I have to say, Ashleigh and I had high hopes for Nova Scotia and the rest of eastern Canada. Neither of us had ever been there, and everyone we talked to kept telling us how beautiful it was. We did not have the time in our overall schedule to go out to Cape Breton, which is the crown jewel of Nova Scotia, so perhaps that is why we never found the cutesy touristy service-rich area we expected. Also, our two days in the province were rainy, so perhaps that dampened our mood. Nevertheless, we did not have the great time we had hoped for.
The ferry ("the Cat") ride was fun. The car deck was a lot more advanced than the ferries in Alaska. The Cat's car deck had car platforms on hydraulic lifts which would move a dozen or more cars up high enough for more cars to park underneath. We were the very last vehicle to board, and the very last one to exit. The ride was smooth and fast. The boat is a catamaran, so we were skimming across the top of the water, though that fact was not apparent from inside. The weather across the channel was thick foggy; so was the weather once we arrived.
The Cat travels from Bar Harbor, Maine to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. We received a tip to go see a famous lighthouse in Yarmouth, but we received that tip after about a hundred other people received the same tip, so we skipped it and left town immediately. Like in Alaska, towns in NS are separated by wilderness. I like that. This particular wilderness reminded me very much of the trees and plants in south central Alaska, like around Anchorage and in the Kenai Peninsula, with a similar mix of disciduous and evergreen trees.
There are two routes from Yarmouth to Halifax, our next destination: the scenic coastal route and the faster route slightly inland, which cuts off the many jutting peninsulas. The scenic route takes nine hours; the fast route takes three hours. We did a small portion of the scenic route but the thick fog prevented any vistas whatsoever of the coastline, which I assume is beautiful, but I can't personally attest to it. So we stuck mostly to the fast route, but still arrived in Halifax in the late evening, at a Wal Mart (they have Wal Mart in Canada! awesome!).
We had been told that there was an ongoing Busker Festival in Halifax. (Don't look it up: a busker is a street performer.) We found our way downtown and to the festival, which was still going on that late at nite, but the performers were not enough to keep our attention. We decided to come back the next day when the better buskers would be performing. As it turned out, though, a couple bad experiences turned us off of Halifax and we never went back to the festival.
In the morning we got up and headed downtown to get breakfast. The gray weather was weighing down our mood, but we parked and looked for breakfast. After struggling to find two loonies to feed the hungry parking meters, we found "Voted the best breakfast in downtown Halifax" at the Bluenose II restaurant, which advertised free wifi. Well, not only could we not get the internet to work, but the service was lackluster, and the food was downright inedible. I left half of my Greek omelette on the plate and left hungry. Ashleigh finished her eggs Benedict but didn't particularly like them. We tried a second time for commerce at Uncommon Grounds coffe shop, which advertised free internet. I bought a slice of carrot cake, my favorite, in order to make me feel better, but it was so bad I ate two bites and left the rest on the plate. I can confidently say that it was the worst carrot cake I've ever had the displeasure of tasting. Ashleigh got a blueberry smoothie which was also bad, and she didn't finish that either. On top of all that, we struggled with the wifi for 45 minutes before they said, oh golly, the power was out, we better reset the router.
What the heck is up with commerce in Halifax? Were our experiences atypical, or does everyone there eat bad food all the time? In any case, we got the heck out of there, and our day improved with distance from Halifax. We stopped and did one more activity that day, which was to go to the Fossil Cliffs of Joggins, an important scientific site which holds many important fossils, such as he oldest known lizard. As I wrote briefly earlier today, we made it to Moncton, stayed at a Wal Mart, and saw a movie at the local multiplex. That was the end of the day, capped off by an above-average-beautiful sunset.
No comments:
Post a Comment