Eastward Day 3: Deer Island

Whitney and Michael had to head back home to Halifax this day, but apparently we had not yet had enough of cruising the Bay of Fundy in a boat. This time we took the car with us. 

The ferry to Deer Island runs frequently, and just happens run from virtually around the corner from our Green's Point lighthouse. Deer Island seems to be, to some extent, New Brunswick's smaller version of Nova Scotia's majestic Cape Breton Island. It also is ringed by a (sometimes) scenic coastal highway, which is dotted with occasional artist studios/shops. 

Probably the most memorable stop on this island for us was probably The Happy Shoppe. 

True to its sign, there were indeed antiques, some old books, and.... archery! While the others went in to check out the "shoppe" (of which the shed in the picture above is only part, it also extends to the house a bit up the hill to the left), I took the dog for a stretch/walk down the road. When I came back, I found the family out behind the above shed... on the archery range. 

So it turns out the proprietor is a retired University of Guelph administrator (if I recall correctly), who opened up his antique shop as a sort of hobby. And also he hand crafts wooden long bows. He was kind enough to take everyone around back and give them some archery lessons and practice on one of his bows. 

The old archer also tipped us off as to where a hiking trail was nearby, which we'd wanted to find. Even with his helpful hints we missed it, and had to double back to finally find it.

The trails weren't terribly long, but it was fairly rugged with several varying terrain types. At one point there is a cabin-like building with a balcony look-out towards the ocean. 

Em left his mark. We'll say no more about that. Have a picture of an interesting old stump, instead.

At the very south end of Deer Island, you can catch another ferry which takes you to Cambobello Island. Campobello Island, oddly, which only can be reached from New Brunswick via the two ferries, actually is attached to Main, USA, via a bridge on its south-western side. Anyhow, the Campobello ferry was not running for some reason while we were on Deer Island, so we didn't have to decide whether to check it out or not. 

Instead, we just drove to the very southern point of Deer Island and pointed across the channel to where the kids might look and possibly see some real live Americans. We didn't see any though. Maybe they don't come out in the rain? (It was raining a slight bit, at that point.)

National boundaries are mysterious things up close.

There is actually supposedly a whirlpool out there separating us. In fact the largest whirlpool in the Western Hemisphere. Old Sow Whirlpool, it is called. Maybe the tide has to be right, or maybe you need to get closer in a boat, but we couldn't see much where and when we were.

Anyhow, despite a bit of drizzle, it was another nice day wandering around the east coast. 

The rest of the pictures are here.

Eastward Day 2: Whales

The next morning we rendezvoused back in St. Andrews, with whales in mind. And for the occasion Istra made for herself a new hairstyle...

Sadly the hairstyle proved not entirely practical; so mommy fixed it for her. We saw a random cat, and a motorcycle (which the cat may or may not have ridden in on). And then we headed out on a big boat to see... some rocks.

It was a bit weird how the boat slowed down here. These rocks didn't even look very interesting. There were much more dramatic rocks elsewhere. But, wait a minute... there does seem to be something funny about these...

Those are not rocks!!!

Well, they were rocks... but rocks completely covered in seals! Our guide told us habour seals were the smaller seals with the doggy faces (all of the ones up on the rocks). The larger seals with the horsey faces (a few of which we could see swimming around) were grey seals. 

It was recommended to bring warm clothes for the boat trip. This advice seemed a bit crazy, because the weather was sunny and very hot. But once the boat got moving, the cold ocean air felt very chilly indeed for those of us who refused to leave the deck for shelter below. 

I surrendered my jacket to Emeth, who wore it was like a long robe -- but still being cold he sat on the deck to tuck his legs in. Eventually the kids went and got blankets which the boat supplied for frozen people. Emeth still kept my jacket, but wrapped the blanket, toga-style, to cover his legs. Istra... well, you can see Istra's Arctic survival tactics with her blanket in the picture above.

After the seals, our attention was drawn by a curious fin sticking out of the water in the distance. It seemed fairly large, and just casually drifting through the water. It definitely wasn't a porpoise, many of which we had seen already bobbing up and down. The boat turned to approach the fin...

The mysterious creature we were lucky to see turned out to be an ocean sunfish, or mola mola. The boat got quite close, and the guide extended a waterproof camera on a telescopic pole to get better video of the thing. They are quite large. They have a very odd and awkward appearing way of swimming, with their large dorsal fin frequently sticking up out of the water, and another equally large anal fin pointing down. They do not have tail fins. Their main diet is jellyfish, so I guess they don't need to be super awesome swimmers to get their dinners. 

We were super lucky to see the mola, but even more luck for us was soon to surface...

A fin whale.

We followed this whale around for quite a while, until we had to turn back to the dock. But on the way back to the dock a minke whale was spotted and we were lucky again to see it, though not as closely as the finback. The whale watching company's sightings log for the day says they were unable to find the fin whale again when they went out in the afternoon, so we were lucky we took the first morning trip. 

We also passed an island with many nesting sea birds, including an adult and juvenile bald eagle. But mostly it was awash in gulls nesting in geometric rock faces. The original apartment dwellers.

Another bonus treat we had on this cruise in the Bay of Fundy was that the boat passed by Green's Point, the very point the lighthouse cottage we were staying in is on, and so we got to see what it looked like from the ocean perspective.

Green's Point Lighthouse

On the way back to the pier, the whale watching guides pulled out a tank of live sea creatures, to describe and let people touch starfish, urchins, and snails.

When we got back to our lighthouse cottage, we went for another walk to look at our low-tide sea shore.

There were, to our eyes, amazing and unusual rocks everywhere. Istra found a few she just could not leave behind. Em, on the other hand, appears to have grown attached to a scrap board.

Many more pictures, especially of whale fins, here.

Level up

Off to school for another year.... raining, as usual.

Maybe I'll have a chance to continue the New Brunswick saga now? Thar be whales!

Eastward Day 1: Kingsbrae Garden

Kingsbrae Horticultural Garden is said to be one of the best gardens in Canada. For me, I don't know of any better. The reason it is the best is that while it has an amazing collection of flowers and trees, and other plants, it goes beyond them and integrates a fantastic array of sculpture art into the garden. There is a dedicated "sculpture garden", but there is art throughout. The artistic flurish of nature, intermingled with the artistic strivings of humans. All laid out under the (should you be so blessed, as we were) blue hued vaults of the heavens.

Anyhow, though it wasn't entirely planned, we ended up at Kingsbrae Garden for our first day in New Brunswick.

The garden can be meditative...

Whimsical...

Perplexing...

And weird...

Majestic...

Interactive...

There are several colourfully painted painted pianos throughout the colourfully flowered garden. The random gentleman above wandered over to the keyboard and started plunking out "smoke on the water" with two fingers. It was epic.


And, amazingly enough, they also allow dogs!

We were just cautioned against one area with the dogs at first, because "the alpacas are out there". And indeed they were. Working on mowing the lawn. What a place.

Anyhow, it's really not like being there, but here are all our pictures.

Eastward Ho

So we did it. Three adults, two kids, and a greyhound. Two cars. A long road. Our pilgrimage to Aunty Belle's belovèd lighthouse embarked. And on the evening of the very next day, at the Atlantic ocean's side, joining with two more of the clan, and another greyhound. That I am writing this indicates success! Survival! More than survival. Pictures!

There wasn't a lot of time for pictures on the epic dive, so the few I have (this link leads to them all) makes it seem like the journey was a hop, a skip and a jump. In fact there were many, many hops and skips and jumps. And a few other things besides.

Above can be witnessed the "party car" of our little caravan arriving at Green's Point, shortly before sunset. Below can be seen our mascot making one of many new friends she met along the way.

Stay tuned for more of this adventure. For now, I will leave you at our seaside dinner picnic. With the high tide.

(Grammie brought the sriracha! Hurrah!)

Surprise Music Recital 2015

The end-of-year music recital snuck up on us... but we got video.





Emeth went through many teachers this year. His original teacher, Mark, left. Then he found himself with Anthony who after a while apparently disappeared. And finally he landed with Tong. We never got a picture of the gigantic mop-topped Mark, nor the more buttoned down Anthony. But here is a picture of Tong, at least!

You can see Istra's voice teacher, Grace, briefly at the beginning of her video. We have learned that Grace is no longer teaching at The Music Stand next year, so it would seem Istra is in for some changes also.

Aunty Belle's memorial audio

I have finally, almost a year later (can it be that long already?), managed to check to see if my audio recording of Aunty Belle's memorial gathering worked at all. It sounds to have worked...