The wind picked up really strongly in the night at Corney Brook, Cape Breton Highlands NP. Again we ended up closing the van's poptop in the wee hours just so we could sleep for a few more hours without the "fwomp" going on. The wind was strong enough to blow out the corner of the driver's side window bug screen, shifting several of the really strong earth magnets. You never know what the weather will throw at you!
Today was a long trip down the west side of Cape Breton, past Cheticamp and Mabou (home of the Rankin Family) and back over the Canso Causeway. We had to look for a Napa auto parts store online at a Timmy's in Antigonish and found an easy-to-get-to one in New Glasgow. Our left headlight was out and even though we don't really travel in the dark, the sun will be rising later as we travel west. Luckily we found it and they had the part in stock! Whew. Thom was able to install it himself too.
We headed further west still, past the city of Truro and all the way along the north edge of the Minas Basin. This area has some of the highest tides in the world. When we got to Five Islands, we had a high campsite with a fabulous view:
The one drawback to our lovely campsite was the mosquitos which were very very bad! They bit me at least a dozen times right through the sheet in the middle of the night. Even though we thought we had them blocked out and the stragglers eliminated, we ended up putting on the light and chasing down 4 or 5 of the beasts before we could get back to sleep. Ugh. And they didn't let up in the morning either! We had to pack quickly and drive away to avoid filling the van up again with the bloodsuckers. Double-ugh. Guess I'm just too delicious, huh?
September 9 - Fundy National Park, New Brunswick.
When we escaped the probosces of the mozzies we drove up to Amherst, NS, and over to New Brunswick. We followed the "lighthouse" trail on the map up the east side of the Peticodiac Bay and into Dieppe/Moncton and around the west side and down again. Our first stop was a wildlife sanctuary trail system for a breakfast stop but there wasn't a view and there were more mosquitos. At least there was a Port-O-Pottie! The next stop after dancing among the highways in Moncton was the Hopewell Rocks. We visited here the last time in 2013 and this time we got there before noon when the tide was low and perfect for exploring:
The rocks (also called "flowerpots") are sea stacks of harder rock dug out from softer rock by waves over millennia. They are very cool but the many people and the ubiquitous yellow danger signs get in the way of good photos! One more:
Afterwards we followed the "lighthouse" trail further down the coast. We ran into serious fog at Cape Enrage, which of course enraged us as well. Heh. It disappeared as we went further south again and we pressed on to Fundy NP where we got a nice campsite with, gasp, wifi! Yay. And a comfort station with laundry and hot water on tap. We would have taken more walks and taking more photos but instead we spent the afternoon doing loads of laundry and cleaning out the van. Again. We're back with the soggy socks hanging everywhere again, a la Kouchibouguac. Feels good to be cleaned up though and smelling a little less pungent than we were. The pervasive damp and lack of easy fresh water gets a bit tedious at times. We've been living in our little van for well over a month now. You get the picture. At least we've had frequent showers. Tomorrow it's on to the Canada/US border crossing. Don't want to aggravate the touchy border guards with anything negative now, do we? Nope. We're just an old retired couple heading home...
It's hard to say how much wifi I'm going to be able to access in the next few weeks. We'll be in the US for a couple of days, back into Quebec and Ontario for a few more and then back to the US for the rest of the trip before coming home. I'll keep writing posts but who knows when I'll be able to post them? It's a challenge! Though sometimes I find wifi in unexpected places. Stay tuned.
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