Digby, Nova Scotia

The ferry sailing on Thursday afternoon was uneventful, we boarded and had a crew member show us to an elevator as Ben would not have made the steep stairs nor the escalator. We chose a quiet corner in one of the lounges and he slept the entire way across save for the occasional petting from passers by. Unfortunately visibility remained poor so no photos from the part of our trip apart from one inside shot.

In Digby we called in on André and Marilyn Thiffault and their border collies Toby and Mick. Toby is 11.5 years old and Mick 4. As usual they had the typical border collie idiosyncrasies - Toby tried to ignore the fact I existed [clever boy] while I was give a demonstration of how to make Much run and hide behind the greenhouse - just utter “Mick I’m going to brush your teeth’ and he is GONE! André and Marilyn were perfectly gracious hosts and suggested I check in at my BnB and return for a dinner of local haddock. I was hardly going to turn down the opportunity. The BnB, Come From Away Inn was quaint, right on the water and very dog friendly. On the way there I burst out laughing when my eye fell upon a sign that was I thought a great oxymoron - DOWNTOWN DIGBY ——> ! It really does not warrant a ‘downtown’ appellation but I like the bravado.

Yesterday we departed DIgby after a hearty breakfast and drive to Halifax some 200km distant. A short diversion took us into a village suggested by André and Marilyn, Annapolis Royal - very picturesque with large oak trees singing the streets and pretty clapboard houses in bright colours. We took a walk around in the misty damp and liked the way the fabric of the village had been preserved. I have written elsewhere how it is strangely ironic that old working villages and towns are sometimes preserved in character by the tourism that follows a once but now dying industry. Annapolis is no different. A glance in the window of a local realtor suggested that one could buy even the grandest of mansions here for less than $400,00. Torontonians, read and weep.

The photo below is of Ben with Michael Gunn, a builder of wooden boats who laments the almost complete domination of glass fibre in that market in this age. A shame indeed - as you can see he produces work of beauty.

During our walkabout we found this interesting little collection of inuchuks on the boulder sea wall: