Pulling in to Port Hawkesbury, Chevy’s friend Dan met us on the dock with a couple of delightful treats including a lovely dozen of fresh farmed eggs for us. So after a long journey we enjoyed a few drinks to shake out the sketchy memories of that leg of the trip.
7am Thursday, we depart Port Hawkesbury, and head up the coast of Cape Breton towards Cheticamp. Good conditions running up the coast and beautiful sunny skies showing off its green rolling hills and steep cliffs. Comparatively speaking, the coast of Cape Breton was much nicer than the Eastern Shore of Nova Scotia. Could’ve had something to do with the fog on the first part, but oh well.
Only one boat was passed on the way up, so not much traffic other than a giant pod of seals we ran into. We ended up right in the middle of a pod of about 200 seals feeding off the abundant cod I guess. It was incredible, they’d pop out of the water, check us out, giving us a look of displeasure to indicate we were interrupting their feeding, then dive under and slap their tails loudly. Some of the seals had to be several hundred pounds. We ended up hanging out long enough to take it all in, and marvel at the amount of marine life in this area. Meanwhile we find out later, they’re probably poking their heads out of the water to look for a rifle targeted at them since that’s what the fishermen do out here. Everyone seems to find them as pests that should be controlled so there’s more fish for fishermen. And then the conversations all come back to the Paul McCartney baby seal campaign from years ago.
So we make Cheticamp that evening, and pull up on a wharf all to ourselves. Couple of shots of Sambuca to warm us up, then off to play pool at the town bar. Few shots and pitchers later, we’re still owning the table and winning drinks off the locals. Time to call it a night before our livers quit, so we head home late with an early morning in store. 7am, captain and first mate find ourselves waking up staring at each other from 3 feet away from each other. Legs intertwined, scratching our heads for a minute before saying anything, wondering how we ended up cramming ourselves into the same tiny bed that had even less room from the back cushions and laptop bag. It was ridiculous, I mean it can be tight on a boat at times, but that was just completely unnecessary. So we shut off the radio and lamp that we had left on, purged the excesses from the night before, and off we go. Oh and where’s Boydy? Wasn’t to be seen until he left the v-berth at noon, to find himself half way to Iles de la Madeleine. Must be nice to have that much time to recover.
One other boat was seen that trip, until we arrived in the beautiful islands. Just gorgeous sand dunes and beaches. Very incredible sights out here. We got in Friday afternoon and Boydy’s girlfriend Isabelle met us at the wharf and took us up for some out of this world delicious tapas. Poutine with blue cheese, scallops, and seal sausage were just a few of the delights we enjoyed. Back to the boat for a quick dip in the bay in the warm water. Then off Boydy and Isabelle go, to see her family, so Chevy and I find ourselves having a romantic evening watching the sunset over some Mojitos, followed up by some beautiful crepes with Nutella and Strawberries to top off the night in case we didn’t have enough to eat by then. We quickly realized that we had to budget our metabolisms so we could maximize the amount of food ingested since everything here is so incredibly fresh and tasty. Just trying to figure out how much Bocce is required to burn off all these calories.
Early night Friday, anchored in the bay away from the wharf since its busy with Acadian week here and a huge sand castle building contest just over the dune from us. Dozens and dozens of campers have come out for this event, some say 10,000 people show up for it, hard to say but the tiny street in town here is bumper to bumper with tourists.
Saturday, off to the beach with Isa’s family. Hard not to find a beautiful beach anywhere here, that’s all there is. After that beach, we head back to the boat, and visit the sand castle contest. Saturday night, live music at the bar, running into some guys we played pool with back in Cheticamp. Turns out they have been up drinking the entire time since Cheticamp. Chevy and I become worried, this could be trouble. So we head back and have a lovely prosciutto sandwich with cheese curds and fall asleep instantly. This time, we sleep in separate beds.
Sunday, another beautiful beach, great for Bocce where Chevy and I show the locals how it’s done. Super high sand dunes and nice water with the softest sand and no rocks anywhere. Isa’s family teaches us more French as we enjoy another incredible beach snack spread provided by Chef Boydy. Pate, local cheese, lobster, mackeral, tomato and cucumber all served on the softest bread. Then lobster sandwiches and poutine for dinner, and back to the boat awaiting Kim’s arrival 7am this morning.
Monday now, the plan is to move the boat from the wharf here in Havre Aubert over to Cap aux Meules and take Isa’s family for a trip since they’ve been such great company. There’s about 10-12 of them coming so it should be a good ride for the short hour and a half it takes. Kim’s here now too, and of course we take her to the bakery first thing to show her what she’s in for regarding the food they have. Which includes Beignets or Tortierre(?) -deep fried donut like bread roll with either homemade Molasses or Caramel. How can you get enough of this stuff??? I keep making the mistake of getting home fries with my breakfasts which is just unnecessary filler, taking away room for more important items. Not that the potatoes are bad, there’s just an important ranking system needed to maximize enjoyment based on limited (mostly full) stomachs. The thing is I think Chevy has been planning for this trip for a long time and has a head start on me in terms of having more room for food in his mid section. I have to say with the food here, I might be a tad jealous.
Anyways, I think that’s enough for now. Definitely wish Faye and Brooke could be with us out here, I miss them like crazy, hoping that we can come back another time somehow.
Love the last line – total afterthought – oh yeah, I have a wifey and daughter at home … (thought must have gone something like “maybe I shouldn’t be gloating about this gluttony so much”)…I hope you find some diamonds on those beaches to bring home to your lovely ladies…