Day 15 - Welcome to the Family Heidi !

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After an amazing day yesterday, I slept so good last night. When I woke up this morning I felt extremely rested and relaxed. It really helped that the sun was shining and it was already 59 degrees. It was destined to be a glorious and beautiful day. Little did we know just how wonderful it would be. We were going to spend the day driving and hiking the Cabot Trail through the elusive Cape Breton National Park which is known to be one of the most beautiful scenic drives in the world. The five of us hopped up out of bed and began our morning rituals. Unfortunately there was only one shower in each bath house so it took us a little longer this morning than normal but we didn’t care, we were in no big hurry. That’s one of the great things about going on a road trip, no schedules, no reservations, no time clocks and no hurry ! Shoot, sometimes it takes us a minute just to figure out what day of the week and month it is. Once we were all ready to go, Tim put the pedal to the medal and off we went. As we were driving and enjoying the amazing scenery, we began to have a conversation about all the different animals we had seen on the trip so far. The list goes something like this : Ducks, beaver, bald eagles, pilot whales, big angry snapping turtle, deer, cows, horses, a dead porcupine, regular eagles, a snake and an array of different birds and insects. You will notice that I did not list any moose or bear because we have yet to see one despite the intense efforts of Jason and Lynn’s moose and bear patrol. We only have a couple of days left and we have got to see one or the other before Lynn, Jason and Heidi’s journey ends. We continued on the Cabot Trail for a little while until we came across the Trout Brook lookout. We got out of the motor home to stretch our legs a little and to check out the magnificent views. While we were walking around we came across some other visitors and had a nice little chat. Of course, they could have stayed and talked to us forever because they were enthralled with our accents and just couldn’t get enough. Jason took off down the cliff to get a closer look while the rest of us chose to stay on higher ground and enjoy the views from there. We got some great pictures and then made our way on down the trail to a place called The Bog. Here we got out and walked along a boardwalk through the land and marsh, around a few ponds and came out where we started. We didn’t see any moose or bear but we did get to see some neat insect eating plants. Jason and Lynn had both been sick now for a couple of days and were fighting a pretty bad sinus / cold type sickness but they didn’t let that slow them down a bit. Our next stop on the Cabot Trail would be The Lone Sheiling which was a path through the woods that you could hike in order to see the Nova Scotia sugar maple trees. Tim and I seized the moment to have a little alone time and passed on this trail. The other three however decided to check it out. They returned a short while later with mediocre reviews and then we were back on the road. We had all kinda finned for ourselves for breakfast this morning so we were getting a little hungry and wanted a snack. We had seen these weird ketchup flavored potato chips all over Canada so we decided to buy some at the store yesterday. Yes, I said KETCHUP potato chips ! Evidently they are really popular up here sort of like our bar-b-que lays chips. I pulled them out of the pantry and we all reluctantly began to do the taste test. Well, the overall consensus was that they were not horrible but they definitely were not great either. Let’s just say they were edible but I won’t be buying anymore. As we were snacking, Tim, Jason and Lynn spotted another trail through the woods. Lynn said that there was a lake at the end of the trail so we immediately thought that maybe there would be some moose at the lake so we decided to park and hike the trail. Just a little ways into the woods, we began to see some moose poo so we knew that they were there and we began to get excited. About twenty-five minutes into the hike, Jason turns around and yells at the rest of us that he can see water. Thank God ! My calves were burning and the sun was shining and it was hot and I was scared we were going to run into a bear and anyway, I was just happy to find the lake. Upon arriving at the lake, the five of us were careful to be very quiet and we scoped out the entire area but still no moose. We sat on the benches and rested for a few minutes and then we began to head on back to the RV. About half-way back, I see Lynn come to a dead stop in the middle of the trail and I thought to myself, “She must see a moose, yay !”. Well, it wasn’t a moose, it was a snake !! It was little though and really didn’t pose a threat to us so we just kept going as it slithered off into the woods. Tim and I brought up the rear as we all hiked our way back while the speed walkers, Lynn and Heidi were leading the pack. We eventually made it out of the woods and back onto the Cabot Trail. Tim drove us for quite sometime before Jason spotted a beautiful lookout area called Green Cove. We pulled over, got out of the RV and began to explore. It was absolutely gorgeous ! All you could see for miles and miles was an endless coastline of plunging cliffs and sandy beaches. Tim takes off towards the end of a cliff just to see how far he can go without leaping to his death while Lynn and I stroll around on the huge rocks and Jason and Heidi make there way down towards the water. You are not going to believe what happened next !! All of a sudden we hear Heidi screaming and we look over and she’s jumping up and down and hugging on Jason and yelling at the top of her voice “I’m engaged, I’m engaged !”. It seems as though our sneaky little son had popped the big question and thankfully she said YES ! What an exciting time for all of us, she ran as fast as she could to show us the ring and we all just hugged and smiled and ooooed and aaahhhed; it was truly an amazing thing to experience and I’m so glad we were there to witness it and share their special moment with them. How incredible is it that they will be able to tell all their friends, family and loved ones that they got engaged at 2:30 pm on a beautiful sunny day, at Green Cove, in Cape Breton Highland National Park, Nova Scotia, Canada ? Pretty dang incredible I think. It looks like we officially are going to have a new member of the family and we couldn’t be happier. WOW ! That was so exciting but we all tried to gather ourselves and move on along down the trail. We stopped by the information table on the way out and then hit the road. We were all getting really hungry by now so Tim drove us, for what seemed like forever, until we finally came to a restaurant. He pulled in the Main Street Restaurant and Bakery and we went in to get something to go. We really needed to make it as close to Halifax as possible tonight so we had to make it fast. This quaint little place served beer and wine so I tried to buy a bottle of champagne for us to celebrate the newly engaged couple but the lady said they couldn’t sale it by the bottle only by the glass. Well it looked like we would have to just celebrate with some coca cola and bottled green tea. Trust me, no one minded at all, we were just all so excited it really didn’t matter what we had to drink ! We got our food and were back on the road and other than a quick stop at a Celtic gift shop, Tim drove us all the way through to Halifax, Nova Scotia tonight. He said that we had officially driven the entire 184-mile-long Cabot Trail and boy did his back and neck know it. He’s having such a hard time this trip and the only relief he’s really had was the one night that Lynn massaged his neck and back and worked out some of the knots for him. Just as Tim thinks we’ll be at The Shubie Park campground soon, he realizes that we are lost. It seems as if we were not only lost but now we were at a bridge that the city wouldn’t allow us to cross over so he had to turn us around. It was really dark and as Heidi and Lynn put it “we were not in the best part of town”. Tim pulls over into a parking lot to try and figure out where we went wrong and all of a sudden a police car pulls up. It was the Halifax Regional Police and they were there to help us. They had watched us turn around at the bridge and they came over to see if they be of assistance. The only problem was that when we all started talking to them they began to laugh so much they couldn’t contain themselves. It was hilarious ! They were laughing at us and we were laughing at them and this went on for several minutes. Eventually they figured out where we were supposed to be, they called it in to their boss and got special permission to take us there. Patrol officers Nielsen and Stevens gave us our very own police escort all the way to the campground and we couldn’t have been more grateful. We were so exhausted from such a long day and I know Tim just really wanted to take some Advil and go to bed. We got settled into a site at Shubie Park in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia and we were down for the count. We had another great day today and made many many more memories that we’ll always have to cherish and Lynn and I got to mark off a few things in the book too. Congratulations to our son Jason and his new fiancé Heidi, we love you and wish you all the best. We’ll be off to explore Peggy’s Cove and Halifax tomorrow but until then, sweet dreams !

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Comments

[Ginger]

Congrats to the happy couple!
I am playing catch up on your blog this morning! We've been in Austin and I haven't checked it. It sounds like you are all having a wonderful time. I loved to read about Jason and Heidi getting engaged! How exciting for them!! Enjoy your travels...thanks for the birthday card! I will have to send yours via email, Ms.somewhere up North! Stay warm :)