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Published: September 1st 2016
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Ceilidh Trail - Nova Scotia 28 August We cannot believe we only have a bit more than a week to go before winging our way home after nearly 8 weeks. From time to time, Tom, Sheryl and I reflect on our experiences, what we have seen and the fantastic people we have spoken to. We have also eaten and sipped our way around Canada, sampling their local produce and wine and beer.
Nova Scotia was no exception. We left Prince Edward Island across the 14km Confederation bridge, an engineering feet the Canadians are proud of. We wanted to hug the coast along the Arcadia Coastal Drive towards Pictou, rather than on the freeway, but we mixed it up on our way to Cape Breton Island, the eastern part of NS.
We stopped at a couple of little villages such as Bugwash and Tattamagouche where we found a wonderful bakery with excellent coffee and pastries.
We also stopped at Pictou and drove through New Glasgow before crossing onto Cape Breton Island at Aulds Cove where the Canso Causeway is.
The different attractions in Pictou was the Waterfront,
beaches and all the historic stone buildings.
Pictou is nestled along the shoreline and quaint inlets of the Northumberland Shore which boasts the "warmest waters North of the Carolinas". It is an area known for its year-round festivals and events, diverse peoples and outstanding hospitality.
A bit about Nova Scotia: it is one of the Atlantic Provinces of Canada. The islands consists of a very large peninsula (known as the "mainland"), connected to the province of New Brunswick by a narrow strip of land, and includes Cape Breton Island, which is now joined to the mainland by the Canso Causeway.
Nova Scotia was one of the original four provinces that became part of Canada in 1867, and has a population of over a million people, of whom 44% live in the capital city, Halifax. "Nova Scotia" is Latin for "New Scotland", and Scottish settlers brought culture and traditions that we saw first had that continues today, albeit now mixed with the cultures of native Mi'kmaq and settlers from numerous other places.
Nova Scotia is a relatively compact and densely populated province (by Canadian standards), so travelling to the
main towns of the island, distances are not excessive.
After the beautiful coastal drive, we reached Aulds Cove turning left on the Causway. We then drove along the Ceilidh Trail towards our accommodation for the night at Port Hood.
The Ceilidh Trail is on the western coast of Cape Breton and is known for its large number of musicians who perform Celtic music and reside along the Trail. They play at festivals which are signature events of the small communities throughout the summer. This is the musical western coast where story, dance, music, and song are part of many weekend festivals and ceilidhs.
We arrived at Port Hood at about 5.00pm and the helpful hotel owner who was a descendent of Scottish people who arrived on the Island in the 1700s in search for free, unregulated land told us about the entertainment in the area that night. Believe it or not but he still had a Scottish accent!!!!!!
He recommended we drive 10 minutes to Mabou to the Red Shoe Pub where there was one of the best Irish singer and fiddler of the area playing….and there was
a good feed there. So we headed off and found 4 lots of people waiting for a table. We decided to take the risk pay the $8 cover charge and wait as we listened to the fantastic foot-tapping entertainment while we sipped the local beer at the bar.
The small place was packed but after about 15 minutes a table on the veranda became vacant and they had rigged up a speaker so that the music could easily be heard. Their menu was so good and included a popular Red Shoe Dip and many other Red Shoe specific dishes. We had a lot of fun chatting and listening to the music.
When we returned to our hotel, we went for a walk along the water at Port Hood and watched the sunset.
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