July 7^th

Bay of Fundy

By the time I woke up we were already in Halifax, there was no doubt about it.

We headed to the Westin Hotel to the car rental desk. When we had rented a car in Halifax previously the rental office was right near the pier, but the hotel is only about a 10-minute walk away, so it is still convenient.

The first time we came to Halifax we were on a cruise with our 3 children and Brian’s parents.

We had rented a minivan and spent a great day at Peggy’s cove, leaving there in good time to get back to the ship. A short way from the pier Brian suddenly announced that it would be wonderful if we could go to the Bay of Fundy to observe the tides there.

I was OK with that, but my father-in-law, being a sensible man and thinking that this would be at least a 3 and a half hour round trip, totally forbade us from going anywhere other than back to the pier. Spoil sport. Still, I had to acknowledge that we would definitely miss the ship should we do this. So we never got to go to see the Bay of Fundy.

Finding out that we had an overnight in Halifax I knew we were destined to finally go to the Bay of Fundy. We would get to see both the low tide AND the high tide. Yay!

So there we were in the car rental office in the Westin hotel anxiously waiting to pick up our vrhicle and head for the bay in good time to catch the low tide.

The rental office was quite a challenge, and what should have taken a few minutes ended up taking over half an hour. We were amused by the 2 women next to us who were renting a car so they could go and get poutine at Costco. Now there is determination for you.

Finally, the paperwork was done, and we went to meet our car, and then head off to the Bay.

We followed the Apple Maps directions to our first destination, and it definitely took us the scenic route, with many twists and turns down rural roads, but it was pretty driving through the fields and waving to the cows, so no problem.

Our first tidal viewing was at Burntcoat Head.

Burncoat has the highest tide changes in the world – almost 54 feet, pretty impressive.

There is an information center in a lighthouse.

You can take your life into your hands by climbing up inside the lighthouse to see the view

Despite the danger it was worth it – we could see the folks walking on the “ocean floor”

Soon we joined them, and I must say it was a lovely sight.

You can explore the area walking around on the slippery rocks, and also, being the ocean floor, the red sand.

Beware of the red sand, especially if you are wearing white sandals. There is a shoe scrubbing station so you can try to clean your shoes after your expedition to the ocean floor, but they do warn you that the red sand can permanently stain your shoes.

We bumped into fellow Queen Mary 2 passengers who were there on the ship’s tour. We could indeed have done that, but they only got to see the low tide. We are going to see the low tide from 3 view points, watch the tide come in, and see what the river looks like at high tide. 54 feet! That’s going to be something.

Our next stop was to check out the Fundy Tidal Interpretive Center. This is where the Shubenacadie River is quite narrow and you get to see a surge of water called the tidal bore. It was still low tide there, but we planned to return later to marvel at the tidal bore.

Our 3^rd stop was at another great viewing place in Dawson Dowel Park in Maitland where you can see the tide come in, but it was said to be less spectacular as the river  is much wider there.

The tide was out, so the no diving sign seemed a bit ridiculous. I mean there was nothing but dry land beneath the pier.

From the pier we could see a building on the water.

Could this be Cresthaven by the Sea? That’s where we are spending the night and it looked like it was in the perfect position.

We decided to have lunch at Frieze and Roy, the oldest general store in Canada. When you first enter it looks like a regular general store.

Then you go by the washers and dryers. It was kind of like Queen Mary 2, all of the dryers were out of action.

Past the launderette is the restaurant and bar itself, aptly named mudslide as you apparently can slide on the mud in the river and get caked in mud. I assume you then have to visit the launderette to clean off your mud-stained clothing.

Inspired by the 2 women in the car rental office who were renting a car so they could go to Costco to get some poutine, when I saw this on the menu I just had to try it.

It was a bit of a mistake. The ingredients are chips, gravy and cheese curds. All 3 ingredients that are very tasty by themselves, but the combination leaves a lot to be desired. Maybe when made by some chefs it is delicious (like at Costco?), but the soggy chips and very salty gravy weren’t that great. Hopefully we would find somewhere better for dinner.

Then it was time to check in to the bed and breakfast. Yay! It was the house we had seen from Dawson Dowell park, perfectly positioned on the water’s edge. We had really lucked out. We could sit and watch the tide come in from our very own back yard. Talk about perfection. We didn’t need to go back to the park.

The tide was still out when we arrived.

We sat in the Adirondak chairs waiting for this marvel of nature to appear. Finally we saw some ripples

And then a wave or two.

Not really spectacular, but the river had been running into the Bay of Fundy when we got here, and now it was running in the opposite direction. I was impressed.

It was now time to head further upstream to really experience the tidal bore.

The was a caboose on the path to the viewing platform.

This seemed to be somewhat random, but then we worked out that the path was probably an old railway line, and the large pilings in the river, remnants of an old railway bridge.

Anyway, we seemed to have got there in good time as the water in the river was still very calm.

Then eventually we started to see ripples.

I was expecting something like a tidal wave, but it isn’t like that at all. Just a lot of fast flowing water.

You can experience the phenomenon in Zodiacs, and it did look like fun. I had considered booking a ride, but the website said the conditions today were going to be extreme, so we decided to give it a miss. We didn’t want to risk getting injured and then miss the boat.

It actually looked quite sedate, so I am sorry we missed out on it. It is not exactly white-water rafting on the Zambezi River.

Then it was all over. I wanted to say that the tidal bore was a bore, but that is not quite accurate. It is an amazing phenomenon, and totally worth the drive here to see it.

So now it was time to drive back to Burntcoat Head to see what the park looked like once the water had come in.

There was no more ocean floor to explore, and although it didn’t reach 54 feet it was apparently 44 feet. Not to shabby. That is the highest tide I have seen.

All this tide watching had made us hungry. There were no close by restaurants, and we didn’t want to return to where we had had lunch. We found the perfect sounding establishment, Catch of the Bay. I had visions of a little seafood restaurant overlooking the Bay of Fundy, serving fresh lobster and chilled white wine. It was an hours drive away, but nothing closer looked as nice so off we drove.

Finally we arrived. There was no bay in sight, but the faux lighthouse seemed to be a good omen.

Now the dead give away should have been that there were no other cars in the parking lot, but it was after 8:00 so I thought that the locals were early diners.

I went into the faux lighthouse and asked for a table. Well it turned out that I was actually in the fish market, and the restaurant was in the boat next door.

That sounded quite romantic – dinner on a boat in the Bay of Fundy.

Then I saw the boat. Maybe it had been a real boat once, or maybe it was a faux boat, but in any case, my bubble of a romantic dinner had just been burst.

My lunch had not been great, but my dinner was really substandard. I have had better food at Popeye’s.

We had ordered Cokes, and we were given tokens for the Coke machine. Of course, it was out of regular Cokes. When I complained there didn’t seem to be anything the staff could do about it. So my $3:50 token really wasn’t that useful.

We drove back to the bed and breakfast, not really disappointed. I mean sometimes you find really excellent restaurants when you least expect it. This restaurant had great reviews, so they were clearly doing something right, and it was just my unrealistic expectations that lead to my disappointment. And indigestion.

And it in no way spoiled the wonderful day we had experienced. We finally got to see the Bay of Fundy. We have waited a long time for this.