Nova Scotia – Oh the Colours

Cape Breton Island

We arrived about dinner time from Newfoundland and set out in search of our overnight camping spot. Heidi, in her role of co-pilot, has become adept at locating various types of accommodations for Klara and her inhabitants. We use a few tools extensively to find campsites, the website freecampsites.net, and three apps, Allstays, iOverlander and Harvest Hosts. In the shoulder season these tools have become increasingly important as provincial and private campsites begin closing near the end of September through mid-October. Allstays and iOverlander can pinpoint for-a-fee campsites but we have become use to using freecampsites.net and especially iOverlander to locate free spots to overnight. These have locations in many of the most beautiful seaside spots. The app shows the location and description, which are crowdsourced and really up to date, including reviews and pictures of the sites and the exact GPS coordinates, so Google Maps can show us the way. Both Newfoundland and Nova Scotia are very flexible and welcoming of this type of spur-of-the-moment camping. In our first two months travelling we estimate we only paid for one in four overnight camping spots. Rule of thumb has been, if we stay multiple days, we pay for a site but if we are going one-day-at-a-time we wild-camp using these apps. The continued access to these spots is dependant on being discreet and being responsible in the use of these parking spots. Take only memories, leave only footsteps is our motto.

Heidi located a gem of a spot at the entrance to the Cabot Trail right on a spit of land jutting out into a quiet inlet. We were treated to the most magnificent sunset to welcome us back to Nova Scotia. We were really excited because we were meeting my aunt and cousin at her stone house in Cregnish, (more to come about this amazing spot), but before they arrive from Ontario, we have four days to explore the Cabot trail. This portion of our trip is highly anticipated as early to mid-October is when the colours turn in the Maritimes, but especially on Cape Breton. We also researched the various hiking options and discovered a few of the top trails in all of Canada are on this circuit.

Our initial day was spent exploring Baddeck as we were still in search of a lobster dinner and a ceilidh, both of which we discovered in Baddeck. The weather was spectacular, low twenty’s with brilliant blue skies, so we explored the little town on foot. There is a national site in honor of Alexander Graham Bell in Baddeck, which we found interesting and highly educational. I knew of his historical significance with the telephone but was unaware how important his research was in the helping the deaf. Bell’s grandfather, father, and brother were all involved in the research and development around speech and elocution and both Bell’s mother and wife were deaf. It was during his work to develop technology to assist the deaf that led to the breakthrough that allowed for the development of the telephone, the invention he became best known for. He later would say, the telephone was a distraction from his most important work, helping the deaf community. Bell also was in the equivalent of an air race with the Wright brothers with his experimental aircraft, the Silver Dart, which took flight only weeks after the Wright brother flight at Kittyhawk. Bell’s connection to Baddeck was, he took a summer home in the area that they used every chance they could. It was on the lake at Baddeck that the initial tests of the prototype kites were flown, which led to the development of his aircraft. Bell also hosted the first classrooms that integrated deaf and hearing kids. This work led to the wider integration and acceptance of the hearing impaired group.

The lobster dinner was worth the wait and served as a delayed celebration of our 30-year anniversary. The waitress was impressed with our lobster dexterity as there was nothing left but the shells. Afterward we were treated to a ceilidh at the church hall, across the street from our restaurant. It had been almost 18 months since these types of gatherings were allowed, so we felt very fortunate to take in this authentic Cape Breton celebration of music. The Celtic music scene is woven into the fabric of the island, and we were so fortunate to have my Cousin, Lorrie Mackinnon to show us the ropes. She had found this event for us, and she knew the performers personally, so we were treated to the very best music and step dancing. What a great introduction to Nova Scotia.

It had been a few days since we’ve been out on a hiking trail so we were itching to get back. The Cape Breton Highlands National park is only a few kilometres north of Baddeck and we decided to pick the two best hikes on this coast to begin our trip around the Cabot trail. We settled on the Franey trail as being the first hike we would undertake as it has a reputation for its stunning views especially during the season of colours on Cape Breton. As with most of our hikes we chose one there was between five and ten kilometres long but more importantly was in a moderate range as we planned two hikes for this day. The climb to the top of Franey trail was steep in areas but we enjoyed it as the weather was perfect and we were rewarded with amazing views when we reached the top. When we got to one of the viewpoints we struck up a conversation with a few young women who are there enjoying the view and getting their Instagram photos. Through the conversation we found out that one of the girls was from Boston MA and was up taking a nursing course. We explained our dilemma with the border still being closed and that we were looking for someone with American citizenship to drive Klara across the border for us. She sounded very interested but explained that her course load would not allow for her to take a few days off but she suggested that her parents may be coming up from Massachusetts to visit her and that with enough warning they might be able to assist us. We exchanged numbers and told her there was no pressure but that it for parents did show any interest that they should read our blog to ensure that they were not getting connected with some lowlife just looking for a mule to take their drugs across the border. After a chuckle she agreed that would be a clever idea and we parted ways with a smile.

On our descent we traveled by three beautiful lakes and finally decided to stop and have our lunch at the last one. We always pack a lunch or snack whenever we go hiking, as somewhat of a reward for our effort when we reached the midway point of the hike. Relaxing by this beautiful lake, enjoying the weather and our little lunch, we really appreciated how lucky we are to be healthy and have the chance to see our beautiful country on foot.

Inside the park was an iconic hotel, called the Celtic lodge, that sat on a spit poking out into the ocean. We decided to explore this hotel, which would be in the same category as the Banff Springs, given its unique place in the National Park. The bonus was that middle head trail, one of the top hikes left on this coast, was adjacent to the hotel so we could kill two birds with one stone. As it turns out this hotel is both beautiful, but is also a destination for golfers as there is a beautiful links course adjacent to it. We decided to take the hike on middle head before doing the tour of the hotel and so we drove out to the parking lot at the trailhead. It’s here where the story gets interesting, as I was making a sharp turn at the end of the parking lot, and with the super short turning radius, I rubbed the back tire of Klara badly, taking a few layers off of the tire. After letting off some steam, as I was pretty angry with myself, I decided to take the hike to calm down and deal with the tire on my return. This turned out to be a great plan as you will hear in a minute but back to the trail. The trail followed the coast of the spit far out into the bay, providing magnificent views from every viewpoint. Even this late in the year the trail was busy, which was a departure from what we had experienced in Newfoundland.

When we arrived back, I crawled under Klara and started to remove the spare tire, which immediately caused a group to form around the rig, with everyone providing their opinions or asking if they could help. One gentleman in particular, whose name was Percy, said that he could help us by bringing his hydraulic Jack over from home to help us lift Klara to remove and replace the tire. Percy also said “give me the spare tire and I’ll clean it off and make sure that it’s holding air”. When we told him that that wasn’t necessary his wife said, “he does this all the time, just let him do it”. So I loaded it into the back of his truck and off Percy went and returned about 30 minutes later with the hydraulic Jack and the tire. Not only had he cleaned off the tire, but found that it was not holding air, so he took the tire down to a shop, removed it, had the seal repaired and refilled it before returning. Percy refused to take any money for his effort, so we bought a gift certificate at a local restaurant that Percy and his wife told us they really enjoyed. The hospitality and kindness of the maritimers is amazing, we could all learn a lesson from them.

We left the park heading north navigating along the coast popping into the little harbours along the way. We have found the most interesting drives are the little roads that wind their way along the coast in between these little harbour towns. This truly provides a glimpse of how the people of Canada live when you get outside the large cities and wander along the back roads of Canada. We have found that the people are both warm and hospitable, with most of the most magical places we have seen along the way have resulted from recommendations of these locals as we stop for a chat. In the Maritimes we have also sought out the little harbour towns with lighthouses as they always provide an amazing backdrop to the fabric of these harbour towns that make up much of rural maritimes. We visited three such towns as we worked our way up to the northern tip of Cape Breton in search of the best seafood chowder. We are traveling at a time when the fisheries are out of season too late for the haddock fishery and too early for the lobster fishery so most of the little harbours are filled with small fishing boats of so many colours you can’t imagine it. First little harbour we visited was Neil’s harbour, where the locals had told us the best seafood chowder on this side of the island was to be had unfortunately we arrived too early as they opened at two and we arrived before lunch. We decided we didn’t want to wait, agreeing that we would find seafood chowder elsewhere, so we continued north to the very most northern point on Cape Breton at Bay St. Lawrence near Cape north. We had intended to go to a small place, called Meat Cove, that we read had great hiking trails nearby, plus our cousin Lorrie MacKinnon had said was a beautiful quaint little town worth visiting. We had sought the guidance of some of the locals in terms of what type of road we would encounter on the way up and universally they said “it’s generally pretty rough with some pretty big potholes” so we shied away from it and instead headed down the road in the direction of Cheticamp on the far west side of the island. Ingonish beach on the East Coast and Cheticamp on the West Coast are the sites of the two national park campsites in Cape Breton Highlands National Park. We had hiked extensively in the Ingonish beach area but chose not to overnight there instead opting to go up and over the top of the park and to settle in at Cheticamp for the evening.

Before we arrived at our campsite we decided to do the skyline trail one of the iconic hikes in Highlands National Park. This trail is known for the sunsets as it faces due West and is perched on the edge of the cliffs overlooking the ocean. Unlike the other trails that we had encountered so far this was like Disneyland in that it was so busy that the first parking lot was full and we were relegated into the bus area of the second parking lot. The hike out and back was 8kms and was packed with other visitors making their way out to see the iconic views from the cliffs. Heidi and I found it somewhat uncomfortable in that it was impossible to social distance and no one was wearing masks so we took our time and in the end really enjoyed the views but we’re happy to be back in Klara and on our way to the campsite. It had been so long since we had been in a national campsite that Heidi and I had totally overlooked the fact that we would need a reservation and so when we arrived we just helped ourselves to the first campsite that look good for Clara. It wasn’t until a woman came up asking if we were in the right campsite that it struck us that we couldn’t just help ourselves to any site and this poor woman was arriving late at night in the dark only to find someone else in her site. We moved out of her site into another unserviced site that we found online and learned a lesson from it, which is you can’t just show up and claim a site, even late in the year.

 After checking out of the campsite in Cheticamp we started to work our way South to the stone house in Creignish, which is owned by my cousin Lorrie MacKinnon.  This house has great historical significance to me in that it was built by my great great great Grandfather back in 1801. He was the first of the McMaster clan to make their way from Scotland to Nova Scotia in the late 1700s and he laid claim to his land and built his stone house in 1801. The home had remained in the family until the 1950s when it was sold to a family. My cousin Lorrie, who is the genealogist in our family following in her father’s footsteps, had researched and learned about the history of the McMaster stone house. Lorrie already had a true love for Cape Breton, travelling yearly to spend time taking in the music and garlic culture. Lorrie is fluent in Gaelic having attended the Gaelic college nearby and is in love with the music of Cape Breton, having learned to play the fiddle in top of being an accomplished pianist. In 2012 Lorrie realized a dream of hers when she purchased the stone house and 132 acres of land it sits on, returning the house to the original family for the first time in over 60 years. Lorrie lovingly restored  the old house to its original glory, with the help of local craftsman. Lorrie’s beautiful stone house had been featured in numerous publications, and on the CBC, for her outstanding project of restoration. The stone house is the oldest family home on Cape Breton island, the stones walls are three feet thick and the original hued beams are over 200 years old,  something that needs to be seen to be appreciated.

 Lorrie and her mom, Aunt Rita, arrived out from Ontario to put their summer place to bed for the winter. We had coordinated our return from Newfoundland to coincide with their arrival so we would have an opportunity for a good visit and to see this beautiful and historic stone house. We had also timed our return to Cape Breton so that it would coincide with the Celtic colours festival, which runs for the first two weeks of October and celebrates Celtic music. Unfortunately, due to COVID-19, the international performers could only perform remotely using zoom, but the locals still were holding music events around the island much to our delight. Lorre and her mom we’re a fountain of information about where to go who to listen to and what to see on this beautiful island. We spent five nights with them at the stone house and we were going flat out the whole time, seeing parts of the island that we would never have been able to see without Lorrie’s guidance. My ageless aunt Rita kept step for step with us the whole way, even taking a hike with us down to see Egypt falls, and take it from me, this hike was not for the faint of heart. The hike was rated hard on Alltrails, our hiking app, and at points you require ropes to either lower yourself down or to pull yourself back up the trail. I give aunt Rita full credit, this was no easy trail, even for a middle aged like me.

On two of the nights we went into the harbour town of Mabou where we had dinner and listened to some amazing Celtic music at a little restaurant /pub called the Red Shoe, which is owned by a couple sisters from the famous Rankin family. This place is so popular the the first night, if it weren’t for Lorrie’s reputation and relationships, we would surely have been on the outside looking in. As it was, we were able to get a seat and experience some fantastic Celtic music,(fiddle guitar and piano), with one of the performers being a former premier of the province of Nova Scotia, Rodney MacDonald. The second night we took in a doubleheader, first a lovely dinner and wonderful music at the red shoe and then across the street for a community concert hosted in the parish hall that included both music and step dancing from many of the locals in and around the Mabou area. Poor Lorrie must have driven over 1000 kilometres in the five days we were there, from one end of the island to the other and back again taking in music, visit the local beaches, sampling the beers at the local brewery and seeing the colours of Cape Breton. All the time spent was special as Lorrie and Rita were able to explain in detail how rich my family’s history was in this area. I will be forever grateful for their patience and for their knowledge of family history.

North Coast of Nova Scotia

My maternal grandmother was a McMaster and in the area around Craignish and Port Hood many Macmasters can be found in local graveyards. My mother’s maiden name was McKinnon and her father haled from Antigonish NS, across the causeway from the stone house. Nova Scotia is rich wth the history of the Scottish families settling in Canada to begin new lives and my roots trace straight back to this wonderful place. Leaving the stone house was really hard as we had such a wonderful time with Lori and Rita, we really didn’t want to go, but if we were to see the rest of Nova Scotia we needed to get on our way again.

Thanks to Lorrie’s encyclopedic knowledge of our family genealogy, I was able to connect and have a telephone conversation with my mom’s first cousin Florence, who still lives in Antigonish. After speaking with Florence she suggested dropping by to meet with her daughter, so we stopped by the library at Saint Xavier University, the university my mom attended, and had a chat with and met my second cousin Margie. Margie lives outside Antigonish in a small town of Airsaig and she suggested the lighthouse was a great spot to stay the night, so we followed the coastline along and visit both lighthouses along the way, staying at the last one overnight. These impromptu overnight stays have become a norm for us on this trip and always end up being ideal spots for Clara and her inhabitants. Next door to the lighthouse what’s a provincial park and we visited it in the morning then took a very interesting hike in and around the coastline that is littered with fossils.

We moved on down the road to Truro where we intended to do some shopping at the Stanfield outlet store at the suggestion of our cousin Lori. Stanfield’s is best known for their line of underwear but since being introduced to salmon fishing by our friends Stacey and Kim we have learned that Stanfield’s also make terrific line of wool items as well as yoga wear and baselayers for skiing. After securing our haul of we moved on down the road in the direction of the Parrsboro shores on the north side of the Nova Scotia Bay of Fundy.

The Bay of Fundy is known for having the highest tides in the world and also resulting in amazing cliffs that dot the shoreline along the coast. We tried to camp at the five islands provincial park but again we’re disappointed to find out that all the Nova Scotia parks were closed by now. We stayed in a little trailhead parking lot overnight, after hiking through the parks numerous trails, and left in the morning in the direction of Cape de Oro lighthouse. The lighthouse is perched at the edge of a spit with dramatic cliffs on either side with caves being visible from the lighthouse, but inaccessible due to the high tide. It appeared that, at one point, there had been a campsite where the parking lot stood that had since been decommissioned. We decided to stay the night and move on in the morning, and we were glad we did, because we got to witness the massive tide changes that Cape de Oro is best known for. The closest thing I have personally experienced was seeing the tide changes at the skookumchuk narrows, on the sunshine coast in British Columbia.

Heidi had read about an amazing set of cliffs on the North Coast of this peninsula that was known for its fossils, so we got on the road and wound around the end of the peninsula and arrived at Joggins Fossil Cliffs, with its terrific beach with amazing fossils. Upon arrival we prepared and ate lunch in the parking lot, and now fortified, made our way down to the beach to witness this amazing site. As we traversed the beach, we could see specimens of fossils embedded in rocks just lying at your feet, which had tumbled down from these limestone cliffs. It’s humbling to think that what we were witnessing was the result of massive climate change over 300 million years ago, which trapped these plants and animals inside these rock structures. During the summer the only access to the beach is through guided tours provided by the government, but during this quiet time, with the exception of one or two other couples, we had the beach to the to ourselves.

We left the North Coast of the Bay of Fundy and circled around into the North Coast of Cobequid Bay and the Minus basin. Along here we saw similar examples of extremely high tides and very interesting Cliff formations riddled with fossils. The weather was beautiful and we looked on our app, iOverlander, and found a beautiful beachside campsite at a place called Mutton Bay. Even if we were to pay for a campsite, I’m not sure we could have found a more beautiful spot, right on the ocean all by ourselves. We witnessed the tide swings that went from lows of 11 feet to highs of 56 feet in less than 12 hours, Heidi slept with one eye open as our rig was 50-75 feet from the high tide line. We carried on the next morning to Blomidon Provincial Park for a terrific hike and the night was spent at another iOverlander site called Houston beach. Another marvellous free site right on the Bay of Fundy. Each morning we began our day walking on the beach and we made a decision that we were going to, if possible, discover every bit of coastline in Nova Scotia with the time that we had left. If we carried on west down the same coast we would be in the famous Annapolis valley, known for its wineries and orchards. We made the decision to delay exploring this part of the coast as we intended to leave Nova Scotia via ferry to New Brunswick from Digby at the other end of this coast. We instead crossed over the middle of the province to Halifax to begin exploring the south coast.

South Coast of Nova Scotia

We arrived in Halifax with beautiful weather for mid-October, and found a great overnight camping spot right downtown next to the cruise ship terminal. We were within walking distance of the beautiful waterfront, and Halifax is extremely walkable, so we set off on foot to explore. We stopped first at the immigration museum, which highlighted the pivotal role this pier played for many incoming future Canadians, like Heidi’s mother. This pier was the equivalent of Ellis island in the US, welcoming a good majority of incoming immigrants arriving by boat to the shores of their new homes in Canada. This was a fascinating tour and we were able to see pictures of the actual boat Heidi’s mom arrived on in 1953, before making her way to Montreal to begin her new life in Canada.

We toured the Halifax waterfront on A beautiful sunny day and afterwards climbed the hill up to the citadel National Historic site to tour the Fort. We were lucky enough to arrive just before noon and to see the 12:00 o’clock gun go off holy smokes what a bang we measured it at 125 decibels. Heidi and I decided that Halifax was a cross between Vancouver and Victoria in terms of the beautiful waterfront and the manageable and walkable type of city that it was. We had really wanted to see the Maud Lewis exhibit at the Halifax Art Museum but unfortunately it was closed on the days we were in Halifax so instead we spent our time discovering Halifax parks such as the botanical gardens and point pleasant park at the tip of Halifax harbour. That night we headed out for a wonderful lobster dinner as we had had real difficulty finding it during our journey through the maritimes. With the weather being as beautiful as it was, and all that we had heard of the southern beaches of Nova Scotia, we decided to push on down to the south coast

Peggy’s Cove, our first stop, is the site of one of the most recognizable lighthouses in Canada which had recently under gone a facelift around the lighthouse to provide wheelchair accessible access to this beautiful site. Peggy’s Cove is tiny, with only a few hundred inhabitants, but during the summer swells to thousands who make their way out to see the craggy coast and this iconic lighthouse. Even for this time of year it was busy so we took the obligatory pictures and then got out of town to take in one of the best hikes in the area. The hike was relatively short, about 5K, but as usual we ran into other hikers and struck up a conversation that resulted in being invited to visit them in New Brunswick, Maritimers are so damn friendly. We decided to stay out at the trailhead and make dinner and wait for dark to go back into peggy’s Cove as we intended to stay at the Information Centre parking lot overnight. In the offseason not many people pay attention to the RV’s that park in the parking lots, pretty much a live and let live attitude all through this part of the world. There were two or three other RV’s parked and so we feel safety in numbers and less chance of getting rousted in the event someone took exception to our camping overnight. On the whole we’ve never really been hassled by anyone anywhere in the maritimes as a matter of fact we got good guidance from locals as to where would be the best place to stay so really amazing. We took a slow and lazy route following the coastline away from Peggy’s Cove through all the little harbour towns as we made our way South.

We stopped for an ice cream in Mahone Bay, a quaint little historic town, before heading on to Lunenburg, one of the most recommended stops in Nova Scotia. We invested in a membership called Harvest Host, which allows members to book overnight stays at brewery’s, farm stands and wineries. The expectation of the businesses is that for staying for free you will buy something from their establishment. We booked into the Lightship Brewery and the location was amazing, right on the harbour only a stones through away from the Bluenose, the famous sailing schooner that graces the Canadian 10 cent coin. The tours of the graceful old girl was closed for the season but getting to see her was a great pleasure. We enjoyed a couple of hours inside the brewery restaurant chatting with the staff and locals while the rain fell outside, and resumed our exploration of the town after the rain abated. At the recommendation of the brewery staff we took in the local BBQ restaurant, but after having spent so much time in Houston over my career, this just didn’t compare. We had the parking lot to ourselves overnight and awoke to enjoy our morning coffee overlooking Lunenburg harbour.

The weather forecast was deteriorating later in the week so there was some urgency to our exploration of the southern beaches before losing the beautiful weather. We were amazed at the beauty and number of deserted white sandy beaches we found meandering along the coast. We walked along at least 6-8 over the next few days, each one amazing unto themselves. We stayed at a series of deserted beaches or lighthouses and had to imagine what these places would look like in the busy summer season. I would highly recommend exploring this part of the province, as the beauty of the beaches was unexpected and stunning. Heidi and I both remarked it reminded us of Mexico.

Yarmouth, Digby and the Annapolis Valley

With the weather turning bad on us we made our way to the larger town of Yarmouth. Yarmouth serves as one of the exit point from Nova Scotia to the USA, but with COVID-19 and the travel restriction, the ferry was not running, instead the terminal was under renovations. This meant we were now forced to exit Canada through New Brunswick, if and when the border opened again. We were hopeful this would happen, because if not we would need to skedaddle back across Canada before winter set in on the prairie. Klara is a bit of a diva, snow is NOT to her liking.   

We needed to do laundry and wanted to have a swim and visit the library, all typical rainy day activities for us. There was another storm forecast so we chose to move away from the waterfront, where we stayed the first night, and ride out the wind and rain once again. After a few days of rain we were itching for a hike so we made our way up to Digby and out into the long spit of land. We took two ferries to reach the end, one of which was quite and adventure as the wind and tides had our ferry rocking like a teeter-totter. We arrived at the camping spot we located using iOverlander at the end of a dirt road right on the beach. We hiked around this area for a day but ran out of activities to keep us busy so worked our way back up the long spit, hiking along the way.

We ended up at Digby and stayed overnight at the old visitors Center parking lot overlooking Digby Harbour. We went out to dinner looking to taste the world famous Digby scallops. We were not disappointed, mine were pan fried and Heidi order her three ways, pan fried, deep fried and wrapped in bacon and baked. The portions were generous, a dozen large scallops for about $20.00. After dinner we took in a game of bowling, we both embarrassed ourselves but had great fun.

Digby itself was a beautiful little harbour town, very well preserved and an obvious hub for fishing in this area but also served as the gateway to the Annapolis valley. The valley would be the equivalent of the Niagara region, the Napa Valley or for those from back home in BC the Okanagan valley. This beautiful valley is bordered  by ranges of mountains, ( if you could call them that),  and is dotted with farms, orchards, wineries, and the odd brewery, which attracts millions of tourists each year. Because we were visiting the valley out of season none of these were offering tours so we resumed our exploration of the coast checkered with hikes in between. After hearing the good news about the border we found out that our plans to visit New Brunswick we’re not going to workout. Due to COVID-19 outbreaks there had been a circuit breaker health alert announced limiting visitors and locals to travel within their health region and visitor interaction. This meant that we were going to need to kill another week in Nova Scotia and decided to return to Halifax to see the Maud Lewis exhibit that we had missed on our last visit and to return to the South Coast to visit some of the points we passed by due to weather. This also gave us an opportunity to travel one of the last national highways we had not driven through the middle of the province and to visit the Kejimkujik National Park along the way.

Our return to Halifax was for just one day, enough time to take in a movie in the evening and when we arose the next day to visit the Maude Lewis exhibit at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia. Maude Lewis is a renowned maritime artist whose simple life in Nova Scotia became as famous as her art. She initially became famous in Canada after a piece on the CBC, but later became well known worldwide due to the critically acclaimed movie Maudie, starring Sally Hawkins and Ethan Hawke. I would highly recommend the exhibit and the movie.

We move soft again spending a night in Bridgewater and then making our way down the coast to Liverpool where we stayed in a free campsite adjacent to the Hank Snow museum. It was at this campsite that we ran into another couple who were on an even longer adventure than ours. Ernst and Erica were from Switzerland and we’re driving a 4×4 Mercedes camper van. They had purchased their camper in Germany in 2016 and hand immediately shipped it to South America to begin their journey. They had spent three to four months each year navigating their way from the southern tip of South America through Central America and into the US over the course of the next three years. As with all of us their plans we’re stymied in 2019 and 2020 but they resumed their journey this year in Vancouver. They had spent four months crossing Canada but were completing their four year trip only two days from now in Halifax, where they were shipping their camper back home to Europe. We agreed to stay in touch and to visit them in Switzerland on our next trip to Europe. I was inspired with their sense of adventure and was enthralled by their trip and intend to look into a similar rugged adventure RV with the hopes of retracing their steps at some point in the future.

We left Liverpool in the morning making our way through the centre of the province and up to the National Park to do one of the many hikes available. We had a great day with wonderful weather but we’re undecided as to where we were going to stay the night as the campsite was closed for the year. Heidi suggested we go have a look at the Information Centre to see if it might be a candidate to park for the night and when we got there the park warden was just getting into his truck. We rolled our window down and in the nicest possible Canadian way we asked if it would be OK with him if we parked overnight. He smiled and said “officially I must say no but since me and that guy right over there”, pointing at one of his colleagues’” are the only ones checking tonight and you guys look like you’re trustworthy I will look the other way. I just don’t want to come back and find you having a barbecue in the parking lot”. We laughed and said of course we wouldn’t we would be completely discreet and then made our way to the corner of the parking lot to set up for a quiet night.

The next day we drove to Digby to catch our ferry and end the last part of our Nova Scotia journey. Heidi and I both remarked at what a special place Nova Scotia is and how much we loved our time there. If we had to chose to live anywhere else in Canada, we both agreed, it would be here.