Jim & Jeanette's Travels: Day 29 – Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Hilden, Nova Scotia to Hubbards, Nova Scotia – 121 miles

It was a short day, at least as far as mileage goes. But it was a tiring and somewhat stressful day, as this was our day to visit Halifax. That meant driving the motorhome into the heart of an unfamiliar city, on narrow streets and through what seemed like a dozen construction zones, then trying to find a place to park that is RV-friendly. We finally succeeded, though, and found a public surface parking lot that was right where we wanted to be, down on the waterfront. We spent a couple of hours strolling along the boardwalk that follows the harbor’s edge, right down in the midst of that vibrant city. There was construction everywhere – not only the aforementioned road construction but a lot of building construction. There were construction cranes everywhere we looked, with multiple high-rise buildings in various stages of completion. The economy must be doing well here.

The boardwalk passes through the mooring area for some very large private yachts, both the sailing kind and the motorized kind. There was one rather old schooner, and one brand new two-masted vessel that looked to be about 70 feet long. There seemed to be a lot of activity on the latter, including a guy way up at the peak of the aft mast, installing some sort of rigging. Everything looked brand new and spotless, which was confirmed when I asked one of the crew (or owners) about the boat. She said they had just taken possession of it a few days before, having picked it up directly from the boat builder just up the harbor. They were preparing it for its maiden voyage, and gear and supplies were lined up on the quay beside the boat, ready to be loaded. In the next slip over was a large, modern cruising trawler, which I estimated to be about 60 feet long. But the real gem was a bit up the way – an ultramodern, gleaming power yacht at least a hundred feet long. It was flying the flag of a country I didn’t recognize on the stern, and the name of the boat was plastered in polished stainless steel letters on the side of the cabin, again in a language I didn’t recognize. I can only guess at the cost of something like this, but it must be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Judging from the array of antennas on the mast, the cost of the electronics alone had to be in the 7-digit range.

Getting ready for the maiden voyage

Getting out of Halifax proved to be almost as much of a challenge as was getting into the city. We were a little better prepared navigationally, but we hit a delay caused by road construction that must have lasted at least 15 or 20 minutes. I guess the harsh winters in this part of the world are really hard on the roads, and the crews have to shoe-horn the entire year’s maintenance into the three months of summer.

Our destination as we left Halifax was Peggy’s Cove, a historic fishing village about a half-hour drive from the city along a winding county road, with, of course, more construction. Peggy’s Cove was one of the “don’t miss” sites recommended by friends who have visited Nova Scotia. It is a designated world heritage site, so we were really expecting it to be something special. As often happens, though, when you have high expectations, the reality turns out to be something less. It may have been because we were tired and frustrated from the stress of working our way through Halifax, but we were both rather disappointed when we drove into the village of Peggy’s Cove. Yes, it is uniquely situated on a windswept, rocky peninsula; and yes, it does have a picturesque lighthouse; and yes, it does have the prototypical small harbor with a few fishing boats beside piers piled high with lobster traps, and yes it does have several weatherbeaten shanties along and overlooking the harbor, as well as a few brightly-painted shops along the single road which dead-ends at the lighthouse; but somehow it just didn’t click with either of us. Personally, I was looking forward to finding a photographer’s delight with all the neat amenities I just described, but I guess the combination of my mental attitude at the time and the grey, leaden skies and equally grey and flat water out in the cove just put a damper on the whole experience for me. To top it off, it began to rain as we drove away. Here’s looking forward to better days ahead.