Nova Scotia 2021

We woke to a weather forecast that made us frown and sigh:  one last blast of winter tomorrow, on the last day of winter.  And while all of Nova Scotia will be impacted, Cape Breton is to bear the brunt, with up to 30cm of snow.  The near-certainty of the Sydney area being shut down by that amount of snow made us decide to pull the plug on the Cape Breton portion of our March Break.  So, with heavy hearts we cancelled our hotel reservation for the next two nights and set out to complete the Mainland Nova Scotia portion of our plan and head home. Sticking out of the north shore of Nova Scotia is a peninsula whose tip is called Cape George Point and whose eastern edge borders Bay St. George, with Cape Breton Island's western shore on the other side, and Prince Edward Island a short distance across the Northumberland Strait.  It's a part of the province we had never explored, so we were excited to dig our teeth into it. With very strong Scottish linkages, the Gael...

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Halifax has a much closer affinity with Scotland than with Ireland, but still, even Nova Scotia has a wee buzz over March 17th.   We awoke on this St. Patrick's Day to beautiful blue skies and a slightly warmer temperature than yesterday.  Our Residence Inn by Marriott, like all hotels that formerly offered a continental breakfast buffet, had a modified approach, with a staff member compiling each breakfast tray according to guests' desired items.  Breakfast sandwiches, yogurt, muffins, juice and coffee were sufficient to get us on our way at 10AM, after a quick look at Halifax's iconic Clock Tower. The day was comprised of three key activities:  a walk to Joseph Howe Falls in Truro's Victoria Park;  a visit to the Nova Scotia Museum of Industry in Stellarton;  and a walk along the Samson Trail, adjacent to the East River.  We arrived in Victoria Park just after 11AM and headed out of town at noon.  At 1PM, we starte...

As the saying goes, when life gives you lemons, sell them and buy a pineapple.  When it comes to March Break and a year of pent-up desire to go somewhere, the lemons are the inability to leave Nova Scotia.  The pineapple represents an attempt to salvage a few days' change of pace and scenery within this small province. We were supposed to be in Seychelles right now (a rebooked version of the trip we were supposed to take the day after the World Health Organization declared the pandemic on March 11, 2020).  Instead, we have organized a four-day visit to Halifax > Stellarton > Cape Breton. It was a year ago today that David had to convene the staff of his four Atlantic offices and ask them to work from home.  To mark the one-year anniversary of the Great Telework Experiment, a special virtual staff gathering was held today to lightheartedly commemorate the trying year that has been.  Once that was over, we headed to the Residence Inn by Marriott in the hear...