We woke up to a foggy morning at the Walmart of Yarmouth:
We drove south to the Pubnico Peninsula and visited Dennis Wharf, where a “Living Wharf” demonstration was scheduled:
We first learned about mackerel fishing:
Holy mackerel, as they say. The mackerel feed on the what falls into the water from the fishing boats when they process the fish out of the net at the wharf. When this happens, they school in the cloud of food and are easy to catch:
M brings in two:
All the boats here are lobster boats, except for the net fishing boat on the left:
Bringing up a lobster trap:
There was a guest green crab in the trap:
A lobster from the trap:
M learns to use the claw banding tool:
This guy was in the trap too:
Learning how the trap works:
Next we learned about rope splicing:
The rightmost boat needed a paint job, and the fisherman’s wife told him if he didn’t paint the boat, she would do it for him. He found it like this one day:
After taking advantage of a roadside dump station, we continued south to The Hawk Beach on the eastern shore of Cape Sable Island, the southernmost point of Nova Scotia:
There’s no shortage of fishing equipment that’s washed ashore:
An old lobster trap:
At low tide, the remains of a forest, drowned 1,500 years ago when this land sunk, are visible:
Cape Sable Lighthouse in the distance:
We had the beach mostly to ourselves:
We continued east to overnight at the Walmart of Bridgeport, Nova Scotia. See the trip map for today’s drive and our current location.
We first watched the site movie in the auditorium. Each seat had headphones with a switch to select english or french audio. The movie focused on the history of Grand-Pré, an Acadian settlement founded in 1682. The settlement flourished until 1755 when the British deported the Acadians from Acadia for refusing to swear allegiance to the Crown of England. The Acadian population, historically French but under alternating French and English rule from 1605 to 1755, developed its own identity and attempted to remain neutral. Acadian assistance in the defense of French Fort Beauséjour (see Day 748) in 1755 encouraged the English to view Acadians as siding with the French, and shortly thereafter the Acadians where deported wholesale from what is today New Brunswick. Most Acadians were forced onto ships and transported to the American colonies, where the English Protestant colonists refused to accept the French-Speaking Catholic Acadians. The Acadians were then shipped back to Europe. Many Acadians fled to what is today Nova Scotia, where they remained until the English captured the Fortress of Louisbourg and expelled the Acadians from Nova Scotia in 1758. Eventually, many Acadians made their way to the only non-English controlled portion of North America, Spanish-controlled Louisiana, where the Acadians became known as Cajuns.
The visitor center had exhibits on the deportation, as well as the extensive dike system built by the residents of Grand-Pré, so historically significant that the “Landscape of Grand Pré” was listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2012. The settlers of Grand-Pré used dikes to convert over 1,000 acres of tidal marshland into the most fertile farmland at this latitude in North America:
The dike’s clapet, a one way gate that allows the diked marshland to drain but does not allow incoming seawater into the diked area:
We walked the grounds where the settlement of Grand-Pré used to stand. A statue of Longfellow’s Evangeline, which inspired a wave of Acadian resettlement of Maritime Canada, stands watch over the grounds:
Looking out over the diked marshlands:
Playing settler games:
The reconstructed blacksmith shop contains a sling for horses which, when raised, allowed easy access to the hooves for shoeing:
Bust of Longfellow:
An archeological dig is underway to find the palisade built by the English to impound the Acadians during deportation:
The kids completed their Parks Canada Xplorers workbooks and received their tags:
Continuing west, we stopped at a tourist information center to refill our water tanks, then continued on to Port-Royal National Historic Site:
Port Royal was settled by Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Mons in 1605 after loosing half his colonists in the winter of 1604 at St Croix (see Day 743). This site was the captial of Acadia until 1613 when the English destroyed this site:
This site was rebuilt in the mid-20th century by Americans in “compensation” for the Amercian colonial destruction of the original site in 1613. The attention to detail is impressive:
Park staff dressed in period dress use recreated period tools to fabricate roof shingles:
Pondering the Acadian’s fate:
The kids completed their Parks Canada Xplorers workbooks and received their tags:
We drove east a couple miles to Fort Anne National Historic Site. After the above-mentioned destruction of Port Royal in 1613, the French moved the Acadian captial here in 1632, when the area was ceded to the French by treaty, forcing the removal of Scottish settlers from the area. In 1710, the English captured the French fort and ultimately renamed the fort Fort Anne.
This needlepoint, completed by dozens of volunteers, tells the convoluted story of the history of the area:
The original charter for Nova Scotia, granted to Sir William Alexander by King James in 1621:
The kids had fun with the costumes in the visitor center:
A model of Fort Anne. Later building projects would add more ravelins:
Today we left the fairgrounds in Truro and drove south to Dartmouth, where we did laundry. We had to park about five minutes walk from the Laundromat and carry our laundry back, which was not so much fun. Trish and the kids did homeschool in the RV while I did the laundry. After lunch, Trish made Shabbos dinner and I went for a bike ride. The route took me by some pretty lakes:
After I returned, we moved the RV to the Walmart in Dartmouth for Shabbos. This will be our first Shabbos in a Walmart parking lot:
Good Shabbos from Darthmouth, Nova Scotia! See the trip map for today’s drive and our current location.
Today we drove from Amherst to Truro, where the Nova Scotia Provincial Exhibition is underway. It’s the Canadian equivalent of a state fair in the US. The last time we visited a fair was the Iowa State Fair on Day 5. We had to backtrack through town a bit after we encountered a bridge with 3.9 meter clearance, which is 0.2 meters shorter than our 4.1 meter height. We paid the $3 parking fee to park in the field next to the fairgrounds. The parking attendant told us we could use one of the overnight RV spots for free, so we picked one of the electrical posts and parked next to it. After plugging in and having lunch, we walked down to the exhibition.
The typical livestock displays abounded:
For a cow, it’s cute:
In the main pavilion, we watched the Women’s Cart competition. The drivers are judged on control of the cart in a variety of tasks:
The horses walked in perfect synchronization:
Next up was the Ox Pull, where pairs of oxen pull increasingly heavy loads. The ox team that pulls the most weight relative to the team’s weight wins. Ox teams ranged from 2,500 pounds to over 4,000 pounds:
The sled weighs 1,000 pounds, and each concrete bar weighs 250 pounds. The ox team has three attempts to move the sled a total distance of three feet. Once every team has had their turn, 500 pounds is added to the sled. The initial sled weight is 2,500 pounds:
2,500 pounds didn’t seem like much for these oxen:
The weight kept increasing and teams were gradually eliminated. Pulling 5,000 pounds:
Pulling 6,500 pounds:
Pulling 7,500 pounds:
Pulling 9,500 pounds. The oxen are really struggling now:
The winning team pulled 2.91 times it’s own weight:
After the competitions, we walked over to another pavilion where more animals were on display:
On our way out, we walked through the horse stables:
This horse is being readied for an event:
We returned to the RV after dark. Trish was very happy to be able to visit a fair this summer! See the trip map for today’s drive and our current location.
Facebook
Instagram
Email