Jake's Journey: Perce, Quebec to Five Islands Provincial Park, Nova Scotia

We've covered a lot of ground, since I posted last. The blue arrow at the top of the map is Perce in Quebec. That's where we were when I last gave you an update. Tonight - Thursday, September 13 - we are in Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, which is next to the red arrow near the bottom of the map.

Also wanted to tell you that I forgot to download pictures from Mom and Dad's camera last week, before I posted. They don't use the big camera often. They mostly use their phones. I found this picture from their hike to Land's End. Thought you would like to see an Atlantic Grey Seal. They saw this guy and 7 or 8 of his best friends swimming around. Thought they were pretty cute.

But now, let me take you back to Perce and catch you up with what we've been doing for the last week or so.

Thursday, September 6 - This morning was beautiful and Mom and Dad decided to go into Perce. They walked along the Boardwalk and took a few photos of the "pierced" rock, which gives the town its name. It's a big rock, over 1500 feet long, nearly 400 feet tall, and nearly 400 feet wide. It sheds more than 300 tons of stone each year!

This was MY view, taken from our campground.

taken from the Boardwalk in town

Another view

The harbor in another nearby village.

They learned that Perce was originally a cod fishing village, but with dwindling stocks of cod, the town has become a tourist mecca for eastern Canada. It's a popular honeymoon destination for people in Quebec.

Friday, September 7 - This morning we left Perce and moved down the road about an hour to the town of Chandler. Chandler is host to a special event known as Nova Lumina. Dad saw information about this about a week ago and was able to get tickets. It's hard to explain what "it" is, but the best way that I can explain it is that it's a hike along the beach and through the woods, at night, and you see a light show. Everyone gets a "torch" that helps light the way and is synchronized to the light show. If you want to know more about it, it was done by a company called Moment Factory and their web-site is momentfactory.com. They've done installations around the world and produced concerts for several major popular music stars. Anyway, here are some photos of what they saw ...

They thought it was really cool and they were glad that it worked out that they could see it.

Saturday, September 8 - Today we left Chandler and headed toward New Brunswick. We stopped at the Battle of Restigouche National Historic Site which was a key battle in the 1750's between the French and English for control of Canada. The historic site had portions of a frigate that sunk in the battle and was recovered in dive operations in 1969-1972. Mom and Dad thought it was cool to see such an old ship.

Then, we said au revoir to Quebec and crossed the bridge into Campbellton, New Brunswick. We also crossed into the Atlantic Time Zone, so now it's 1 hour later than the East Coast of the US and 4 hours later than at home in the Pacific Time Zone.

The bridge to Campbellton

Shortly after we crossed into New Brunswick, and got outside of town, we saw a bear along the side of the road. Mom and I were so afraid that he was going to walk across the road before Dad could slow down, that neither one of us thought to get out a camera and take a picture of him.

We decided to stop for the night at Wal-Mart in Miramichi, New Brunswick. This Wal-Mart closed at 10 pm, so it was THE quietest Wal-Mart that we've ever stayed in. Just us and 3 other rigs all night. Great stop!

Sunday, September 9 - Today, we saw a fox. It was bigger than the foxes that we have in our neighborhood. After a little while, we crossed into Nova Scotia.

Our stop for the next two nights is Five Islands Provincial Park. When we checked in, they told Mom that they could take a hike at low tide and see some really cool red cliffs. Mom and Dad decided to do it.