We made our way down to the St. John, NB area to see the reversing falls. When the high tide comes into the Bay of Fundy, it pushes the St. John river back upstream and reverses its flow. We sat for four hours watching the change over. We have a few tidal rapids on our coast where this happens. Reversing Falls Rapids | Discover Saint John When we first got there, the river was running pretty good towards the sea. I think this was the tail end of the whirlpool. The buildings across the water are a pulpmill. Built in the 1940s, the owners kept it up to date with technology so it is still operating. Quite a few of the pulpmills out our way have shutdown due to technology. Looking upstream, you can see the falls. Unfortunately I didn't know there was a better viewpoint just up around the corner so I didn't get a good shot of these rapids. The black line on the island is where the water reaches at high water. For this kind of scenery, you need action shots so I took a few videos. You can see that the water is slowing down as the tide is rising out in the Bay of Fundy The rapids are slowing disappearing I found the better viewpoint upstream but the water wasn't running as fast. It was starting to be close to slack water when this sailboat headed up stream. They definitely knew where the channel was. We are at the point that water is about to reverse. https://youtu.be/efE1RodTgBk The flow is now heading upstream https://youtu.be/aD1w9s6A9II The cormorants were busy flying upstream, landing and going downstream with the current. With the flow going the other way, they flew downstream, landed and floated upstream. https://youtu.be/wBLaiLcG4Oo Last video. You can see that the upstream flow has really increased and started to create a small drop just past the island. https://youtu.be/M1tAz6CeS8E
After leaving the falls, we drove through St. John. Our GPS was trying to get us back to our campsite so we ended up in some weird places. St. John is a seaport on the Bay of Fundy. I love the look of the older homes on the east coast. They are older and very different looking than our area back home. I told Mom that this was the design for an upgrade on the library she works in. So many churches and most of them look like they are being used as churches.
Leaving our campsite, we headed east to the coast of Bay of Fundy. We were going to make a circle trip around back to our campsite. It took a lot longer than we anticipated. Our first real glimpse of the Atlantic ocean or really the Bay of Fundy Wild orange day lilies every where. Because there has been enough moisture, flowers are in full bloom. The best place to see the view. Shadow wasn't interested in the view. She was checking to see if any treats got dropped. View from the chairs. Alma, NB. Boats waiting for the tide to come in. As we drove along the shore of the Bay of Fundy, I was struck by all the red sand. Salt marshes.
As we had to wait until our Newfoundland ferry date in August, we found out that the Maritime conference of our church was holding a camp meeting in Pugwash, NS. They had a spot for the trailer so we spent a very inspiring blessed week at camp. To get there, we went through Amherst, NS. This was the nearest place for major grocery shopping and laundry. Some old buildings again. Have you figured out that I like old buildings? Pink roads. They are quite something to see. The pictures doesn't really bring out the colour. Camp Pugwash is on the north shore of Nova Scotia. It was first built in 1952. Northumberland Strait looking at Prince Edward Island on the horizon. Red sand beaches. It is quite shallow here even when the tide is in. The camp was quite big. We were in an RV park across the road.
Leaving Camp Pugwash, we headed to North Sydney, NS to catch the ferry to Port aux Basques, Newfoundland. I am trying to capture the colour of the pink roads. To me they are quite unique. Before we reached Cape Breton, we stopped to have lunch and a break. As it was a long weekend, we found a Kal Tire shop that had a big empty parking lot. Perfect place to stop. Wildflowers all along the edge of the parking lot. North Sydney is on Cape Breton Island. Road access is by one road over a causeway. All the traffic to Cape Breton and Newfoundland goes over this causeway. Waiting for the ferry. As we didn't book months ahead for the busy season, we ended up with a midnight run of 7 hours. No cabins available and no sleeping in the RV. It was an interesting trip trying to sleep in a room with 100 people - some of whom snored quite loudly.
We landed in Port aux Basques at 7:30 AM. First thing was to stop and let Shadow out. We were not allowed to go down and let her out while we were on board ship. She did really well in handling herself. We spent the day traveling to our first campsite which was much farther than we expected. It was a lovely spot in a National Park. After sleeping almost 12 hours, we went exploring. Not far from the campsite, was Norris Point (left) and Neddies Harbour (right). The entrance to the bay was on the far right. Norris Point Every town has a least two churches. Norris Point Outside the harbour. We could almost be looking at the coastline back home. On the far point is a lighthouse. We drove around to the lighthouse on the point. Looking back to where we came from. It was quite the windy day. We came back and drove around to Neddie's Harbour. This is looking at the place I took the earlier picture of the church. You can see it on the left side of center. Looking at Norris Point.
It has really been the trip of a lifetime. So much to see and so little time to see it all. Really brings home how big our country is.
