Peggy's Cove, NS

So, I woke up this morning and what do I hear??? MORE Rain!!!!! Geeshhh!!!! We loafed around here a little longer and finally set out to the South Shore area of NS. I'm not saying it cleared up, but I can say that whenever we were ready to get out of the jeep and walk around and area, it stopped for that time. I'm thinking we should be in an ark instead of a jeep. We were still able to do what we wanted, just not in sunshine. Tomorrow is supposed to be great outside.

Our first stop was Peggy's Cove. It was an awesome spot with a nice lighthouse. The setting was very much like something you would see in Maine. From Peggy's Cove we meandered further down the South Shore and visited the towns of Chester, Mahone Bay, and Lunenberg. We loved them all, especially Lunenberg. They were small town fishing villages, but big enough to have a restaurant and a shop of two to look around in. The buildings were quaint and Lunenberg had a lovely harbor area with some nice boats in the water. We had a sandwich at a Subway and sat outside on their upper deck overlooking the water.

Some things I noticed today: The smell outside is often that of wood burning in stoves in the houses. It's chilly up here already and the rain has really put a chill in the air. People are burning their stoves to warm things up already. The whole outside smells either of pine or the wonderful fall aroma of wood burning in the stoves in their homes. Another thing is the grocery store....there are no supermarkets for the most part. All you see are small country type general stores or small convenience stores of some kind. I went into a store today for a couple things and was appalled to see that a 4 liter of milk was over 7 dollars!!!! Eggs were 2.50 a dozen. I tried to buy beer for Glenn and discovered that no store sells it. It can only be purchased at a liquor store. We got lost on the way back and accidently ran into a liquor store. That was unfortunate I guess because the beer was twice the cost that it is at home! Another thing that I find interesting is that every community seems to have a volunteer fire department. I think it's kind of cute. But what if all the volunteers are on vacation or something and there is a fire?

I have also found it interesting to notice the various cultural influences on different areas. You can tell from the names of the restaurants, cities, stores, etc. whether the main influence is French, English, or Scottish. It is evident even in the names of the churches, most of which are Catholic.

Things that we haven't seen since we crossed the border...or have seen little of-

law enforcement...only 2 spotted anywhere

Blacks...a total of 3 have been seen at all

Middle eastern people running gas stations, hotels, etc....almost every place we have seen has been run by locals

thugs

gangs

sagging pants

supermarkets...1 spotted

chain restaurants are very limited

When we finally got back to the RV tonight, the people in the RV next door came over to say they had seen us at the lighthouse today. They are from England and were so much fun to talk to. They had flown into Toronto and rented a motor home and have been touring aound it it through northern US and Canada. As always, talking to people from other countries gives a new appreciation for the good old US. They would LOVE to live here. So we have some new RV friends, Andy and Kate. Unfortunately they are leaving tomorrow. I was thinking that they could be our Thanksgiving Day friends. For fear of having nothing celebratory on Thanksgiving up here Monday, I did buy a pumpkin pie at the store.

Tomorrow we plan to go into Halifax and see a few things of interest. We will likely leave here Monday and head through New Brunswick and into Maine.