Cape Breton and the Ferry to Newfoundland

July 29 - we left Louisdale area and headed to Baddeck and Denis toured the Alexander Graham Bell museum. We continued on to New Harris to camp for the night. We are on a hill and have a great view of a bridge over an arm of Bras D'Or Lake (I think). Which is nice since we're here for 3 days.

July 30 - We got an early start and arrived at the Fortress of Louisbourg before they opened. We enjoyed the day and the weather co-operated very nicely. About 1/5 of the fortress has been rebuilt using plans that were archived in Quebec/France and from archaeological digs. The French took detailed inventories of a person's possessions when they died, and not just for the wealthy, these were also archived in France so they were used to duplicate furnishings and accessories in the reconstructed buildings. The re-enactors are a mix of young and old, even children. We had soup at the lower class eating establishment and then an afternoon rum tasting. They didn't make beer, only spruce beer of which there were no samples (but I have seen it in the grocery stores). The wine, imported from France, was far too expensive for the lower class so they drank cheap rum, imported from the French West Indies. The rum punch (grog) was very good, made with lemon juice, and they gave us the recipe. We left just after 4 and headed to Glace Bay, to the Marconi museum at Table Head. This is where Marconi sent the first message across the Atlantic.

Gates of the Fortress of Louisbourg



An Infantry soldier at the Fortress

The Fife & Drum Corp

You can't have too many cannons....I always say!

Waiting for our ration of grog

July 31 - This morning we had a bit of a lazy start to the day, it was raining so we weren't  too eager to go exploring. We set out about the time the rain stopped and toured around North Sydney and Sydney. We checked out the giant fiddle on the waterfront, it's 55 feet tall. We walked around town (in the drizzle) and went to the Triangle an Irish pub for lunch. After lunch we toured a bit more and then headed back to the trailer to cook our Alberta steaks because the fridge will be off for the 14 hour ferry ride to Newfoundland. Next post from the Rock!

That's a big fiddle