We wake up well rested and ready for our first full day
exploring Nova Scotia. The plan for the
day is to drive east along the southern shore from Yarmouth to
the capital city of Halifax. The coastline along the peach area of the map is our route. A search for better value in accommodations led us
to select a Hampton Inn in Dartmouth, just across the bridge from Halifax, to
spend the night.
Before we leave Lakelawn B&B in Yarmouth we consume an
excellent breakfast of omelets, toast, juice, coffee, and fruit in a pleasant
dining room with classical music playing in the background, and flowers
blossoming in the rear courtyard. Completely
satisfied, we confirm our return in eight days for one more night, and head
down the road.
It's Thursday at around 8 am and the traffic in Yarmouth is
light. Driving around Nova Scotia is
very easy for Americans, the signs are clear, numerous and easy to follow. A
few traffic lights made us stop and think, like the rapidly blinking green
light that seems to signal a delayed green for opposing traffic. The GPS on
Gloria's Subaru Legacy detects the speed limits and automatically translates from
kilometers per hour to miles per hour.
Our first stop for coffee and sightseeing is the Tim Hortons in Barrington. Cape Sable Island across a causeway is listed as the southerly most
point of Nova Scotia. This
morning it's shrouded in fog and we decide to skip the drive to the point and take
our coffee further down the coast. We
discover that many of the Tim Horton's will accept American dollars, and their
cash registers are programmed to give a reasonable exchange rate. Two medium
coffees, paid for with a $20 bill result in $21 Canadian dollars and change.
It feels like being paid to drink coffee.
Following a tip from the car GPS (the restaurant locator)
our lunch stop is the village of Shelburne.
We park on Water Street (also known as Route 3) and then walk down Dock Street to
the Visitors' Center. Dock Street is flanked by a pleasant park that stretches to
the waterfront. Neat lawns, comfortable benches, great views of boats in the
harbor, a museum, bars, and restaurants make for a pleasant stroll.
We ditch the restaurant picked by the GPS and eat at the Sea Dog Saloon overlooking Shelburne Harbor. The day
is sunny and warm, so much so that we retreat from the sunny deck to a table
inside. It's June 1, early in the tourist season, and the outside deck is half full
but the interior restaurant is nearly empty. About a third of the patrons are
locals, usually the sign of good, reasonably priced meals. The food takes an
inordinate amount of time to arrive, a point of pride according to the menu. The food is good, but not so special as to
justify the wait. The staff are very
pleasant.
After Shelburne we set our sights on the Old Town of
Lunenburg further up the coast, but don't make it. We're noticing that Nova
Scotia is just coming awake to the tourist season and some of the things we
want to visit are not yet open for the season. We decide to check first and stop
at a couple of locations that should have held Visitors' Centers. Unfortunately these were closed or consist of
a kiosk not yet restocked for the season.
We finally find an open Visitor's Center near Liverpool staffed by two
bright and eager women. The friendly
pair defy the stereotype of slow talking Canadians by presenting an enthusiastic
overview of the wonders of the area
delivered at an impressive speed.
Because the historic village of Lunenburg deserves more time
than we have on this day, we decide to forge ahead and arrive in
Halifax/Dartmouth early enough to do some exploring there.
Our clever change of
plans places us in the middle of a traffic jam in Halifax that is worthy of
New York or Boston at rush hour. After more than an hour making the crossing of
Halifax Harbor, we arrive in Dartmouth with a fire engine on our rear
bumper. Despite our best efforts to get
out of the way, the truck follows us to the Hampton Inn Dartmouth and pulls up
to the door. The call turns out to be a false alarm, but the inexperienced
hotel staff don't appear up to managing the aftermath during which elevators
don't work for hours, our room first won't open to our keys, and then won't
lock, and the final straw, the hot water is off all night. The cold shower the
next morning wasn't fun.
One mostly good experience in Dartmouth was Ela! Greek
Taverna, a little Greek restaurant across the street from our hotel. The Greek dishes were outstanding except for
the little problem of a piece of plastic wrap that got heated up along with my
Mousaka. The thoroughly embarrassed waiter whisked the dish away, replaced it
and deleted the item from our check--unnecessary, from my viewpoint, but a
class act.
I don't know if the result of my bad attitude about this
particular Hampton Inn, but the breakfast
eggs had the texture of carpet underlayment.
Disillusioned with that hotel, and city life, we cancel our plan to
return to this hotel in two days for a longer stay, and instead book another
B&B in the town of Truro about 100 kilometers north from which we will
explore the north shore.
