Wednesday, 14 June 2006

Truro to Pictou (Nova Scotia)

There were no kitchen facilities at the Agricultural College so I was up at 7:30 and out in search of breakfast. You can't get the full English here, with all those nice extras such as tomato, mushrooms etc. (My mouth is watering just at the thought) It tentds to be a simple egg(s), meat (sausage, bacon or ham) with lots of 'homefries' (cubes of potato, fried) and toast (white or wheat)

There was some talk of election results in the cafe, but no-one seemed too excited. The thing I did notice today - not one single sign for any candidate, anywhere. They've all disappeared overnight. Before today, it seemed as though every house and garden had at least one and sometimes more. Not that the gardens are now bare by any means. They're very fond of their garden ornaments are the Canadians, or at least the Nova Scotians, which are the only flavour of Canadian I've really come across - although come to think of it, most of the ones I've met have been expats from other parts of Canada. There are areas where several generations of the same family have lived in the same area for many years as the surnames on the mail-boxes often appear in little clusters. In Cape Blomidon I saw one farm 'Grain Fed Chicken - J. Fuller' and then a little way up the road, an exact mirror-image farm on the other side of the road; 'Grain Fed Chicken - D. Fuller' Most of the name clusters seem to be in fishing and farming areas where people are perhaps more tied in to one way of life.

Anyway, back to the garden ornaments. There's a lot of lighthouses, and statuettes, and silhouettes, and the like. They have some wacky stuff too, painted bicycles and abstract sculptures, and twee stuff; fairies and things. The thing that annoys me, is when they have animals that are really life-like; Is that a deer? No. It doesn't f*****g move! Wouldn't that irritate the hell out of you? Move damn you. Please, paint a red nose on it so I know it's a fake.

I'd seen a sign at the Agricultural college in Truro for it's rock garden, so I went there after breakfast for a quick look around. It was really well looked after (in fact a lot of volunteers were there already there weeding and planting) and there was lots in bloom. It's odd that the Visitor Information Centre made no mention of it - like the VIC in Wolfville which made no reference to the Botanical Gardens.

There was no-one to hand my keys in to when I left, so I posted them through the door and set off out of town on the 311. I had the option later of following an unpaved road across country, but the 311 was so quiet and quite scenic so I decided to stay on that. According to one map, there was a place called Summit en route, so I knew that I would be climbing up for the first 20 km or so. The climb was quite gradual so it was fairly easy going and the weather was perfect for cycling; some nice warm sun and a cool breeze. Again there wasn't much service-wise - again I found no cafes or restaurants all day long. As the 311 climbed up though the pleasantly wooded hills to Earlstown, there was a gas station cum store where I stopped to buy a cold drink.

From Earlstown I dropped down onto the 326 road and followed it's undulating path north to the coast at Brule. Here, on route 6, I was looking out into Tatamagouche Bay on the Northumberland Strait. I had covered a good distance already so I stopped at a picnic spot in a Provincial Park. I walked the boardwalks down to the beach and took off my sandals to walk bare-foot in the soft warm sand. Bliss.

A few km from the park I came into River John where I was hoping to find a cafe but only found the library. There was a campsite near to here at Seafoam, but it seemed too early in the day to stop even though the next campsite was quite a bit further on - about 30 or 40 km. I pressed on along route 6 stopping only for the occasional energy boosting snack. I was feeling weary as I approached Pictou (Pron. Pic-toe) and turned off route 6 to follow the road through Caribou and the Prince Edward Island (PEI) ferry terminal and finally arrived at the Harbour Light Campground. The owner disappeared into the office as I rode up and re-appeared ice-cream in hand. What a welcome. An ice-cream has never been so appreciated. Later, when I went to pay for my stay, ($15, showers free) I thought I'd try to repay his generosity by buying a can of drink, but he refused any payment for that too.

My final piece of luck for the day was to meet Ray Hobbs, a cyclist from Calgary, who had just come from the way I'm headed, and so he had some great hints and tips to pass on to me.

Today was a long day in the saddle and at some point I passed the 1000 miles mark for this trip.

Distance: 107.8 km
Cycling time: 5:37
Total distance: 1676.6 km