Whale Watching in the Gulf of St Lawrence

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On Monday we arrived at the Normaway Inn on Cape Breton. The Inn site on 250 acres on a country road at the beginning of the Cabot Trail. Sportsmen, avid hikers, bikers, and ordinary people like us fill the 9 rooms and 17 cabins. It is really remote here -- no TV, no cell tower signal, but we do have Internet access. The newly arrived chef from NY makes fabulous meals using local fish and meat and vegetables from their garden.



On Tuesday we drove 45 minutes (actually more because we kept getting lost in the maze of back roads) to Cheticamp to take a whale watching tour. We did see a number of pilot whales, which are only about 15 to 20 feet long and are actually the largest of oceanic dolphins. We were hoping to see something really big, but those sightings must be rare. The whales were in and out of the water so fast that it was nearly impossible to photograph them on the rocking boat. As exciting as seeing the whales was sighting a 4 to 5 foot leatherback turtle, the largest living sea turtle.



Unlike western Cape Breton, which has signs in both English and Scottish (or Gaelic or Celtic) the Cheticamp area is an enclave of French speaking Acadians. We had a local favorite for dinner, meat pie, a nice change from seafood.

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