Acadia National Park

Saturday, October 6 - Today we left Fundy National Park.   It seems that in all the National Parks in Canada, they have red Adirondack Chairs in places where you should sit down and enjoy the view.  The idea is that you are supposed to take your photo sitting in them and then post it to Social Media.  Mom and Dad have seen the chairs in lots of places, but they haven't taken any photos.  We stopped at an overlook, as we were leaving the park.  A nice lady offered to take our picture.

This was our view from the chairs.

The trees are even prettier today.  Mom took a turn at driving.

In fact, Mom was still driving when we got to the US Border.  After a 30 minute wait, it was our turn.  Mom handed the Customs Agent their passports and he said that it was the sign of a good marriage when the wife is driving.  😉  He asked about the food we had on board and asked if I was friendly.  Then he said that he needed to come inside.  He looked in our refrigerator and in the bathroom.  Apparently didn't see anything interesting, because he came came back up and petted me and said goodbye.  Then he went back in his booth, gave Mom the passports and we were on our way.

Our home for the next few nights is the Timberland Acres RV Park in Trenton, Maine.  We are staying here, because it's one of the few campgrounds near Acadia National Park that is still open.  It closes on October 15.

Sunday, October 7 - Today Mom and Dad went to Acadia National Park.  They were talking about going for a hike.  That sounded like too much effort for me.

Not a very good first impression.  It's starting to 

sprinkle and there are people EVERYWHERE!

This is a place called Thunder Hole.  It's supposed to be spectacular at High 

Tide, but it's low tide now.  Even so, they are all waiting for "the big one".

This is taken from the same place, but looking in the other direction.  

The waves crashing over these rocks is just as spectacular, but just a few people.

Mom and Dad decided that a hike up Gorham Mountain might have less people.

They enjoyed Gorham Mountain, which is not accessible by car.  There were people, but much less crowded than the other areas of the park that they've seen.  After Gorham Mountain, they took a drive to the top of Cadillac Mountain.  Beautiful views there, too.

Lots of people trying to get into the parking lot.  This is at least 1/2 mile 

from the summit.  Mom and Dad ran into a traffic jam when they got near 

the top, so they parked at a pullout and walked the rest of the way.  When 

they got back to the bottom, they saw that rangers had put up a barricade.  

They were only letting cars go up as other cars came down.  

Monday, October 8 - Mom and Dad went back to Acadia National Park today.  It was a nice sunny day and the crowds are smaller.  Here are a few pictures of their day.

We are currently at Croton Point Park at Croton-on-Hudson, New York.  I'll tell you about our trip here and what we've been doing in my next post.

Love,

Doolin

Fundy National Park/Hopewell Rocks, New Brunswick

Thursday and Friday, October 4 and 5 -  I usually tell you about each day of Mom and Dad's adventures, but a visit to Hopewell Rocks (aka the Flower Pot Rocks) is all about the tides and that usually takes two days to experience, so this is going to be a combo entry. 

On Thursday Mom and Dad experienced low tide.  On Friday, they went back for High Tide.  These photos were taken from about the same spot.

Low Tide

High Tide

To give you a sense of scale, that's Mom next to one of the rocks.

The water level changes 46 vertical feet between high and low tide.   It can change as fast as 13 feet per hour!  In addition to the dramatic tide changes, the rocks are really colorful.  As a bonus, we are also starting to get a little fall color in the trees.

The brown stuff on the base of the rocks is seaweed.  

Again for scale, that's Dad in front of the rock.  

The seaweed is all below water level at high tide.

The seaweed makes interesting swirling patterns.

Mom's been wanting to see a big moose.  

She finally found one.

Here is one more example of the tides, taken near our campground at Fundy National Park.

Mom and Dad spent much of the day on Thursday walking around on the Ocean Floor looking at the Hopewell Rocks.  When they went back on Friday morning at low tide to take a few photos, but it was a relatively short visit.  In the afternoon, they came back to Fundy National Park and did a little exploring nearby.

View of the shore from their hike.

Lovely little babbling brook.  OH WAIT!  That's the trail!!

It's a beautiful day today, but it's been rainy for the last few days.

Well, that pretty well wraps up our stay at Fundy National Park and Mom and Dad's visit to the nearby Hopewell Rocks.  I still need to tell you about our stay at Acadia National Park.  I'll try to do that soon.  

Love, 

Doolin

Cape Breton Island - Part 4

Monday – October 1 - Today we left the Mira River Provincial Park and drove about 2 hours to Battery Provincial Park.  It was named Battery because it was a support site to the Fortress at Louisbourg and was transferred between the French and the English a couple of times in the 1700's.  

It's next to the St Peters Canal which separates St Peters Bay and the Bras d'Or Lake.  In the 1700's, they would portage boats between the lake and the bay over this narrow strip of land.  The Canal was completed in 1867.  We learned that it is unusual that it connects a lake that is relatively constant level with a bay that is affected by the Tides.  Depending on the point in the tide cycle, the water on the Lake side may be higher or the water on the Bay side may be higher.  

 

Standing at the middle of the canal and looking to the left and then to the right.

 

When you arrive at the canal by boat, you are greeted by this lovely banner 

and a high tech communication device to contact the lockmaster.

The road bridge crosses the canal and was replaced just last year.  Since the canal 

is sometimes used by sailboats with tall masts, the bridge needs to be able 

to move out of the way.  It spins in the middle on these wheels.  

It hardly seems possible that all that weight can rest on such little surface.

When Mom and Dad got back from looking at the canal, we all went outside.  I took a look under the picnic table (first place I look, after the fire pit).  I think Battery Provincial Park is THE BEST place we've stayed.  Our campsite came with a free bone!!!!

At first I was a little stunned and all I could do was admire 

it and marvel at my good fortune.

Then, bliss!

Followed by a beautiful sunset over St Peters Bay (view from our campsite).

Tuesday – October 2 - Dad needed to do some work for a client and needed Internet access.  We don't have Internet access at our campsite, so he and Mom went into town to the Visitor Information Center.  Travel Tip - There is a Visitor Information Center in most towns in Atlantic Canada and they have free wi-fi.   

After Dad finished with his work, they went for a drive on Isle Madame.  The lady at the Visitor Information said it's as close to being in Newfoundland as you can get in Nova Scotia.  Since Mom and Dad didn't make it to Newfoundland, so they decided to check it out.

They decided that if Newfoundland looks like this, they may need to put it on the bucket list.

Wednesday – October 3 - After 12 days on Cape Breton Island, we crossed back on to the mainland of Nova Scotia and continued on to Fundy National Park in New Brunswick.  It was a rainy gray day, so this is the only picture that we took.

Welcome to New Brunswick!!

I'll tell you about New Brunswick next time.

Love,

Doolin!

Back in the USA

We crossed back into the USA one week ago and it's been quite a week!  I normally like to post my blogs in chronological order, but I'm going to skip over some stuff for now and come back to it later.  Here is my IOU for a report on Cape Breton Island - Part 4 (Nova Scotia), our stay at Fundy National Park (New Brunswick), and Acadia National Park (Maine).

Tuesday, October 9 - We left our campground near Acadia National Park this morning.  Our first stop was the gas station.  Then, Mom and Dad hitched up the Jeep and we were on our way.

We were only about 2 miles from the gas station when Dad said a bad word.  Then he told Mom that he needed help to find a good place to pull off the road.  Mom saw a little shopping center that had two entrances to the parking lot, so we could get in and back out without backing up.  When we got stopped, Dad and Mom discussed the "check engine" light that had come on.  Dad has a thing called a scan gauge and he checked for fault codes then called Freightliner Customer Service.   Our motor home was built on a chassis made by Freightliner, the same company that makes BIG trucks, so their customer service is about the best place to start when you have a problem.

Freightliner had Dad run some checks and then had him call Cummins.  Cummins made the engine and sold it to Freightliner to put on the chassis.  Cummins had Dad run some more checks and then had him call back to Freightliner.  More checks and everyone finally decided that it was a "communications" problem between the systems, rather than something really wrong with the actual engine or the transmission.  It needs to be fixed ASAP, but it's safe for us to drive to a repair place.   We don't need to call a tow truck.  Dad pulled back out of the parking lot and Mom got on the phone to Freightliner of Bangor.  It's not too far up the road and Mom and Dad thought that if they called ahead, maybe they could get on the schedule to get work started faster.

The nice man at Freightliner in Bangor told us that they were pretty busy, but they could look at us first thing on Monday.  HELLO!  Today is Tuesday.  Monday is a week from now.  He did say that they had a sister location in Portland, Maine and we could try there.  The location in Portland said they could look at us tomorrow morning, so Mom and Dad decided to go there.

While Mom was on the phone, Dad was discovering that the dash board was mostly dead. Occasionally the tachometer would register for a while.  Sometimes the Speedometer would kick up and then back down.  The DEF gauge showed empty, even though we filled it this morning.  He also realized that it wouldn't shift higher than 4th gear (we usually have 6), so our peak speed was about 50 mph and it took us a LONG time to get there from a stop.  About the only thing that worked was the beep that goes with the check engine light.  It beeped the ENTIRE way to Portland.

I don't drive, because I can't see over the dash when my feet are on the peddles, but I've watched this process and it seems like some of those gauges are important.  Did I mention that Portland, ME is 140 miles?  That's a long way when you are averaging 45 mph.  Our GPS has a setting to tell us how fast we are going, so Dad used that for his speedometer.  He has a gizmo called a scan gauge that's wired directly to the engine and that tells him  RPMs, so he used that for his tachometer.  Glad Dad knows how to improvise.

It was the middle of the afternoon by the time we rolled into Freightliner of Maine near Portland.  They gave us a nice campsite and we settled in for the night.

Our "campsite" at Freightliner of Maine in Portland.

The "view" from our campsite at Freightliner of Maine.

Not our best day, but on the bright side, we limped in here under our own power, so we weren't left sitting on the side of the road waiting for a tow truck.  Speaking of power, the nice people at Freightliner let us plug into a power pole.  It's only a 15 amp plug, but we can watch TV, charge the computers, etc.  Also, it was a pretty drive getting here.  The leaves are really getting colorful around here.

Oh, and I've discovered the best thing.  Mud Flaps!  Mud Flaps on big trucks smell wonderful and our campground is FULL of them.  Some even taste good!  This is a great campground.

Did I mention that it's warm and sunny?  Actually, it's so sunny that it's 85 degrees inside the motor home and 80 degrees outside, so opening the windows didn't cool things down much.  Mom and Dad changed into shorts.  I'm still wearing the same coat that I was wearing when I started the trip and it's getting thicker every day.  Mom has an appointment for me to get a haircut in Hudson, Massachusetts this Saturday, but not sure we will make it.

We were all so hot that Dad decided to try running the A/C.  By turning off everything that requires electricity and putting the Fridge on LP, he could get the A/C to run.  That took all the current we were getting from the power pole.  We couldn't even watch TV, but oh the cool air felt good!

It looks like we are going to be here a while, so Mom called Pet's Mart and made a spa appointment for me for tomorrow here.  Then she canceled my Saturday appointment in Hudson.  

Wednesday, October 10 - Today Mom took me to the Spa at Pet's Mart for a bath, shave, haircut, and a pawdicure.  The works!  

Meanwhile, Dad stayed home in the heat with the motor home.  Today's high 85 degrees.  By 11:00 a.m. a technician came out to look at it and he thinks we need new gauges.  Based on all the checks that Dad did while he was on the phone with Freightliner and all the things he's read on the Internet since we got here, Dad thinks this isn't going to fix anything, but we are kind of stuck.  At least the new gauges are supposed to be here by noon tomorrow.  Maybe we will be out of here tomorrow?!?!

Thursday, October 11 - About 11 am, Dad went in to see if the parts are here.  Yippee, they are!  The technician is finishing up on something and will be out "soon".  About 3:00, we finally got someone that came out.  He plugged in the new gauges and the new ones didn't work either.  It's a different guy and he listened to Dad tell him about all the stuff he'd already checked.  He then moved us into a service bay and connected us up to their diagnostic machines.  No, the other guy didn't do that 😡  

Frustrating that we've been here 48 hours and just now getting someone to run diagnostics, but at least this guy seems to know his stuff, so we seem to be making progress! 

Mom and I hanging out in the Trucker's Lounge.  It's kind of hard to see 

black me on a chocolate brown chair, but I'm there and I'm bored.   

Mom's trying to decide if she wants to buy a truck.

Around 9 pm the guy came in to the waiting area and said that he's looked at everything he can think of and can't find a problem.  The only thing that he can suggest is that he leave a note for the day shift to call Freightliner Corporate in the morning.  He says they don't work on a lot of motor homes there, so there may be something else that Corporate can suggest.  

I guess I haven't mentioned that Freightliner of Maine opens at 7 am and closes at midnight.  That means that there are strange noises ALL the time.  Not only is their banging and horns and back up beepers all day long, but at 4:30 am this morning a truck came to wait for service.  I'm certainly not getting my usual sleep.

Friday, October 12 - This morning Dad went in about 8:30 to see what the day shift found out from Freightliner Corporate.  They told him that corporate didn't open until 8 am (your point? it's now 8:30!).  Anyway, they said they would call them.  At 9:30, they said they were waiting on a call back.  At 10, Dad called Freightliner Corporate.  Corporate said that their records show that they talked to Dad on Tuesday, but no record of a call from Freightliner of Maine this morning about our vehicle or any other.  Grrr!

Anyway, Freightliner Corporate said they would call the local shop and by 11, we were back in a service bay with a technician underneath doing some more checks.  Around noon, they told Dad they are pretty sure they have found the problem.  There is a connector that is part of the main communication system.  It connects all the electronics in the engine (in the back) with all the gauges and controls up front. The connector is under the motor home, on the side of the transmission.  It has water in it and it's corroded.  The good news is that they can rebuild the connector today and get us on our way.  The bad news is that they need new pins and they don't have any in stock.  They can't get them shipped until tomorrow, but if we want, we could drive to the other repair shop and pick them up.  The place that has them is 125 miles from here.  

We decided that was our best shot, so Mom, Dad, and I got in the Jeep and started our 250 mile journey for a sandwich bag with a few little pieces of metal.  We got back about 4:30 and by 7 we had a new connector and they asked Dad to take it for a test drive.  He got behind the wheel, turned the key, and it wouldn't start!  It's started just fine as we've moved it around the lot.  In fact, we've had it for 7 years and we've never had a problem getting it to start.

The technician that built the connector went home as soon as he was done.  The night guy started checking all sorts of stuff again.  Finally, around 9 he came in and told us that he found what the other guy broke and fixed it.  It now starts just fine and they'd like Dad to take it for a test drive and make sure the gauges and everything else works.  This time it started and the test drive went well.

We decided that it was too late and we were too tired to go anywhere, so we backed into our site by the power pole for our 4th night at Freightliner of Maine.

Saturday, October 13 - Today we put Maine in the rearview mirror and drove to Hudson, Massachusetts.   Thankfully, the drive was uneventful.

Dad has friends that live here.  He knows them from when he worked at Intel.  Mom and Dad were supposed to meet them last night for dinner.  Fortunately, they are also available tonight, so Mom and Dad will meet them later.

We got in early, so Mom and Dad went to Costco to buy more kibble for me and a couple of things for them.  We were just about out of kibble and the kind I eat is only available at Costco, so I'm really glad that we are back in range of a Costco.  

Well, that's been our week.  Hope yours has been better.

Love,

Doolin

Cape Breton Island - Part 3

Friday – September 28 – Today we left Baddeck and drove along Bras d’Or Lake.  Bras d’Or Lake isn’t really a lake.  It’s actually an inland sea.  It's partly fresh and partly salt water.  It was cut by glaciers and is 942 feet deep at the deepest point. 

The route we took required a ferry.  It’s the first time we’ve taken the Winnebago on a ferry, so we weren’t sure what to expect.  For this ferry, they wanted us to keep the Jeep hitched.  The ferry was 3 lanes wide and we took almost the full length of the middle lane.  It cost us $7 for the RV, Jeep and Us.  Quite a deal!

Waiting for the ferry to arrive.  It's pulled across the channel by a cable.  

If you look close, you can see it in the water.

Dad and I watching during the ride across the river.  I was a 

little nervous, but felt better between Mom and Dad.

We couldn't really see where we were going 

because the unloading ramp was in front of us.

We made it safely across the lake and by early afternoon, we were at our home for the next three nights, the Mira River Provincial Park, just south of Sydney, Nova Scotia.  After we got parked at the Campground, Mom and Dad went into Sydney and went down to the cruise ship terminal to see the big fiddle and look around.

Afterward they went to Breton Brewing for beers and live traditional music.  On the way home they went by the market and bought mussels that they cooked for their dinner.  I had my usual kibble.

Saturday – September 29 – Today Mom and Dad took a drive along the coast and went to the Fortress of Louisbourg Historic Site.  The French originally built the Fortress in the first half of the 1700's.  It was captured by British colonists (i.e. Americans) in 1745.  It was returned to the French in a subsequent treaty.  Then, in 1758 it was captured and destroyed by the British (this time the ones in England).    Mom and Dad are starting to detect a trend in Nova Scotia history - French, British, French, British.

Since this Fortress was destroyed in 1758, what did they see?  In the 1960's and 70's, there were many unemployed people in this area because coal mines were shut down.  The Canadian government decided to build a replica of the Fortress using labor from out of work coal miners.  They used the original plans and construction techniques from the 1700's.  Today, there are costumed people that tell visitor's about life in the 1700's.  Here are some of their photos.

View from the Battery

The Kings Bastion Barracks

One of the streets

A pasture for livestock and a few houses

Ladies making lace

Farmer taking his geese for a stroll

Here he is again.

Dad trying to get the perfect surf photo.

Yup, that's a big one!

The Louisbourg Lighthouse

The Mira River, near our campground.

Sunday – September 30 –  Today Mom and Dad went to the Cape Breton Mining Museum near Glace Bay.  It’s about ½ hour from our campground.  They’d learned at Louisbourg yesterday that the mining industry pretty much shut down in the 60’s, but learned a lot more about mining prior to that.

They arrived at the Museum just as a tour was about to go into the mine.  Within minutes, they had their hard hats and capes and were down in the mine with the others.  Mom says that it’s a good thing that she didn’t need have time to think about this.  You see, the first thing that they glossed over for the late arrivals is that the mine ranges in height from 4’ 2” to about 5’ 6”.  The height of the mine is the height of the coal seam.  No reason to dig out rock, rock did not make any money.   If you are 5'10" like Mom, that means that the whole tour was done bent over or squatting.  The hard hat isn’t for falling debris.  It’s to protect you when you hit your head on the ceiling or a support beam (not if you do, but when you do!)  Not the most fun when you are on a 30 minute tour, but kind of drives home the point that these guys worked 12 hour shifts 6 days a week in VERY difficult conditions.

The tour guide was a retired miner and he had lots of interesting stories and insights.    For example, the miners lived in houses that they rented from the mining company.  There weren't any other houses to live in.  One of the conditions of renting the house was that a male in the household had to work in the mine.  That seems reasonable, except that it meant that if a miner was injured or died, either a member of the family had to go to work in the mine or the family had to move.  At one time, there were boys as young as 9 years old that worked in the mines. Our guide started when he was 14. The miners were paid on a contract basis, i.e. how many tons of coal they could dig and load in a day.  These mines were hand excavated from the late 1800's through World War II.  They got electricity and automated machines in the 50's.  

Our tour guide was about 5'2"

Everyone got a cape to protect their clothes from rubbing 

on the ceiling when they were bent over.  

A few days ago we started to notice some fall color.  Each day gets a little better.  On the way back to me, they drove by this marsh. 

When they came home, Dad made pan seared scallops with roasted cauliflower and gingered carrots for their dinner.  It smelled really good, but all I got was kibble 😞

Tonight is our last night at the Mira River Provincial Park.  I'll close with a photo of Sunset over the Mira River.

Love, 

Doolin