St. Anns, NS

Saturday June 14…10:15pm

We left the campground around 11am and drove on to Whycocomagh Provincial Park. It was a good place to stop for lunch, and afterwards we went for a hike up the mountain behind the campground at the park. For whatever reason, the park
is not yet open…in fact a lot of Nova Scotia Provincial Parks don’t open until June 20th. But they do have a sign up saying that you are free to use the park during daylight hours. It doesn’t make any sense. In slow season, they should have the campground open with a minimal fee. And have it be a self pay system. The campground has no services anyhow, except pit toilets. It was a nice hike though, up a fairly steep trail to a couple of lookouts over Bras d’or Lake and the town of Whycocomagh.

View of the town from Whycoomagh Provincial Park

Another view of Bras d'or Lake 

Put in another $110 of gas. Paid $1.442 a litre. Got a third of a tank. But we should now have enough to get us around the Cabot Trail and to PEI without having to put anymore in. And we’ve heard rumours that some of the smaller gas stations around the trail are having difficulties getting fuel delivered to them because of the high cost of delivering the fuel. So we think it’s a good idea to go around the trail with enough fuel to make it all the way.

We then headed for Baddeck. Alexander Graham Bell lived near Baddeck for the last half of his life, and there is a National Historic Museum located in the town. We arrived a few minutes before 3pm and we noticed people lining the main street. We hadn’t called ahead, so they couldn’t be there for us! Then we remembered reading that Baddeck is celebrating their 100th anniversary, and that there was to be a parade today. Had we been a few minutes later, the road would have been closed for the parade. But we made it through and parked at the Bell museum and then walked back to watch some of the parade.

The parade in Baddeck

Women, talking on the phone...

The museum was sort of interesting, but not worth the $7.80 admission fee. Fortunately, we didn’t have to pay because of the annual pass we have. (Thanks again, Glen and Steve!) And if we did have to pay, we wouldn’t have gone in at all in the first place. Alexander Graham Bell was a teacher, and his tinkering with electronics and hearing and speech led him to stumble across the telephone. He became wealthy from this invention, and used the proceeds to tinker with other inventions, none of which became commercial successes. So they’ve made this museum to essentially profile these other inventions. Yes, Bell invented the telephone, and he was a gifted teacher of the deaf…but I’m not sure his accomplishments are worthy of a National Historic site. His private house there still stands, and is used as a summer retreat by his now over 100 decendants. His grandaughter recently passed away at the age of 101.

We made it on to the beginning of the Cabot Trail and are parked up behind a church near the town of St. Anns. We’ll have to leave fairly early though…with tomorrow being Sunday we need to get on the road before the churchgoers arrive!

Total Nights Sleeping in the RV…237

June Fuel $ 321.23

June Grocery $ 377.50

June Overnight Costs $ 58.56