New Brunswick, June 2-5

                                        The Grand Falls falls, the largest falls in New Brunswick

               Erica and I in front of the worlds largest covered bridge in the world, located in Hartland, NB

Rustana (Rustic Canadiana's nickname) coming out of the covered bridge, Mom, Erica and I had already walked through, so we were able to take the picture.

                                              Erica and I in front of the Fredericton Legislature

                                                             Hopewell rocks at high tide

                                                Erica and I at Hopewell rocks at high tide

        Erica and I waiting near groundhog holes, we didn't see any, ( we only got this close for the picture).

Mom and Dad in Hopwell rocks at low tide, these particular rocks are named Lover's Arch, so named because there have been weddings there.

                                                   Erica and I at Hopwell rocks at low tide

                                                          Hopewell rocks at low tide

               We were lucky to visit Hopewell rocks at the time this Peregrine falcon was nesting her chicks, she was sitting on them at the time, but apparently she has three.

 As we passed through Shediac, we had to pose with the world's largest lobster, that is one of the most uncomfortable positions I have ever been in!

We were in New Brunswick for a total of four days. The first day we did Fredericton. I t is not a large city, we alked around a little, looked at their fairly small Legislature building, and moved on, arriving that night in the Bay of Fundy national park. The next day we went to Alma Beach, and the following day we visited Hopewell rocks, were we got to walk on the sea floor among rock formations. After that we did plenty of driving, our last stop being in Shediac, where we quickly visited a lobster, and then went over the Confederation Bridge into P.E.I.

Alma Beach,. New Brunswick, June 4

A scallop shell at Alma Beach, this one was the best, the other where pale in colour and most were missing peices  

                                           Erica and I trying to get through a mud flat quickly

                                             Snail shells on a rock, there were hundreds there! 

Knotted wrack, there were many boulders so full of  this plant that you could hardly see any rock surface at all.

                                       Dad rescuing one the codfishes that had beached themselves.                        

                                      

       Dad first put the fish here, but we realized that it was freshwater, so we put him (or her) into salt water 

Dad checking on his fish after he had put in better water, he repored that it was starting to move a bit now that it had some oxygen in his lungs 

                                                   A rocky area of Alma Beach at low tide


On June 4 we visited the town of Alma, home of the largest tides in the world. As we were walking along the beach at low tide we came across many freshwater streams crossing our path on their way to the Atlantic. We had had enough sense to wear our sandals, so we rolled up our pants and waded across them, they were quite cold. After we had walked through some mud flats (areas of soft, sticky, mud) we were happy to find that there were pools of water that had collected in dips in large rocks throughout the beach were we could wash our feet. As I was walking I nearly stepped on what I thought was an odd rock. Further inspection startled me thouroughly; it was not a rock but a dead fish. Dad, curious, also inspected it and said it was a cod of some sort, and it was alive! So Dad put it on a piece of wood we found and carried it to the water. Continuing our walk we found yet another beached cod, so we rescued that one as well. We found many scallop, snail and mussel shells on the beach as well as an odd sort of plant call "knotted wrack" a type of weed that grows on rocks and has little pockets of air on its leaves that help it float upwards in the water at high tide to get it closer to the sun.

Happy Father's Day

Happy belated Father's Day all!

St-Jean-Port-Joli

                                                   Erica and I in the St. Lawrence river  

                Me getting draged down, Erica had already gotten out safely, her arm is in the picture

After Montreal, we went up the St. Lawrence river to St-Jean-Port-Joli for two nights. It was another hot day, so we sat on some rocks near the shore and let the waves wash over us. At first the water lapped up to our shins, and a while later, we were getting VERY wet. This part of the river, being so wide and close to the ocean, has tides. As we were getting out, (we were getting water all up our backs) a huge wave hit me and nearly dragged me down, as i was scrambling out, I cut my ankle on a rock.

ST. JOHN'S!!!!!

We made it! We are finally in St, John's, hallelujah! The weather has been pretty cold in Newfoundland, yesterday, however, was quite nice while we were in Trinity, Bonavista Penninsula.

Montreal, May 30

                                                                  Scrabble in the dark 

                                                                    Inside Notre Dame  

                                                             Erica and I in Old Montreal 

               Erica and I in Old Montreal, it was one of our few hot days on the trip, we had ice cream

                                                     The white squirrel eating up-side-down 

                                               Erica and I on the top of MOunt. Royale 

Dad and a statue of Guy Lafleur outside of the Montreal canadians hall of fame

                                            Dad and Rustic Canadiana in the MOntreal KOA 

                                                    Exhaustion: climbing up Mont. Royale

We arrived at a KOA in the outskirts of Montreal on May 29, that night we played Scrabble on a picnic table by the light of ski headlamps. Our day in Montreal was long, and very hot. We took the Metro (subway) around, but still did a lot of walking. First we went inside the Notre Dame church, which, although it has the sme name, is not a replica of the church in France. After touring Old Montreal, we hiked up Mont. Royale. Mont Royale is a large tourist attraction because of the great views it offers and historic cross. We were given walking directions by a tourist information person, so we walked. What she did NOT tell us was that there was a Metro station that was positioned very close to Mont. Royale, which would have saved us a lot of time and energy. By the time we arrived, we were tired, so we stopped in the grassy area at the foot of the mountain before starting to climb. There we saw a white squirrel and pigeons. Eventually we made it to the top, where we took in the view and refilled our water bottles.When we were somewhat rested, we went down the shortcut of stairs that we hadn't seen on our way up, and a few blocks from the bottom of the stairs, was a metro station that would take us back too Old Montreal for dinner. After we had got off the MEtro that took us near our motorhome, we stumbled upon the Montreal Canadians hall iof fame, which was (to Dad, not me) a bonus.

Current Position

My blog is VERY behind due to having no internet for several days at a time. We are currently in Sydney, Nova Scotia. We will take the ferry to Newfoundland tomorrow, if they let us on, Erica and I don't have picture ID!

Ottawa May 28

 

Some of the horses in the stables

                                       Some of the horses of the musical ride in one of the pastures.

                                                     Rustic Canadiana in downtown Ottawa

                                                      The Centre Block Parliament Building                                          

                                                                     The Peace Tower

                                               The Speaker's chair in the House of Commons

                                                             The House of Commons 

                                                        One of the rooms from the floor above              

                              One of the rooms with guards, there were many stationed throughout

                                   A section of the centre block Parliament building from an odd angle

                                                Erica eating her lunch outside of the Parliament


                                                    
                                                      Erica and I in the Parliament Grounds

                                 Mom and Dad in Quebec, with the Parliament in the background

                                     Erica and I in Quebec with the Parliament in the background

                                               Erica and I outside of the Museum in Quebec


We had a great day in Ottawa. First we went to the base of the "RCMP Musical Ride" except the website didn't inform us that it is closed on Saturdays, therefore wecouldn't tour the stables or watch thte musical ride practice. After we had walkd around a bit and seen a few horses in one of the pastures and peeked into an open stable door, we went and toured the Parliament. To enter the Parliament we had to go through security. The interior was Gothic style, lots of pointed arches. The House of Commons and Senate Room were closed, but we were able to look in through a glass door in both rooms. After our tour, we went up the Peace Tower and saw most of Ottawa beneath us. After the Parliament we walked across a bridge into  Gatineau, Quebec to visit the Canadian Museum of Civilisation, which had an Imax theatre.

Roadside attractions

                                               Erica and I in front of the Terry Fox Monument 

                                         Erica (the tiny speck) on some rocks in Lake Superior 

                                    A rabbit eating vegetation in the bush in Rainbow Falls Campsite

                                  Another rabbit running across the road in Rainbow Falls Campsite 

                                  The monument commemorating the birthplace of Winnie-the-Pooh 

                                                                   The Wawa goose 

                                                    A Canada flag near the Wawa goose


As we were leaving Thunder Bay we went to see the Terry Fox monument, there to commemorate his courage against cancer and his dying in the Thunder Bay hospital.  All that day we could see Lake Superior, that is one HUGE lake! It was also a long day, we drove from just outside of Thunder Bay to Sault. St. Marie. We had camped at Rainbow Falls Campsite not far out of Thunder Bay, there were lots of rabbits there who were obviously used to people. Continuing along the road we came to White River, where Winnie-the-Pooh started. A young bear cub had been orphaned and brought to the town of White River. A train carrying army troops had stopped in White River (White River was founded because of the railway).  The little black bear cub was purchased for $20 by Lieutenant Harry Coleburn (this was a pretty common thing to do in 1914), who named her Winnipeg after his hometown. Everyone called her Winnie, and she became a pet for the soldiers. When the Lieutenant was sent to England to fight, he gave Winnie a home in the London zoo. Winnie was loved by all in London, so the Lieutenant donated her to the zoo, where she lived for the rest of her life. While she was at the zoo, a man named A.A. Milne and his son, Christopher Robin, went to visit Winnie. Christophr Robin recieved abear for his birthday, which he named Winnie-the-Pooh, after Winnie. Christopher Robin added 'the-Pooh' to her name after his pet swan, Pooh. A.A. Milne wrote about his son, his bear and his son's stuffed animals in his popular books. Winnie died in the zoo on May 12, 1934 when she was 20 years old. After White River, we continued on, when we reached Wawa, a gold rush town, we saw the worlds largest goose. there to acknowledge the vast number of Canadian geese that stop here on the yearly migrations, Wawa means "wild goose" in Ojibway.