipment that they had in the yard, most of which still operated.  When we were able to escape we went to the schoolhouse. The school held about 40 children from grades 1 to 10 in one room.  Some of the smaller children sat 3 to a desk.  I guess class size was not an issue with teachers at this time.

Afterwards we drove further along the coast to the Cape Bear lighthouse.  The lighthouse is still there and open for tours during the summer but the light has since be removed and replaced by an automatic light. Samuel, a grade 12 student from Montague, PEI gave us the tour of the station and described the former Marconi Wireless station that first received the distress call from the sinking Titanic.  (Cape Race, NL received the signal at the same time but was not a part of Canada then.)

 

 

Prince Edward Island appears so small on the maps of Canada but we were hard pressed to travel the perimeter of the island on the secondary roads that exist there.  We were wishing that we had the rental car back!

Another Rant - Good Service and Bad Service

Technorati Tags: vehicle,automobile,truck,car,repair,service,Halifax,Hammonds Plains,Winnipeg,GM,Birchwood

 

Friday, July 26 – Another post out of order!

Every time that I go to my GM Stealership in Winnipeg I feel that I’m going to Get It In the End.  Not in a pleasant way.  Before our trip, I had taken the truck into Birchwood GM with a braking issue…Every time I depressed the brake pedal the truck would start to brake but when I had slowed to about 10 km/h it would seem to go soft and braking power would diminish until I applied more pressure.  Anyway, when I returned at the end of the day to pick it up the Stealership reported this as a Non-issue and that it was working as it should…I swallowed that one.  Janet does not swallow anything…and she felt that we should get a second opinion.  So while we were in Hammonds Plains, Nova Scotia.  Let me tell you about Hammonds Plains – It is a dot on the map just north of Halifax about 17 Km., where we are camped. They have a few service businesses there and one of them; (fortunately for us) is Hammonds Plains Service Centre .  I phoned them at 7:30 AM and told them I was from out of town and that my wife would divorce me if I didn’t have those @#$%^&* brakes fixed.  The service writer told me that they were fully booked, being a Friday, but she could squeeze me in at 9:00 AM.  I was in their shop by 8:50 and after waiting about 1/2 hour, Danny came out to talk to me…well actually he was not only the tech but he was also one of the owners!  No kidding, the owner actually came out to talk to me. ( At my Stealership, I couldn’t get an audience with a tech or the service manager if my life depended on it.)  Anyway, after test driving it – yes that’s right, they actually took it out to experience the problem, not just scan it -  he was pretty sure that it was a bad sensor on one of the front wheels.  He could order a new part and have it installed this afternoon – he told me the part would be about $250.  I told him that this was a very small price to save my marriage and to go ahead.  He told me he would call around 1:00 or 1:30 PM to advise if the part was in and that I should go back home and bring the truck back later.

Fast Forward 12:51 PM and I’m still eating my lunch.  Hello, yes the part is in and can you bring the truck in…Five minutes later I’m in the reception area.  About 3/4 hour later Danny is out front again with the new part in his hand explaining that he didn’t have to replace the the old part, he just cleaned it up, reinstalled it and checked the gap between the sensor and the rotor.  He had just returned from test driving it AGAIN! …I’m beginning to love this man!!  I told him that this was a long way to come to get my car and truck serviced and do they have a branch office in Winnipeg?…No such luck!  Final bill - $198.32 including a healthy 15% Harmonized Sales Tax for the boys downtown and in Ottawa.

So if you are anywhere near Halifax and need excellent auto service you should check out Hammonds Plains Service Centre .  All their techs are fully qualified and most have years of service experience behind them. They are passionate about training and customer service.

Post Script – Janet and I, are still happily,  amicably, married.

Prince Edward Island

Friday, July 12 to Thursday, July 18   -   Days 24 to 30

Charlottetown

We took the Confederation  Bridge to get to Prince Edward Island. (If you follow this link – also check out the “About” tab – neat design and construction stuff.) This is the longest bridge over ice covered water in the world at 13 kilometers.  An amazing structure that only took 4 years to complete including the approaches and toll plazas.  (The City of Winnipeg could learn some lessons from this massive project.)

In the truck we were able to see over the barricades – that’s a lot of water below us and we could see the red sandstone cliffs of PEI appearing in the distance.  There is no toll going over to PEI but there is a toll coming back – I suppose that is how they increase their population on the island.  And it’s true they grow potatoes on the Island: lots of them from what we could tell travelling towards Charlottetown.  The soil is a deep brick red colour and appears to be derived from those same red sandstone cliffs.

We settled into a Kampground of America (KOA), in Cornwall which is just outside Charlottetown.  Finally a good Wi-Fi connection!  We have been surprised that there is such poor connectivity in the east. This was our home base for exploration of the island.

Charlottetown prides itself on being the Birthplace of Canadian Confederation, although nothing was ever signed at the 1864 Charlottetown Conference and PEI didn’t even join confederation until 1873.  They joined Canada when their railroads needed to be bailed-out of financial difficulty. Their pride in joining confederation is shown in a number of venues around the city. The Confederation Centre of the Arts presents a free, outdoor, noon hour show, daily during July and August.  The show presents a story of Canada from the landing of the white man, to the building of the trans Canada Railroad – immortalized in Gordon Lightfoot’s, Canadian Railroad Trilogy and through to the multi-cultural Canada of today.                                               There are also people in period dress who do impromptu presentations on the street as well as leading guided tours through the downtown.   The other tribute to Confederation is a museum called Founders Hall. This is a multi-median presentation of confederation starting with the Charlottetown Conference of course and working through to the Canadian Centennial in 1967.

 

Lots of nice old buildings in the downtown area.  We went into St. Dunstan’s Basilica which is just down the street from Province House.  I’d never been in such an ornately decorated church in my life.  I can only imagine someplace in Europe that could surpass the beauty of this place.

Sea Caves, Covered Bridges and the Hopewell Rocks

Saturday, July 6 to Thursday, July 11 – Days 18 to 23

Penobsquis, Kings County , New Brunswick

The “tranny transplant” had been posted previously, so I won’t discuss that at length.  Just to get things into the proper chronology…The truck transmission “went south” for us on Saturday afternoon.  We spent the balance of Saturday and Sunday brooding about what we should do next.  We decided that on the following Monday, July 8 we would rent a car and do some touring while we waited for the truck to get fixed.  We rented a Kia Sportage, which was cheap at only $35 dollars a day – no mileage charges.  It was fairly roomy and easy to get in and out of.  The only complaint that I had was the steering tended to be a bit “twitchy” for me.

  We travelled to the tiny, coastal, fishing village of St. Martin via Fundy National Park.  We didn’t spend lots of time in the park but it looks like a great place for hikers.  We had tried to time our trip so that it coincided with low tide that afternoon but it turned out that we were a couple of hours early before we could get into the sea caves.  We decided to catch a couple of covered bridges located on the edge of town.  Kings County has the most covered bridges of any place in Canada and over the course of the few days that we were here we saw six of them.  The reason that they built covered bridges was to protect to wooden beams and bridge decking. They proved most popular though as romantic hide-aways.

We then proceeded to the Fundy Trail, it is a hiking, biking, driving trail that follows the shoreline of the Bay of Fundy.  It starts just east of St. Martin and runs for about 11 Km one way.  We stopped at most of the scenic lookouts into the bay and they were quite spectacular.

 

By the time we returned to St. Martin the tide had gone out and we were able to walk to the sea caves. Really quite neat. The picture on the left shows one of the caves when we arrived – the picture on the right shows the same cave at low tide with people walking on the beach at its mouth.

 

The Hopewell Rocks is one of the prime attractions on the Bay of Fundy.  Again to really appreciate them you should try to see them at both high and low tides. We were fortunate enough to have the time to do this. In fact they sell tickets that are good for two consecutive days. There are two highs and two lows in 24 hours and 52 minutes – the difference between a high & a low is about 6 hours and 13 minutes. You can walk on the ocean floor 3 hours before and 3 hours after the low tide.  These formations are called the “Flower Pots”.  At left you can see people walking around and through the arches; on the left you could paddle through on a kayak – as many people sign-up to do.

 

The Fundy tides are the highest in the world due to the shape of the bay, which becomes shallower and narrower the further up the bay you go.  The volume of water that rushes into the bay twice a day is approximately 100 cubic Kilometers. I suppose for Maritimers this is just an everyday occurrence but for this couple from the prairies it is absolutely amazing.