We had a great night in Halifax and a great sleep at the hotel and actually ended up all sleeping in for the first time on our trip.
With sleeping it didn’t give us any time for some more exploring since we were meeting up with an old friend for brunch so we could catch up and meet his girlfriend. We enjoyed a nice breakfast at the Ardmore Tea Room on Quinpool Rd. It is a greasy spoon type of restaurant where the servings are a good size and the prices are right. We had a great visit and caught up on all of the most recent news.
Once breakfast was over we were headed back to Truro, but not without a stop at Darthmouth Crossings which everyone out east had been talking about. This is similar to any of the new shopping plazas being built full of “outlet” stores.
Once we were back in Truro we met up with Dave’s oldest sister for a walk in Victoria Park. We followed the path up to the waterfalls and on the way back stopped under the shade of a tree for a visit and to let our daughter stretch her legs some. There are quite a few trails in this park, so next time we are out we will have to explore more of them, since we didn’t really have time on this trip.
Check out what we got to on some of the other days of this trip:
We set aside a day and night on our trip to head into Halifax. We both love this city as it was somewhere we had both lived at some point.
We headed for the city shortly after breakfast to be able to enjoy the day wandering around and doing a little shopping. Our first stop was the Delta Barrington to see if we could check in early and park the vehicle. The room was ready early so we could off load our stuff before heading out by foot to explore the city. They definitely welcome families at this hotel and were quick to get a crib for our room. They also gave our daughter a little gift pack which consisted of a phthalate free dinosaur which was just the right size for her little hands and a little board book. She loved these gifts and we can’t keep the book out of her hands!
Once we were set we headed down to the waterfront for some lunch at Salty’s. This is one of the best waterfront restaurants for fish and chips and a great view. It was a busy spot out on the patio. The restaurant did not disappoint.
We wandered along the boardwalk running the length of the harbour area making our way to the Keith’s brewery.
We did not go for a tour on this trip, but instead turned up towards Spring Garden road to wander and maybe some shopping. The rain started to come down pretty hard as we were making our way up this road so we stopped to buy an umbrella so we could keep wandering. Once the rain lifted we ventured into The Halifax Public Gardens. These are lovely gardens that are open to the public during the day and are locked up at night. They are a great spot to enjoy a picnic lunch.
After wandering around downtown Halifax we made our way back to the hotel for our daughter to have a nap. She was not having any of that, so I thought it might be nice to take a drive out to Fisherman’s Cove since it is written about in all of the tourist information.
I have to say that it is not what it is cracked up to be, however there was a nice little beach area where little ones can splash about in the ocean water. Since it is a shallow cove the water isn’t too cold either. Our daughter had her first step in the ocean here.
After our little play in the water our daughter was sleepy so we loaded her in the car and headed back to the hotel. Once back at the hotel she was ready to go again and full of energy so we changed into dry clean clothes and figured we would grab some food down on the boardwalk. We grabbed a bite from one of the huts and sat at one of the picnic tables set up in the harbour. We got to see Theodore Tugboat up close as well. Maybe next time we are out there we will have to take her on a tour on Theodore.
What is your favourite thing to do in Halifax?
Check out what we got to on some of the other days of this trip:
Day 9 – Our first full day in Nova Scotia was set aside to visit with my sister-in-laws and their families as well as Dave’s grandmother and parents. It was a warm day so the little ones had fun playing in the kiddie pool and getting to know each other. It was great to catch up with everyone and this was their first time meeting our daughter.
After which we took some family photos and enjoyed a nice dinner.
Day 10 – Was a nice relaxing day. The kids played together in the morning and then after lunch Dave and I headed out to catch up with friends and their little ones for a bit. When our visit with friends was over we made our way over to Dave’s oldest sister’s place for a swim in the pool and some more visiting.
Day 11 – Dave’s parents took us out to Masstown Market for lunch. This is a large fruit and vegetable market as well as some grocery goods, deli counter and some household goods. They also serve lunches and ice cream. We had a wander around the market checking everything out before sitting down to a great lunch. I had a half a sandwich and salad. The salad was a spinach and strawberry salad which was fantastic. While Dave enjoyed another lobster roll.
To read about more of our trip check out the links below:
It was another early morning, but not as early as we had been getting up (5:45am) which meant we got a good start on the road.
Our original plan was to drive as far as St John’s, NB and then camp for the night. Dave had other ideas though once we got on the road. We took Route 1A up to the Maine/ New Brunswick border and enjoyed some of the sites along the way.
From the border we then headed to the main highway since Dave wanted to get to his parents that night instead of the following day. On the way we did take one detour to St Andrews By the Sea to enjoy our picnic lunch by the water and wander the main street. This is a really cute town and they have a great art shop where we picked up some pottery to take to my mother-in-law.
Then it was back to the main highway to reach our destination. This was our daughters first time meeting Dave’s parents and we arrived just after dinner.
To read about what we got up to on the other days of our trip check out the below links:
This past week-end we were up in Kincardine to celebrate with my brother and his family. They were married in a very small ceremony last year with just their immediate families present and so this year they were having the party and a vow renewal ceremony on their first anniversary.
It was one heck of a hot evening, but the setting was gorgeous. They had the ceremony on the beach with everyone standing watching at around 7:00pm. It was a fun evening and a great reason to get the family together. Here are a few of the pictures I snapped of the evening.
Early morning trend continued on day 7 with our daughter waking up at 4:45am. Since it was nice and early and the weather forecast for the morning was good it seemed like the perfect day to hike up Cadillac Mountain. We headed out of the campground around 6:15 once we had woken up enough, brushed our teeth and made some peanut butter sandwiches for the hike. We hiked the Cadillac Mountain South Ridge Trail leaving from Blackwoods campground. The trail is fairly flat and moderate from the campground to the main trail head and involves crossing the main island road. There are some boards you need to walk across in the swampy areas as well.
Once you hit the main trail head the climb begins. The South Ridge Trail is the easiest of the trails leading up Cadillac Mountain but the trail could be challenging at times, especially with a little one on my back. It is recommended to hike up the mountain to be at the top for either sunrise or sunset. After hiking this trail in the light, I would definitely not want to hike this in the dark. They were working on the trail in a number of spots when we were hiking up to help preserve and protect the surrounding landscape. There are some fantastic views along the way. At the right time of year there are also a great deal of blueberries lining the trail so you could have a nice snack. Our daughter napped in the carrier for a large portion of the upwards climb.
Once we reached the summit we enjoyed a bit of a snack and a break before hiking back down. Many people will hike one way and take the Island shuttle back down. Nearing the final stretch is where you can meet the biggest challenge. It is rocky and a bit of climbing is involved. You reach this portion after hiking down a bit where there is a pond. The views are definitely something else once you are up at the summit.
As we started the decent back down Tessa had a run in with a porcupine. She would not let us remove the quills while on the trail so she had to hike back to the campground with them in her mouth and nose. We were back at the campground by 11:00 am, so Dave headed into Bar Harbor to take Tessa to the vets while our daughter and I made and had some lunch and relaxed a little. The vet told Dave that they have dogs in there at least a couple times a week who have had a run in with the porcupine on Cadillac Mountain.
After lunch we headed out of the park to grab a shower and get cleaned up. There is a private operation offering paid showers just outside of the campground located on the main road. It is $2 for 4 minutes since there are no showers within the campground.
Once cleaned up we headed back into Bar Harbor to pick up a few items, check emails and then pick up Tessa from the vets. Since Tessa was in no state to walk (she had to be put under to have the quills removed), we took a drive down to Bass Harbor to see the lighthouse.
The drive was nice and it was a great way to spend part of the rainy afternoon. Once we reached the lighthouse the sun decided to come back out.
After a little drive around Bass Harbor we continued on to Southwest Harbor to grab some dinner before heading back to camp. We decided to order take-out from a little place on the main street. Once I had ordered dinner I headed next door to check out Hatched On MDI. This is a gorgeous children’s shop carrying clothing, toys, etc that are not your run of the mill. She carries lots of the brands that I like for our daughter which are more unique and the woman who owns the store was a great help in choosing some outfits to take home with us. Once my shopping was done dinner was ready and we were back on the road.
We decided we would take our dinner to a freshwater beach we had passed on the way down. Paige was enjoying watching a family play frisbee on the grass while we ate. Then we let our daughter wade in the water and play in the sand.
We had trouble getting her out of the water to head back to camp. Once back at camp it was time for our daughter to head to bed and then we got ourselves organized and partially packed for the trip the following day.
To see what else we got up to on this trip check out the links below:
Up with the sunrise to greet the day (approximately 5:00 am). Since quiet hours at Blackwoods campground are until 8:00 am. We headed out of the site by 6:00 am, with Peanut Butter sandwiches in hand, so we didn’t disturb too many campers with our daughter talking up a storm. She was really taking to the camping thing by this point.
We headed out for a drive on part of the park loop on our way to Sandy Beach to hike part of the Ocean Path. It was the hi-lited trail of the week so we figured it must be worth checking out. It was so nice and quiet on the drive and we were able to enjoy some great views while we watched the sun coming up more.
Sandy Beach has large washroom facilities and change rooms which made us wonder if this beach gets pretty packed on a hot summer’s day. It was quite cool when we headed out so we were dressed in our sweats and hoods were up. There is a very nice beach down a set of stairs here which dogs are not allowed on. It was so peaceful standing at the top watching and listening to the waves crashing into the pink granite cliffs.
The ocean path is a relatively flat gravel path that follows the road for a portion of it. There are some stairs on trails leading from this path to lookouts along the way. You could probably do this path with a stroller as long as it was one meant for “off-road”. We decided to hike as far as Thunder Hole which is a 2.8 mi hike return. We were the only ones on the trail going out to Thunder Hole so it was so nice and peaceful. We reached Thunder Hole shortly after low tide and it was putting on an impressive show. Our daughter was a little uncertain of it when we neared the hole, so I mostly stayed up top while Dave and Tessa spent some time right down there watching the waves and the spray.
After our short hike we ventured into Bar Harbor. Our first stop was breakfast at the Ivy Inn located on the main strip as you are heading south out of town. The service was incredible, and the food was amazing. I had oatmeal with fruit compote and burnt sugar (never thought I would rave about oatmeal, but this was so good, even my husband who only like the instant oatmeal packets thought this was really good) with a bowl of fruit (nice fresh fruits and berries), and Dave enjoyed the local egg breakfast with a side order of praline bacon. If you enjoy coffee with your morning breakfast then you must stop in here. They have the best coffee I have ever tasted. The breakfast was quite reasonable for the 2 of us and our daughter enjoyed a little of our breakfast while chatting up a storm with some of the other guests.
After enjoying our breakfast we then thought it would be a good morning to browse the shops and maybe pick up a few items to take back with us. It was still early so many of the shops were not yet open, but as we made our way towards the harbour more were opening up. We picked up a couple locally written books for our daughter at Sherman’s books that were recommended by the staff there. Tessa also got a new lobster stuffed chew toy to play with.
Once we were shopped out we drove out to the Oceanarium to check it out, but you have to do the 1.5 hr tour (can’t pick to do only some of the sites) so we weren’t sure our daughter could handle that since she hadn’t yet napped.
So it was back into Bar Harbor for some lunch before heading back to the campsite. We tried Stewman’s which is right on the harbour. The service was terrible, the food was not very good (I ordered 2 piece fish & chips – one piece of fish was cold and soggy and the other was ok) and much pricier than many of the other restaurants around. Dave said that his lobster was cooked properly and he enjoyed the lobster. I would definitely not return here. The high chair they brought us was coated in dried food and when I asked for a cloth to clean it, the server told me I could just use the paper napkins sitting on our table.
The rain started while we were eating our lunch, so we made a stop at the grocery store and Natural Foods to pick up some groceries before we headed back to camp.
Since it was raining and our daughter had finally fallen asleep we dropped the groceries and headed out to Thunder Hole as they had told us the best time to see it was 2 hrs before high tide. Since it was bucketing down and our daughter was napping, Dave parked the car and then headed down on his own to see it. It was very busy, but Dave said that we had actually seen it put on a better show when we had been there early in the morning.
We then decided to drive down to check out Northeast Harbor. This is a cute little town and where you can catch the mail boat over the Cranberry Island. We stopped and enjoyed the view at the harbour until our daughter woke up, at which point we stopped at the hardware store to pick up a tarp then back to camp.
The tarp was to create a floor in our dining tent for our daughter to play on while we prepared dinner. She thought it was great since she could check out our camping bin and get her sillies out.
To read about what else we got up to on this trip check out the links below:
Again we were up about 6:30, grabbed breakfast (included at the hotel) and headed out. There was a light rain in the morning. We continued on Hwy 1 to be able to enjoy the coast and little towns along the way.
Our first stop of the morning was at the Rockland Breakwater Lighthouse. We walked out part of the way along the breakwater but after reaching about the halfway mark, we decided to turn around as it was harder going since the breakwater you walk out on is large stones piled together. I was nervous about taking a wrong step and falling with our daughter on my back which prevented me from being able to look around and enjoy the view. We stopped, took a couple photos and turned back where we spent a little bit of time on the sandy beach checking out the sea weed and shells as the tide was partially out when we were there.
Our next stop was Camden, Maine. This is such a cute town with an interesting attraction. The waterfalls that run into the harbour do so by running under some of the building on the main street. It is pretty neat to see.
We picked up lunch to go and took it with us to Camden State Park where we drove up Mount Battie to enjoy our lunch at the top. It gives you a great view of Camden and on a clear day you can see Mount desert Island. The cost was $4.50 per adult and we did not have to pay for our daughter. There is also a lookout tower you can climb to get an even better view.
As we continued on our drive we drove through Fort Knox, Maine where we saw this interesting bridge which has an observatory at the top. Maybe next time we do this trip we can stop to check out the observatory.
“Next stop Acadia National Park on Mount Desert Island, Maine. We set up camp for the next three nights at Blackwoods campground which is down at the south east end of the island. The camp sites have little to no privacy, are stone and quite a bit of water was running through our site when we got there. You are not able to reserve a specific site, but rather they are assigned as you arrive. When we checked in there were still quite a number of empty sites left. The washrooms were not the cleanest and Dave kept noting to me that there was no soap in the washrooms. I think we just got too spoiled when we camped at Silver Lake State Park that it made this site look worse than it was.
We wanted to take it easy after getting the tent set up so just headed into Otter Creek (first stop near the campground) to the general store where we picked up a few grocery items and ordered a pizza. The pizza took over an hour to be made on a grocery store crust so we ended up missing the evening program at Blackwoods campground (the other nights we were there they only offered the late program). So we just headed back to our site and relaxed and had a fairly early evening.
To read about what else we got up to on this trip check out the links below:
We had another early morning (this was the trend on our trip!), up about 6:30 am and made ourselves pancakes so we could enjoy some of the maple syrup we had purchased the day before. After breakfast we packed up camp, before the rain returned.
We drove through Portsmouth, NH, but since it was raining pretty hard and our daughter was napping we decided to see it from the car rather than get out and walk around. Portsmouth has a great deal of old buildings lining the downtown core. We then drove out to the point past gorgeous old homes. The downtown core reminded us a great deal of Old Montreal.
After our drive around Portsmouth we crossed the bridge to Kittery, ME. We stopped at a couple of the outlets for some shopping (after seeing Freeport we would recommend skipping Kittery as the same shops are in Freeport where it is much nicer). The Trading Post was a recommended stop so we checked it out. To be honest, I would not recommend stopping there, it is name brand clothing which is at all of the outlets except it is not discounted there. They do not have anything different or quirky. They do have some camping gear and books on the second floor, however if you are looking for this sort of thing, check out one of the LL Bean outlets along the way or wait until you reach Freeport for LL Bean or the outlet.
We continued on Hwy 1 all the way to Freeport, meandering into some of the small towns along the way. We drove through Ogunquit while it was pouring rain and drove out to the beach. On a sunny day this would be a great beach to spend a day at and the town itself was really cute.
In Portland, ME we drove around trying to find a hotel room, but there were none to be had, so we continued on to Freeport which had not been our original destination for the night.
In Freeport we stayed at the Holiday Inn Express which you pass just before entering the town of Freeport. The handy thing with this hotel is they have a laundry room (1 washer and 1 dryer) which allowed us to get some things dried out and cleaned. As well we were able to give our daughter a bath before bed so she had some semblance of a routine.
The rain was letting up as we checked into the hotel so we headed into Freeport to wander around. The streets and shops were pretty quiet by the time we got into town which was quite nice for us to enjoy some shopping and get some dinner. This is where Dave had his first Lobster Roll which he said was the best one of the trip and at the best price as well. We got it at what looked like an ice cream stand/convenience store (I don’t recall the name of the place).
We forgot to pull out our camera this day to take photos of some of the interesting sights we saw or the towns we visited, so all we have is memories.
You can check out my posts from our previous days on our trip here:
We woke up about 6:30 am to a nice day. Had breakfast, cleaned up and took it easy, then headed out from camp about 8:30 am. We took route 107 through Woodstock, VT to Quechee Gorge where we stopped at the visitor centre to gather some information on sights to see. We then took the trail from the visitor centre down to the gorge. It is a fairly steep hill down, but easily manageable as the distance is about 0.5 mi down. Once down we wandered out on the rocks to get a better view of the gorge and let Tessa play in the water.
At the bottom we headed up the trail past the entrance to the visitor centre to the dam to see the waterfall there and then on to the pond.
After the hike it was time to explore the area. We drove through Quechee Village and stopped at the Simon Pearce Glass Blowing studio to see the artists at work. They had some beautiful glass blown items as well as pottery at the studio for sale. Unfortunately we did not have room in the vehicle on this trip to be able to pick up a piece. There is a nice little waterfall off the rear of the studio as well.
After our short stop we continued on our way to Sugarbush Farm (http://www.sugarbushfarm.com/)which I had seen mentioned in a number of different posts on the internet as a place to see. At the information centre they also recommended this so we figured me better check it out. The drive is very nice and scenic out to the farm. You will pass by some high end resorts and gorgeous old mansions. The staff there are very nice and friendly and there is an old lab that wanders the property named Max. They were very open to letting us tie our dog up in the shade near the cars and Tessa and Max laid near each other just checking each other out while we went to try some cheese and maple syrup. After trying a number of cheeses we decided on the 8 yr old cheddar and the sage cheddar. our daughter liked all of the cheeses she was offered to try. We enjoyed the maple syrup tasting as well and picked up a couple different grades to take home with us. After tasting and shopping we went out to the petting zoo area which is near the entrance. They had a calf tied up and various small animals in their pens which you could see. Our daughter wanted to pet all of the animals.
We decided to continue on the backroads back into Woodstock where we wandered the main street, checking out some of the shops and we stopped for lunch at one of the local cafe’s.
Once we were shopped out we headed back to camp so our daughter could take a nap before we decided to hit up the beach. It is a small sandy beach with a nice park area around it. The water was the perfect temperature with a nice sandy bottom. There were many families there with their kids. Our daughter was having so much fun swimming in her lifejacket and watching some of the older kids play in the water.
That evening we cooked dinner at the camp and once our daughter went to bed we played some more sequence.
It rained overnight, but thanks to the lean-to our tent was nice and dry.
To see what else we got up to on this trip check out the links below:
