Summer Travel Map

Thursday, August 2, 2007

Back to the day trips

August 1, 2007
Upper Sackville, Nova Scotia

Holy crap, it's August already! July just seemed to sneak past us. Oh well, it's a nice day and off we go.

Today was the first completely clear day we’ve had (it’s supposed to be relatively clear through Friday) so we mapped out a day trip. We’ve started to get this down to a science, which is a good thing. We clear out the back of the Range Rover to be able to put the seats up; we pack a lunch, water, and dog treats in the 12v cooler; and we put the pups in the back seat (it’s too much to have them in the lap all day). We got an early-for-us start around 9:30.

Our route took us along the southern shoreline, west of Halifax. The tourist route is alternatively labeled the “Bluenose Coast” and the “Lighthouse Coast”. In general, our plan was to follow NS-3 to the west, but first we had to backtrack toward Halifax on NS-101, then south on NS-102 until we picked up NS-3.

The “scenic routes” here are well done. Each route has a stylized logo which is posted on directional signs (no words needed, just follow the arrows – and don’t miss any signposts). Here in the southwestern part of the province, NS-1 runs along the Fundy coast (north shore) and NS-3 along the Atlantic (south shore). The great news is that they’ve built limited access highways in parallel (NS-101 and NS-103, respectively), so you can poke along in one direction all day, and then take the express route back home. We’ve seen similar situations in the US, where Interstates many times parallel the old US Highway system, but not so specifically engineered. It’s quite effective here.

Anyways, we followed the tourist route to our first stop, Peggy’s Cove. This spot is advertised to contain the world’s (or at least the province’s) most photographer lighthouse. Who was I to argue? We stopped for pictures, of course. It’s also supposed to be the only lighthouse with a post office in it, or the only post office in a lighthouse, or – well, you get the idea – it’s special. It’s on a little spit of land, where the trees disappear and the rocks take over. Driving along, it was like entering an alpine region, where you climb so high you’re above the tree line. The only difference was that here, we were at sea level, moving horizontally.

After taking some pictures, using the loo, walking the pups, and picking up a couple of souvenirs cards, we hit the road again. We followed the route around St Margaret’s Bay, through Chester and Mahone Bay, to Lunenburg. We stopped at a beach-side picnic area near Blandford for lunch. By the time we got to Lunenburg, it was already after 3 PM. After touring a bit, we headed for home via NS-103. It took us 6 hours to get there and about 90 minutes to return. Not bad!

We’d taken a pork tenderloin from the freezer, so I thought I’d be clever and put it, still frozen, into the 12v cooler to a) thaw and b) help cool the other stuff. It worked like a charm. Dinner was a tag team effort, with Geri making excellent sautéed carrots in beef stock and polenta while I roasted the pork on the grill outside. It matched quite well with a 1997 Meridian Cabernet Sauvignon that we’d brought from home.

Given that my original thought was that we’d do the whole southern shore in one day, and we only got about 20-25% of the way to Yarmouth (at the western tip of the province), it looks like I’m going to have to adjust my expectations.

Geri’s been suffering over the last few days with her sciatic acting up, which causes a lot of pain, difficulty sleeping, and a hard time with steps (even the few steps into and out of the coach). These “driving day trips” are designed to reduce the amount of walking she has to do, but I’m concerned that sitting in the car for a long ride may be contributing to the flare up. These spells come and go, of course, but this one’s particularly bad. She’s hanging in there, though! We were talking to another couple staying here (they were actually staying at Harding’s Point in New Brunswick when we were there, and we’ll probably see them on PEI in a week and a half when we get there as well), and they recommended an over-the-counter muscle-relaxer/analgesic (I forget the name), and we traded them a bag of Coco’s Canine Cuisine (the dog food mix Geri uses) for a sample of the pills. She’ll try them overnight and we’ll see if it helps.

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