Thursday July 22nd

I'm sitting at the breakfast table trying to think of what to write and all the time my eye is drawn to the view of White Point harbour, which is directly in front of us. How I'm supposed to write anything at all, let alone anything sensible when faced with scenes like this, is incomprehensible!

I don't kow what I expected to find in Nova Scotia, but the southern part was not much different to New Brunswick. However, that all changed fairly dramatically once we entered the Cape Breton Highlands National Park, on Cape Breton Island, as you can see from this photo taken just after we started travelling along the western part of the park - you can see the road winding up the side of the mountains.

 Most of the beaches are rocky, beautiful with round reddish rocks interspersed with small, sandy beaches.
Another surprise has been the temperature of the water. It is a hell of a lot warmer than Melbourne! I expect this is just a summer phenomenon, as I can't imagine the water being anything other than freezing in winter. Still, I took advantage of it and had a lovely swim. Apparently Leatherback Turtles frequent these waters in the summer, although I didn't come across one - there were quite a few large, purple jellyfish though.
Whale watching is very big business here, although it's a little early for humpbacks yet and the operators appear to be doing a roaring trade taking folk out to see minke and fin whales. Lobster fishing is by far the major industry on Cape Breton Island and every small bay has a jetty and a small fleet of lobster and crabbing boats.
On the way to White Point we stopped and did a couple of walks, one along a highland peat bog trail, which had heaps of beautiful wildflowers, including lots of large insectivorous Pitcher plants. Heather informed me that you can buy these plants at home but she had no idea that they originated from areas such as this - she assumed they were more tropical.

 I also spotted a large Green Frog (its proper name!) sunning itself on the edge of a small pond and it obliged our photo-taking mania by staying put whilst we changed lenses on the camera, so here is the evidence:

Not far from here we saw our first moose, which fortunately didn't charge our car - it was much too busy eating the new growth on the bushes along the roadside.  We could only really see its head, but I risked life and limb to get this shot for you all!

Interestingly, all of the major highways in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick that we have travelled on have extensive moose fencing as they are a major cause of road accidents and deaths and in fact today's news has reported the death of a farmer who collided with a moose. Apparently they crave salt and in the winter time come to the roadsides to lick the salt that has washed off after it is applied to reduce snow and ice.
Today brought an end to the dream run of weather we have had to date. Yes - it actually rained nearly all day and the temperature dropped by about 10C. Still pleasant, but I suspect we will want more than just the sheet on the bed tonight. Did play havoc with our sightseeing, as we went up to the topof the island around the Bay St Lawrence and the towering cliffs and mountains dont look quite the same through a veil of rain and mist. Neverthless, here is look at Meat Cove beach:

Donned the raincoat this afternoon after our chowder and fish lunch and went for a walk along the coast of the headland behind the b and b, where I got a close-up look at two bald eagles - a juvenile and an adult. Also to my surprise, I watched some Northern Gannets diving for fish. I thought we had a monopoly on them in Australia and NZ. I terminated the walk when the track went into the bush and after about ten minutes I started to think about Bill Bryson and his stories about bears in his book, A Walk in the Woods.
The phone has chosen the least opportune to give up, for if something doesn't have scales or require a rope lashing, there is absolutely zero chance of getting it seen to or replaced on this part of Cape Breton Island.
Tomorrow is a big day for Heff. We are off on a Puffin boat tour and Puffins were Heff's favourite bird as a child, which undoubtedly explains a lot about her!