Cape Breton Highlands NP covers most of the Northern tip of
the island. It is basically a rocky
plateau about 1000 feet above sea level, crisscrossed with deep river valleys
and covered with a mix of evergreens and maple/birch forest. Right now the fall color is at is peak and
the hills are in flame with yellow, orange and red foliage, especially in the
valleys. We walked among 350-year-old
maples in some of the only forests on the island that have never been logged.
The Cabot Trail is a 180-mile loop road, much of which
follows the coast and winds in and out of coves with vistas of the shoreline
and back into the highlands. Small
fishing towns dot the coast and farms are cut out of the forest in the valleys
and hills. It is a spectacular drive and
we spent 3 days leaving our trailer behind in Cheticamp and staying at B&Bs
along the way. We explored a rocky cove
with a waterfall cascading down one side of it, hiked around a lake smothered
in yellow and red trees, walked a trail out to the headlands that ended in a
wooded stairway down to a platform hanging over the ocean and saw dozens of
pilot whales swimming just off the coast.
 |
| Cabot Trail |
One night we stayed with the Gordon and LaVerne in the house
that was going to be torn down before Gordon had it moved a mile to his
property. Here he spent 15 years
renovating it with boards he cut from his own trees and all his own labor. Gordon is 82 and is currently working on
adding a roof to the from porch. Gordon’s
family homesteaded on this land in the 1860s and he and his wife were the
nicest people you could meet, inviting us into their living room to chat in the
evening and sitting with us while we had blueberry and elderberry pancakes for
breakfast. We talked with them about
Gordon’s plans to put solar panels on his house and discussed new oil drilling
off Newfoundland and fracking in New Brunswick.
As we left Gordon scuttled off and brought back a bag of beautiful potatoes
he grew in his garden. Our hearts were
full when we left that house.
 |
| LaVerne and Gordon |
No comments:
Post a Comment