Thursday, October 1, 2015 - It's Still Raining!

Today was a day of transition, with a long drive from New Brunswick into Nova Scotia.  It was a much anticipated day as I would be spending the night in the lighthouse keeper's quarters at the Lighthouse on Cape d'Or. The time planned for Cape d'Or was one of the highlights while planning for this vacation, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

The weather was still dreary with rain and high water on several of the roads.  As with other days on my journey, I was easily distracted from my route as I chased after road signs and interesting side roads.  Sometimes I felt it was a miracle I ever got to my intended destination.  And for this day's travel, it was critical since I did have a paid in advance reservation at the lighthouse.

Before leaving the Fundy National Park area, however, I first ventured into the neighboring harbor village of Alma, NB.  Having had cold boxed cereal and hard boiled eggs for breakfast for nearly a week, I wanted a nice hot cooked breakfast with eggs and bacon.  The Octopus's Garden Cafe did not disappoint.   Even the hot tea was delightful!

I enjoyed driving back through town as leaving the area required backtracking through the national park.  With the lobster fishing season on break until the weekend, many of the fishermen were making repairs to their traps and boats.  With the rain still coming down at a pretty good clip, I just drove on through but not before snapping this photo of the boats listing on their sides at low tide.

Back in Fundy National Park, I enjoyed making the drive out to the replica covered bridge inside the park.  By that time the rain was just a light drizzle, so I got out my rain coat and ventured out.  I climbed up and down the stairs that led down to the Point Wolfe River beneath the bridge.  The rain swollen river was high and loud.

During my time there, a lady joined me on the observation deck.  She told me that she and her husband had been staying in the park for a week, and that before the rains came on Tuesday, the river bed was nearly dry with only a trickle of water making way to the Bay of Fundy.  She also told me that they had seen a black bear the day before.  I could only think "I should be so lucky!"  I wasn't!

One of the blue signs indicating a covered bridge, took me nearly 10 kilometers off course.  I thought at the time "What's 10 km?  Piece of cake."  HA!  It turned out to be a narrow one lane logging road.  No problem, or at least not much of one, so long as there are no trucks.  But on a Thursday morning, that would be too much to ask for.  There were several trucks!


I was fortunate that I had pulled into a small intersection to take a photo of the hill ahead of me when a trucker came through.  As he approached, he rolled down his window so I did the same, not really knowing what he may say to me.  He told me there were three more behind him and that I might want to wait until they all pass.  GREAT IDEA.  I sat and waited for nearly 20 minutes, until they all three passed me.  I can imagine the chatter on their CB radios . . . "Dumb American Touron!"

Anyway, once they were past me, I continued on my merry way.  I finally made it to the covered bridge.  While it was pretty nice, I have to say I questioned the worthiness of the provincial highway department diverting unsuspecting tourists out of the way to visit The Malone Homestead (circa 1820) and its covered bridge (built in 1910).  Here are the photos, I'll let you decide!

But that wasn't the last covered bridge sign that would get me off the beaten path.  You'd think I might have learned something by the near call with what I feared could be an episode out of the TV show Fargo.  Nope . . . not me!  I let another blue sign divert me, but this time I was happy to have the opportunity to really put into perspective just how much rain New Brunswick and the Atlantic Coast of the US and Canada had received over the past couple of days.  I'll let this photo speak to that point.

Once on the road for Nova Scotia, the rains stopped but the skies were still dark and gloomy.  I stopped at the Welcome Center at the boarder with New Brunswick.  It was a nice, spacious welcome center . . . one of the nicest I've seen in all of my travels.  I stopped to stretch my legs and to walk down to the ramp to get this photo.  Because of all the rain, the ground was saturated and I returned to my truck wet to the ankles.  Good thing I had a change of shoes!

This would be the start of a full week in Nova Scotia.  I was so looking forward to this opportunity to see a province that heretofore, I had only heard stories about and seen photos of.  As I write today, looking back on it nearly two months ago, I can say it did not disappoint me!

The drive from Amherst, NS down the peninsula to Cape d'Or was very interesting.  I really didn't expect the vast rolling hills and thick forest along my route.  The twisting, winding roads reminded me of the Highlands of Scotland.  The only thing missing were sheep!

As I approached the turn off to Cape d'Or, I called my host at the lighthouse as he had requested.  Because the road down to the lighthouse is not much more than a narrow gravel path, they request that all guests park at the top of the hill and walk down the quarter-mile trail.  With my mobility issues, he said that he would meet me at the top and either give me (and my bag) a ride down the hill . . . or perhaps drive my car down for me.

When he met me at the top, he looked inside the truck and said "Oh, all wheel drive.  You'll be fine - follow me!"  Those might be famous last words for sure.

This day was "just" 210 miles, but they were long and hard miles!