So, I finally made it back to the USA today, and I have to admit, I'm really grateful for that. But I had a wonderful few days in the Maritime Provinces beforehand.
Last Wednesday, I left Quebec City and drove to New Brunswick. To make the drive shorter than all-day, I drove to a small town called Miramichi. It's located on the Miramichi River, which apparently has amazing fishing, and some amazing local and provincial parks. I thought about staying in Miramichi to ride out Hurricane Earl, but two women at my hotel and my waitress at the restaurant where I ate supper all told me to go to Moncton, New Brunswick, instead. Moncton is larger, about 125,000 people, so there would be lots to do there, and it's closer to the other provinces. It's also on the backside of the Bay of Fundy, and so wouldn't take a direct hit from Earl. I decided to listen to them, and even though I'd never heard of Moncton, found a B&B to stay while I was there.
I left on Thursday for Moncton, after a morning hiking at the French Fort Park in Miramichi (which was really nice, BTW). The B&B was very cute; it's called the Wild Rose Inn. It's owned by a Chinese couple who had been living in Auckland, New Zealand, until they bought the inn about 5 months ago and moved to Canada. Anyway, when I arrived I took a long nap, and then I went out that night to see a movie. Ended up seeing Eat, Pray, Love against my better judgment. I wish I hadn't. I really liked the book, and the movie was a big disappointment for me. But it still was nice to see a movie; I hadn't seen one since I'd been in Portland in June.
On Friday, I went to the Hopewell Rocks. New Brunswick forms the western side of the Bay of Fundy, which has the highest tides in the world! The Hopewell Rocks are a famous site along the bay in New Brunswick. During low tide, you can walk among these amazing rocks which have been eroded by the high tides; during high tide, the ocean floor which you walked upon earlier is now 40 feet below the surface of the water, and you can kayak among the rocks! The rocks themselves are cool, too -- they have plants which grow on their tops, but they are each separated from the others, so they're called "flower pots". I wandered among the flower pots, looked out at the mud flats and at the water during low tide, and then had lunch at the park while I waited for the tide to come in.
A couple of hours later, I went to the salt flats at Demoiselles Beach, at the other end of the park. There were all kinds of cracks and crevices in the mud, indicating where there was water carving into the mud. I sat high on the beach for a couple more hours, and read and watched the tide come in. The crevices soon filled up with water, and then overflowed the entire flats, until the water came up almost to my feet! It was really cool. I could actually see the tide rising, it moved so quickly. I didn't stay until high tide, but even in the hour or so that I watched the tide rise, it definitely changed by at least 8-10 feet. Pretty amazing.
The following day was Hurricane Earl day. I decided to stay inside all day, and do some reading. So I took myself to a bookstore, bought a coffee, and hunkered down. I read for a long time, left and got some lunch at a fish & chips place, then actually went back to the bookstore and read some more. When I finally was sick of reading, I walked to the movie theater next door, and saw another movie, The Switch with Jason Bateman and Jennifer Aniston. It was cute. After the movie, I went back to the B&B and went to bed early.
As everyone had predicted, Moncton didn't get anything serious from Earl. Nova Scotia did, though (200,000 homes had lost power), and so I was glad that I'd decided against going there for the weekend. But on Sunday morning, the weather was fabulous: clear, blue sky, 70 degrees, and breezy. So I left my B&B and drove to Prince Edward Island. And PEI is gorgeous! Farmhouses, manicured lawns, lots of dairy cattle, and vineyards inland, and then absolutely stunning coast with lighthouses and Victorian homes. No place on the island is more than 16km away from the coast (about 10 miles). I spent the afternoon on Sunday in Summerside. It was very windy that day, and I remember seeing a flock of seagulls trying to fly, but getting pushed around by the wind. So they hung out on the ground in a parking lot, waiting for the wind to die down. Every so often, a gull would take off and try to fly, get pushed backwards, and finally land back in the flock. It was pretty funny, and I watched them for a long time.
I left Summerside that afternoon and drove to Charlottetown, where I'd booked a hotel room. Charlottetown is the capital of PEI, and so I wandered around a bit that afternoon. It's really cute there, with lots of little shops and restaurants. There's a famous ice cream place there called Cows; Nimmi and I had eaten at the Cows in Banff when we were there. But the original is in PEI, and so I stopped in for an ice cream, then pretty much wandered through the town and then along the harbor. That night had dinner at a famous seafood place called Water Prince Snack Shop, and met another traveler there; she lives in Vancouver but is originally from Australia. It was nice to hang out with someone, and to compare travel notes.
Monday was Labor Day, and I decided to spend the morning walking along the Charlottetown boardwalk. It was gorgeous that day, very sunny and cool, and I walked for a long time, then sat on a bench on the boardwalk to read for a while. I didn't get much reading done -- an older couple sat next to me on the bench and started chatting with me. They are PEI'ers, although they are both Lebanese. The wife was born in Quebec City, and moved to PEI when she was 3; the husband moved from Lebanon to PEI when he was a teenager. They were very cute, and they insisted upon taking me around town to show me the sights, and then back to their house for coffee, which turned into a full-on Lebanese luncheon feast. Two of the husband's brothers showed up, as well, so it turned into a full family event! Lunch was great, but the best part of all was the grapes that we'd picked from their garden for dessert. They have a large backyard and greenhouse, and they have many grapevines of different varieties. Jean and Labeeb were so excited that they got to show me around their garden, and it was fun learning about everything they grow, and picking our grapes for our lunch.
Eventually, after I'd eaten my fill of goodies and drunk the coffee which started the entire event, it was time for me to leave for Halifax, Nova Scotia. I arrived there around suppertime, and I was pretty tired, so I just stayed in my hotel that night.
On Tuesday morning, I went to the Halifax Citadel. It was incredibly cool. Halifax was apparently always considered a key strategic location for British North America, and George Washington (among others) had planned on attacking it. The buildings currently standing are the 4th iteration of the citadel itself. After WWII, when military technology changed, the Citadel was no longer needed to protect the area, and so now it's a National Historic Monument. They have it decked out to look as it did in 1864, when cannons were the typical method of firepower, and when the soldiers wore kilts. It was incredibly cool, because all of the personnel at the Citadel are dressed in traditional Highland Regiment (Scottish) garb: argyle socks, kilt, red velvet jacket with brass buttons, and wire-cage bonnet covered with black ostrich and white vulture feathers. And unlike the American fife and drum units, they had bagpipers and drummers, so there was always music being played. It was really, really neat, actually. I got to see several different types of cannons being fired, learned about muskets and rifles and saw many of them fired, had a long conversation with a bagpiper and got to see the pipes in detail (i.e., disassembled), and walked the entire grounds including the main level, ramparts around the citadel, and the ditch which was meant to keep out invaders. I'd only planned to be there for 2 hours, but ended up spending almost 5 hours there! When I finally left, I went to the Halifax harborfront, and wandered around for a long time looking at all of the ships docked there and just glancing into all of the shops. I had dinner at Alexander Keith's brewery and tried his IPA, which was really tasty.
Finally, on Wednesday, I left Halifax and drove to St. John, New Brunswick. Unfortunately, it was raining and very foggy all day, so I really didn't see very much at all -- which is too bad, because I hear that St. John is gorgeous, as well. But I did try Keith's red ale that night with dinner, and it was really tasty, too, just like the IPA. I've never really had Keith's beer before....suddenly, I'm a fan!
Anyway, the Maritimes were really unbelieveably gorgeous and charismatic. I just wish I'd had a little more time to spend there, rather than running from place to place. But definitely, I'll return for a visit sometime in the future. PEI, especially, was too gorgeous to be believed.
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