New England and Canada Trip - Part 5

Halifax, Nova Scotia

 

 

 Our last port of call was Halifax.  This is the skyline as we were coming into the dock.

 

 Dave and I always travel with only carry-on luggage. Because we pack as light as we can we knew we would have to do laundry about halfway through this trip as we were going to Denver for three days after the cruise. So we had planned on finding a laundrymat in this city.  We were able to find one only a few blocks from the ship.  It was such a nice walk through these beautiful neighborhoods.

 

 

 

 

 

When we went to England a few years ago I made a door collage of the UK.  I decided to do one for Halifax as there were so many colorful, fun doors that we passed by.

 

After our laundry was done we went back to the ship, dropped everything in our room and headed out with the whole family on a bus tour to Peggy's Cove.  It was a very pleasant ride as we passed lighthouses,

cozy fishing villages, and saw the beautiful leaves.

 

 

Peggy's Cove lighthouse.  Loved it.

 

 

 Since Nova Scotia means New Scotland there are a lot of Scottish traditions here.

 

 

 I was amazed at how calm the cove was in comparison to the waves just outside of it.

 

 

 

 This sculpture in the side of a hill is in someone's yard in Peggy's Cove.  There is a story behind it, but I can't remember what it was.  Oh well, it was pretty cool looking anyway.

The ride back to Halifax on the bus was another very picturesque one.

 

 The scenery flying past, combined with the rain, made things have an Impressionist painting quality about them.

 

 Monet?

The last stop on this tour was the cemetery where many of the bodies recovered from the Titanic are buried.

 

 

 

 Our tour guide wore a kilt.  He was actually a very good guide.

 We were too late to eat in the dining room that night so we had dinner at "the trough"(buffet).

 

 The last day of our cruise was a "sea day".   Michael Ballam performed two concerts for us that day.

 

 We loved our two dining room waiters - Rigo and Dino.

 After dinner, the last night we were on the ship, Dave and I wandered around while everyone else was packing to go home the next morning.  We sat and listened to these two violinists and pianist for quite awhile.  They were so talented.

It was a memorable trip, as usual.  Thank you, Dad, for providing us with this special time with you and the family.  We loved it and we love you!

New England and Canada Trip - Part 4

St. John, New Brunswick

 

Once again, Dave and I were on the treadmills in the fitness center when dawn broke and we could see where our ship had docked.  One by one church steeples appeared as it got lighter outside.  I was liking the looks of this Eastern Canada city.

 

 

Sandy, Becky, Dale and Dad waiting to board the "Hop on, hop off Big Pink Bus".

Elaine, Dave, Russell, Phil and the photographer (yours truly) were ready, too. 

Notice how many levels of portholes can be seen in this photo. We were docked in the Bay of Fundy at high tide and so our ship is sitting pretty high next to the dock.

The Big Pink Bus, of course. 

 Everything in this city is labeled in English as well as French.

 

 This house is called "The Witch House" by residents because the roof looks like a witch's hat and cape.

 Our tour guide was very proud of the fact that McDonald's signs in Canada have the Maple Leaf in the middle of the M.

 A very unique thing about the Bay of Fundy is it's unusually high tides, which rise up to 50 feet in a few hours.  Because the bay is shaped like a funnel, this causes a phenomenon where the river that usually flows into the bay becomes lower than the bay.  The bay floods into the river and reverses the direction it flows for up to 80 miles.  This is the only place in the world where this occurs.

 We first visited the river in the morning, when the tide was high.  So the river was flowing inland because the high tides pushed the flow the opposite direction.   It's hard to tell in these two photos, but the river is flowing in the opposite direction that it should. It is flowing from left to right in the pictures.

 Here is another view of the river being forced to flow the wrong direction.  (Left to right in the picture again)

 

 Nature shot.  These little flowers looked like orchids, but I don't think they were.

 

 

 Waiting for the Pink Bus after viewing the river.

 

We went to a museum in the early afternoon. This is the complete skeleton of a huge whale.

"I like turtles"

 Then about five hours from our first visit, we returned to the river.  The tide had dropped dramatically and the river was once again flowing rapidly out to sea.  (Now it is flowing from right to left in the photo)

 The rapids have completely reversed from what we saw earlier that day.

 

 Here are two comparison pictures:
                                 High tide- river turned inland. Low tide - river reversed out to sea.

                                 High tide- river turned inland, low tide, river going out to sea

This was the only day it really rained.  We got soaked.  You can see how the ship has gone down about three decks with the drastic drop in the tide level in such a short space of time.

Here is a better view of how low the tide dropped. (Compare with the first pictures in this post)

A very interesting day.