Robert's Ride 2010, Day 11, Tuesday, September 1, 2010, Halifax to Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia

The weather in Nova Scotia continues to be intensely sunny and very hot--very much warmer than the cooler weather that we had hoped for during our three days in Nova Scotia.

Philip and I cycled together today for the first time, to Peggy's Cove, the nearest land mass to the site where SwissAir 111 crashed into St. Margaret's Bay on September 2, 1998.  We left the hotel at 9:30AM, and rode the 25 miles to Peggy's Cove in 1 hour 40 minutes.  It's a very hilly route with a few short but challenging (for me) climbs, which winds past beautiful forested bays and fishing villages.  Philip's sister Pam drove our car to Peggy's Cove and met us there. 

 

From there we doubled back a few kilometers for lunch at Shaw's Landing, which sits on the bay in West Dover.  The restaurant was purchased in 1990 by Ian Shaw, a very interesting and chatty Scotsman who was then living in Switzerland.  His daughter was a passenger on SwissAir 111.  We first met Ian at his restaurant in September 1990, and have eaten there every year since then that we have visited Peggy's Cove.   Ian sold the restaurant about three years ago and moved back to Switzerland.  We miss him.

Pam's son Matthew and his girlfriend Amber, with her two cherubic 8 month old twin boys in tow, drove in from New Glasgow to join us for lunch.  After, we drove back towards Peggy's Cove to visit the SwissAir memorial, which was dedicated to the people of the St. Margaret's Bay community who rushed in their fishing boats to the crash site in the late hour of September 2, 1998 after hearing the boom of the plane hitting the water, and to the many who helped and comforted the family members of the crash victims who came to Halifax during the recovery operations.

In the evening Philip, Pam and I drove to the home of our friends Anne Martell and her husband Harry Cook, who live about a 45-minutes' drive from Halifax.  During the year after the plane crash, Anne volunteered through one of the organizations that assisted family members, to place flowers for us at the Bayswater Memorial, where the names of the 229 passengers are inscribed on a large granite sculpture.  We met Anne and Harry in 1999, and we visit with them whenever we come to Halifax.  Anne has recently taken up cycling, and has promised that she and Harry will visit us in Baton Rouge on an auto-cycling trip, taking the reverse route that Philip and I just finished. 

Robert's Ride 2010 has ended.  It was a lot of fun.  I love road trips that meander on country roads through beautiful scenery and local landscapes.  There is always something interesting around the next bend.

Tomorrow, September 2, we will visit the memorial at Bayswater.  There will be other family members of crash victims there for a memorial service at 11AM.

Robert's Ride 2010, Day 11, Monday, August 31, 2020, Sussex, NB to Halifax, NS

Breakfast at the B&B where we stayed last night, Jonah Place in Sussex, NB, was at 8:00 AM, so we were late getting on the road, again.  It is a very well-appointed B&B, newly renovated, with all the mod cons.  The couple who own and run the B&B, Deb and Phil, purchased the property a couple of years ago after retiring from careers in the financial field, and have done a very professional job of upgrading the building and rooms, doing most of the work themselves.

After a light breakfast, we finally got on the road at 9:10 AM and drove to Moncton, New Brunswick, a real French-speaking area.  Philip wanted to stop at his favorite coffee shop in Moncton, Timothy's World Coffee, which he discovered on his first Baton Rouge to Peggy's Cove cycling trip, and visited again on his later rides.  We called my Dad to wish him Happy Birthday, and he and mom told us about Hurricane Earl  moving up the east coast towards Nova Scotia.  Hummmm.

I got set up to ride in Moncton, and rode from downtown Moncton to Dorchester, finishing with 22.33 miles.  The temperature was in the upper 80s.  The first couple of miles were on a four lane city street with no shoulder and busy traffic, but after the first turn off that road, there was a less busy two-lane road with a nice bike lane for the next 5 miles or so.  The rest of the ride was on crappy road surface and no shoulder, but still the traffic was light.  The terrain was like a washboard--continuous rolling hills, which were progressively uphill for the first half or the ride, and progressively down hill from there.  None of the uphill climbs or down hill glides were too long or too steep, but I clocked 35 mph on the longest downhill stretch, which felt really good.  At 22.33 miles I was at the base of a really long, steep uphill, and decided to call it quits.  All-in-all, I think that today's ride was the best of the trip for me.  

After I finished my ride, we found the Trans Canada Highway and headed for Nova Scotia, and exited at the Visitor Center.  Philip wanted to hear the bagpiper who plays on the outside of the Visitor Center, and to buy an ice cream cone, as he had done of his previous trips.  To his disappointment, the bagpiper was not playing because she had already gone back to school, and the Visitor Center no longer sells ice cream. 

Philip decided to ride the last 14 or so miles into Halifax, across the McDonald Bridge on the bridge bike lane, through central Halifax, to the Chocolate Lake Best Western, where we're staying for the next 3 nights.  Philip's sister Pam, who lives about 5  hours from Halifax, in Marion Bridge, NS, was planning to meet us at the hotel.  Philip started his ride on Waverly Road, which is a beautiful but very narrow two-lane road that twists and rises and falls along a beautiful river.  There is a lot of fast moving traffic on that road.  Philip was nearly driven off the road and into the river by a bus that was moving too fast, the driver of which saw Philip but appeared to have no regard for his safety.  Just after that incident Philip saw a police car parked off the road, and reported the incident.  The police officer want to know the bus number and exact location where the incident occurred,  but Philip could not provide that information.  Nonetheless, the police office drove away in search of the offending bus driver.  

In the meantime, I needed to find my way from where I dropped off, Philip, back to the highway, across the McDonald Bridge, and to the hotel, which should have taken me maybe 30-40 minutes.  I am the first to admit that I am directionally challenged.  I often say "left" when I mean "right", and vice versa, and I invariably choose to go north when I should go south, etc. etc...Today was a great example of my "disability."  I missed the McDonald Bridge totally (I didn't see any signs for it), and took the McKay Bridge, which directs traffic to a different part of Halifax.  It was rush hour, and traffic was miserably heavy.  It didn't help that I couldn't find a street sign for many of the streets that I crossed.  After driving for a short time, I did find a street that was familiar from my previous visits to Halifax, and I finally saw a directional sign for the street that would have taken me to the motel, but I made a soft left turn onto the wrong street instead of a sharp left onto the street that I needed.  At least an hour later I was still searching for the street that I needed.  Philip had already made his way to the hotel, and called to find out where I was.  After driving past familiar landmarks 2 and 3 times, and after asking for directions twice, I finally, finally found the right street, and arrived at the hotel shortly after.  I was tired and grumpy, but after getting cleaned up, I had a very relaxing evening with Philip and Pam. 

Incidentally, Pam mentioned that Nova Scotia is experiencing its warmest ever temperature for this time of the year.  Luck us...we were hoping for chilly weather.

Well, our total mileage today, 251, is a bit inflated because of the grand tour of Halifax that I unexpectedly took today.  Total cycling mileage was 48.3 miles.