Where are we now? - We are at Fundy National Park in New Brunswick, which is about 3 hours east of the Maine/New Brunswick Border. We will probably return to the USA this weekend (Oct 6 or 7). I'll tell you all about that later. Right now, I want to get you caught up with our 12 days on Cape Breton Island.
Friday, September 21 – This morning we are leaving mainland
Nova Scotia and going to Cape Breton Island. While Cape Breton is technically an island, we can drive the motor home
over a causeway and across a bridge, so it’s really not that big a deal to get
there.
Welcome to Cape Breton Island!
There are really two main things that we want to see on Cape Breton
Island. On the southeast part, there are
museums and historic sites. On the
northwest part, there is the Cabot Trail.
The Cabot Trail is a road that takes you through an area of beautiful
scenery and hiking. Originally, Mom and
Dad planned to continue the counterclockwise path we followed with the mainland,
which would mean museums and history first.
However, while Mom was at the library last night, she checked the
weather forecast for Cape Breton, for the next two weeks. There is a 100% chance of rain tomorrow, but
other than that, low % chance the rest of next week. The first week in October looks like lots of
rain. Around here, it seems that rain
comes with fog, so Mom decided that it was time to head to the Cabot Trail for
scenery and nature. She doesn’t want to hike
in rain and fog.
We crossed the causeway about 11:30 and pulled into the Visitor
Information. Before they got out, Mom
and Dad decided to have a little lunch. While she was eating, Mom noticed this man who
was kind of walking back and forth around our motor home. When Mom and Dad got out, he came over to
them. He asked where we were from and
then he told us that he lives in Nova Scotia in the summer and in our town in
the winter. Sure enough, he had Washington
license plates on his car, just like us.
He also told us that he and his wife were on the way to a Ceilidh (pronounced
Kay Lee and it’s a session of traditional Cape Breton music) at the Celtic
Music Interpretive Center, which is just up the road. The man told them that their daughter is a
fiddler and she is playing there this afternoon.
After Mom and Dad got a few things from the Visitor Information,
we were on our way up the road to the Ceilidh. Mom and Dad had a fun couple hours listening
to the music and afterwards, I got to play with another dog from my
hometown.
The Fiddle player is a graduate of the high school in our home town.
After the Ceilidh we continued on and spent the night at the Ceilidh
Cottages and Campground near Mabou. The “Campground”
part is a bit of a stretch, because there are only two campsites. Tonight, the other campsite is occupied by a
motor home from British Columbia. We
haven’t seen many people form the west coast since we’ve been in Canada. Pretty hard to believe that we’d run into two
in just a few hours.
There are still a couple hours of daylight, so Mom and Dad decided
to take a hike that was recommended by our new friends from home. It’s near the Mabou Mines and is about 2
kilometers round trip. While it wasn’t
all that long, it had about 250 feet of elevation gain, so they got a little
workout. They also saw some pretty
scenery.
A photo from Mom and Dad's late afternoon hike.
After the hike, they came home and we all had dinner. Then, they drove into Mabou to the Red Shoe
Pub. It’s owned by the Rankin Family
that helped to make Cape Breton Music famous.
They enjoyed some more fiddle music.
Today is the day the weatherman said has a 100% chance of rain and
he was right. We woke up to heavy
rain. Fortunately, there was a little
break to hitch up the Jeep, but rained during most of our drive to Cheticamp.
Fortunately, it was a pretty short drive. We set up at our campsite in Cape Breton
Highlands National Park and then Mom and Dad drove into town to the Doryman
Pub. The Doryman has live music most
nights and also on Saturday afternoon. A
rainy Saturday afternoon is a perfect time to sit in a Pub, listen to
music, and watch some dancing.
Sunday – September 23 – The weatherman was right again. We woke up to a beautiful sunny day. After Breakfast, Mom and Dad took off for a
hike and I decided to take a nap.
They hiked the Skyline Trail.
It’s an 8.2 kilometer loop. It’s
relatively flat and mostly a gravel path, except for the last bit where there is a boardwalk to protect the tundra like landscape. The boardwalk has 300 stairs.
Dad nearing the main viewpoint from the Skyline trail.
What a view!
The "view" is better without Mom and Dad in the way,
but had to show that they were there.
After the Skyline Trail, they did two other shorter hikes and saw
lots of pretty scenery.
They hiked around a bog and saw these carnivorous pitcher plants growing wild.
They hiked through a grove of 300 year old sugar maples.
A waterfall near the sugar maples.
They stopped at a beach access on the way home. Dad liked the rocks and cliffs.
Mom liked the rocks, waves, and clouds.
I had to sift through over 200 photos from just these 3 days, so I'm exhausted. Hope you enjoy. I'll write more later.
Love,
Doolin
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