Exploring Fundy

Sunday July 17. We picked two places, hike to Matthews point and the Sea Caves in St Martin. Matthews point was a fairly easy 3 mile round trip to get views of the bay. Then we went south to St. Martin to see the sea caves, short caves created by the tides. We almost got caught by the rising tide, ankle deep when we waded across, knee deep and rising when we waded back 15 minutes later.

Had lunch at The Sea Cave, aptly named restaurant with a deck overlooking the caves. Everyone there was from Canada, and most from New Brunswick. I’m sure they were tourists, this is a tiny town, but its interesting that no US tourists were there other than us (based on the license plates in the parking lot). From there we went back to near the park and walked around Alma, NB. High tide that started when we left St. Martin was now gone, and it was approaching low tide again. The lobster boats literally are on the sea floor at low tide.

There are two tide cycles each day, so two low tides and two high tides, 6 hours apart. From the Bay of Funds the boats go out and return at high tides, they must. Other places, Maine for example, they are free to set a more normal schedule.

Monday July 18 We drove from Chignecto NP (very nice btw) to Hopewell rocks. These cliffs and rock formations are the result of erosion from the extreme tides. The pictures show the cliffs are composed of sand, gravel and rock sediment deposited several million years ago. Tides have eroded the sediment layer forming these intricate cliffs and rock towers. We were walking on the ocean floor, notice the seaweed.

The tide will be up at least covering the seaweed in just a couple of hours. People do get caught. Look at this safety warning.

On to Nova Scotia and a hotel room. We ate on the Halifax waterfront, at Salt Yard Social. The downtown is on a hill that descends to the waterfront. Some streets are steep, some quite narrow. The city looked clean and prosperous. The waterfront is where most of the restaurants and night life are. It was very busy, hard to find parking, and this is a Monday.

Here’s another picture with a view of a lighthouse from the waterfront.

There were lots of dogs. I continue to be surprised by how much our Sammy attracts attention. He’s also fairly well behaved, better than most.

Finally a picture from a small restaurant outside Moncton, NB

Really, gluten free scallops clams and fish.

Tomorrow we plan to drive the Cabot trail around Cape Breton and we will stay at Broad Cove CG in Cape Breton Highlands NP.