Mahone Bay to Peggy's Cove Nova Scotia

September 17- After our ketch trip Thursday, the crowd was dragging so made a quiet night of it. Rain overnight and then heavy rain to start out travel day. The first stop was in Mahone Bay to go to the farmers market, do laundry if necessary and reprovision. Why more provisions who knows as all of us have been partaking of the super local seafood restaurants and bakeries. And yes there was a true bread baker at the farmer's market who had everything from chocolate croisants to those long thin crusty loaves.

I'd looked forward to going into some of the Nova Scotia yarn shops and found a real treasure in "Just a Yarn" in Mahone Bay. If an of you are fiber people, it is a must stop. Others went into the quilt shop and the pewter maker. Mahone Bay was yet another small, walkable Nova Scotia town with friendly people and lots to see.

We split up from here with most of us eventually following the coastal route from Mahone Bay up to Peggy's Cove, wending our way through inlets, coves and tiny fishing villages. Road names like "Pig Loop" and "Dead Horse" crop up but many of the road names reflect the Scottish heritage with McGregor, Culloden, etc. pretty common. By early afternoon we were in the midst of a strong coastal squall with heavy rain and high winds probably in the 40 mph range.

We are camped just before Peggy's Cove in Indian Harbor, again right on the ocean. This time we are on a small hill or the salt water would be washing over the campers.

Ted and Mike were parked closer then we were to the ocean. Here they are during the storm.

Eventually the storm broke and we could see sunset with a promise of clear sunny skies tomorrow.

Tomorrow we'll do a group breakfast over near the Peggy's Cove lighthouse, visit the shale ledges at the cove and then have a driving day to Antigonish. We plan on sticking to PH7 (Provincal Highway) which will take us right along the coast. Some of that will depend on the weather and deciding if we want to do 160+ miles at 35-50 mph (scenic as it is).

September 18 - The storm blew every particle of pollution out of the air and left us with one of those picture postcard days.

Peggy's Cove is a major tourist attraction and we wanted to get in and out prior to the busloads of folks from the cruise ships out of Halifax. We passed a lot of those buses - double decker and tandem buses on the way out. The cove is a working fishing village with a year round population of 35. This is one of the working wharves with the mirror smooth ocean.

We filled up the back half of the parking lot with a lot of TCs plus an extra Adventurer rented by a couple from Germany who were fascinated with all the TCs.

After a hearty breakfast of fish cakes, fried potato and fatback bacon we waddled up to the light house. Trying to corral 20+ people for a group photo was slightly difficult. Anyway, here is the lighthouse.

(On Edit  - a fellow traveller had this great shot of most of the group at the lighthouse)

We decided not to travel up the coast as we will see a lot of coastline around Cape Breton. The Trans Canada Highway is a well engineered smooth road, easy to drive and lots of scenery including a Bald Eagle. Guess I cannot call it an American Bald Eagle since we are in Canada.

Tonight we are in Antigonish to do laundry, fuel up, sit by the campfire and plan more travels. Tomorrow we head for a two night stay in Englishtown. Some will mackeral fish, some will kayak and others will tour over to Fortress Louisbourg National Historic Site. Joe and I plan a side trip to Iona to see the Highland Village Museum, recreating early settler life on Cape Breton. More when we get wifi again.