Following The Red Starfish

Parlee Beach Provincial Park

The rain began overnight and picked up in intensity during  the morning. With winds of 50 kph forecasted, we decided to stay a second night.
We were quite comfortable with t.v.. Not a skunk in sight. Only thing missing was Wi-Fi,  available at the office and it was too wet to hike or bike over there!

New Brunswick and The Acadian Coast

It was a refreshing 4º and not a cloud in the sky when we woke to a brilliant sunrise. We returned to Amherst for a few more groceries and topped up our gas tanks @ $1.25 /litre. We also bought propane again. (The furnace was getting a lot of use this trip. 😒)

We crossed into New Brunswick, stopped at the Welcome Centre for more literature and continued to Sackville to the Sackville Waterfowl Park. The wetland has 3 km of winding boardwalks, trails and viewing platforms. It was sunny and warm; we walked part of the way, saw a cormorant, some ducks and cedar waxwings. We ate lunch before motoring on.
We left the Trans Canada highway and took the Scenic Acadian Coastal Drive, a series of secondary highways, some in worse condition than others that follow the coast.








At Cape Tormentine we stopped to get pictures of the impressive bridge
to P.E.I..

We stopped for the day at Parlee Beach Provincial Park just south of Shediac after motoring 152 km.. It was a very pleasant 20º, t-shirt and shorts weather at last!

A Planning Day

We spent a relaxing day at the  campground. The day was partly cloudy; it reached 18 deg.. We planned our itinerary for the remaining ten days of our trip which would take us along the Acadian coast of New Brunswick and into Quebec. Jean worked on editing her pictures. Martha finished dismembering her  cooked lobsters and froze the meat. Martha also got her t.v. working and connected her tablet so that we could view our pictures on a larger screen which was nice. Mine were first up. Next up: hers.
Shadow and Kerry played and slept and played some more.
The campground was much busier this Father's Day weekend.

Skunked!

A most upsetting start to our day: Shadow  got sprayed by a skunk on our early morning walk at 5:45. Fortunately she did not get too badly sprayed, her head, nose and throat  and I had a bottle of Skunk Off on board. I washed her off as best as she would allow me to. She was NOT a happy camper. I washed  her collar in stewed tomatoes which did the trick.

We were on our way at 9:00 west on hwy 104. It got sunnier as the morning progressed. Traffic was heavy.  One section of the highway near Truro was a toll road; we paid $5.25 for the rv.
Several of the communities along the highway had colourful signs.

We returned to Loch Lomond RV Park at Amherst and checked in for two nights before going into Amherst to shop. We treated ourselves to lunch at A &W. Jean tried the cod burger; Martha and I stayed with beef. At Pet Valu I bought Odor Out, another product to eliminate skunk odors as Shadow still had a lingering smell.
Back at the campground Jean did our laundry, Martha worked on setting up her t..v. It was great to have t.v. reception again, even if only two channels. Back to civilization. It was also great to be back in warmer climes; it reached 18º but boy, were the mosquitoes bad. We learned that it had rained here all week. It was one of our longer driving days; we did 241 km.

Back on the Mainland

After our exciting evening of  sea bird watching, we were in no hurry to get on the road but did beat the rain which started soon  after we left the campground at 10:45. Great timing on our part. We stopped for gas @ $1.26.5 / litre and took the Bras d'Or  Lake Scenic Drive. Heavy rain and low clouds spoiled the scenery and made picture taking virtually  impossible much to Jean's frustration. Bras d'Or Lake is a large inland sea, part fresh water and part saltwater which sustains diverse ecosystems and wildlife. In 2011 the lake and its watershed, some 3,600 sq. km were declared a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.

We stopped in Iona at the Highland Village, a 43 acre living history museum but the rain and wicked wind  discouraged us from visiting.  We crossed the Canso Causeway back onto mainland Nova Scotia.

We bought frozen shrimp at the fish market there, ate a late lunch and continued a few more km  to Linwood Harbour Campground. We had stayed there on our way through a week earlier. The rain finally came to an end  around 2:30 as we hooked up on the same two sites. 159 km in the rain and wind was far enough. 

Our rigs got a power wash in a thunder shower later in the afternoon. After dinner Martha showed us her  pictures from the bird tour. What a show! Absolutely fabulous.

Puffin Patrol

We had only a 26 km drive to our next campground and sightseeing stop at the same location, Mountain Vista Seaside Cottages & Bird Island Boat Tours. It took us over an hour as we stopped at two lookouts for hazy views of a channel on Bras d'Or Lake. The wind was gusting as we crossed the bridge. We stopped at Cape Breton Trailer Sales  where we bought the new terminal fuse for hot water tank. They  very kindly installed it at no additional cost when I asked if I could hire a technician " if  I get into trouble in the next 5 minutes." 😊 We did a shopping run into North Sydney and stopped for a fish and chip take out lunch at Jane's Restaurant which was recommended to us at the trailer dealership.

We were still under a wind warning but gambled that the

Photographer's Tour at 5:30 would be a go. There was only one 15 amp electrical site available which we took while Martha took a non-serviced site across from us. The 1:30 tour was cancelled but thankfully the winds did ease up somewhat and we were good to go. Sure glad I took some gravol!

 The 2.5 hour narrated tour actually took over 3 hours, the sightings were so good and plentiful! The boat follows the coast to two rock islands which are one mile offshore. Bird Island supports the largest colony of Great Cormorants in North America but is also home to Atlantic  Puffins, Razorbills, Black-legged Kittiwakes, Black Guillemots, grey seals, etc. etc. And we saw them all. Photographing was very difficult as the seas were so rough but we

were up to the challenge, especially Martha and Jean with their super zoom cameras. It was a fabulous  bird watching tour, worth the $55 each. The narration was very interesting; information overload  as I don't remember half of it.

a bonus