When we got back to Halifax last night the Internet was down, seemingly across the city, so I wasn't able to post on our last day on the Cabot Trail until today. I hope I haven't forgotten too much! Downloading all the photos helps, though. We had been supposed to go sailing yesterday, but it turns out the last sailing tour was last week. So after breakfast, we got going to complete the entire circuit of the Cabot Trail, with many stops along the way for scenic views. This was our third day of beautiful weather in Cape Breton. It only began to rain after we left the island on our way back to Halifax. At one point we took a little ferry across a river, a cable ferry. It put me in mind of the ... read more

At 8:00 this morning our tour guide, Ryan, picked us up at the hostel and together with five other adventurers, we set out for Cape Breton Island. Adventurers is the appropriate term, too. This is a bunch of travel aficionados, most of whom are at least two decades younger than we are. The conversation all the way to Cape Breton was about people's travel adventures. One young woman on this tour, Gina, a Californian, amazed us when she revealed that she is just getting back into hiking after nearly losing her life in a 150-foot fall three years ago when hiking on the Half Dome in Yosemite. You can see her story and pictures at http://http://theunfoldingself.wordpress.com/ We spent much of the day today traveling to and through the Cape Breton Highlands, with many stops along the ... read more

We woke this morning to the sound of a fog horn, sea gulls, and crows, three of the most pleasant sounds in the world, at least to our ears. I find it amusing that I so love the sound of sea gulls when I usually find their presence annoying, as when picnicking on the beach when they are trying to steal my food! It's another foggy day in Halifax, and in a few minutes we will be leaving on a bus tour of Lunenberg and Peggy's Cove. Not the best weather for viewing things at a distance, perhaps, but as Roberta observed this morning, there's another kind of beauty in photos of fog. We're really enjoying saying in this small hostel. The building in which it is situated dates from 1864! It has 10 foot ceillings, ... read more

We really played tourist today in Halifax. After breakfast, we walked up to the Gray Coach kiosk, thinking we'd take the hop-on-hop-off bus, but it wasn't running today (no cruise ship in port), so we took the 3-hour city tour instead. It was very interesting, including a walk through the beautiful Halifax Public Gardens, a stop at the cemetery where 121 Titanic victims are buried, and a quick stop at the Citadel. Halifax – or at least the part of Halifax where we have been roaming in – is stuffed chock-a-block with heritage houses. Everywhere you look, there are more of them. Some are being used as residences, some as businesses, and we saw at least one that had been converted into an embassy. The city tour steeps you in two of the big Halifax stories: ... read more

Wow, I'd forgotten how much I loved Montreal! I'm so glad now that we planned to spend a few days in Montreal on this trip, so I could renew my acquaintance with it. I remind myself that when I came to Canada in 1968, Montreal was my first choice of a place to live – it just wasn't a very practical choice at that time for a non-bilingual person, at least one who wanted to work for a living! I found myself wanting to spend more time here, just exploring all the nooks and crannies, getting to know more about the history of this city. Everywhere you go there is something to be learned about the past, but at the same time this city seems to be very much part of the 21st century. To cite ... read more