Friday, 9/10/10 - Last day inSt. John, New Brunswick

We arrived in St John Wednesday the 8th, after dark. What a desolate drive between Bangor and Calais, Maine. It seemed like high up in the mountains of Colorado or the Adirondacks. Scrub vegetation, birch trees, evergreens, and ROCKS. Huge rocks along the highway. Huge rocks in fields and meadows piled along the perimeter and piled up in the middle. What work it must have taken to move those rocks with horses and by hand, just to clear some land for crops or grazing. And I can't imagine that the ground was too good for either. Not a single gas station in ~100 miles and only a few houses and businesses. We were very happy to get to Calais (pronounced calous by the locals) and back to some semblance of civilization.


Border crossing was actually enjoyable, with customs not even asking for our passports. We were quite happy since we had more alcohol than was allowed - 80oz (a little more than 3 750ml bottles of wine). We had brought more than that from home AND we took advantage of New Hampshire's convenient drive through liquor stores.

St. Andrews-by-the-Sea was recommended to us as a quaint little village, so it became our first stop in Canada. Somewhat disappointed as we found only a main street filled with souvenier shops and tiny clothes boutiques. One saving grace was the excellent German restaurant where we ate, "L'Europe". We started with a great spinach salad w/pears and mango vinagrette, the chef's complementary taste of a chilled cucumber soup with garlic and dill, and escgargot (lots of garlic and shallots). Vicki had Jaggerschnitzel with spaetzel and mushroom gravy, and I had wienerschnitzel with pomme croquettes. EXCELLENT!! And we ended with a trilogy desert - homemade pistacio icecream, mini creme brulette, and cheesecake w/ raspberry swirl. Our waitress was a real gem, and we were glad we DIDN'T have the other waitress who was not so nice to the patrons next to us.

St. John was described in one of the travel books as "not like the cute cottages of many seaside towns, but more corrugated." It is a mostly blue collar town with small homes and numerous small, old apartments. A huge refinery and warehouses by the waterfront. Thursday we toured the public market, skirted King's Park and the founders cemetary, and walked through uptown and the waterfront. The brick and brownstone buildings have wonderful, elegant detail and many of them are in the midst of restoration, which is promising for the the city. The infamous assorted doorways to these buildings have been sketched and reproduced in paintings for many years and are really interesting to pick out as you walk along their surprisingly steep, steep streets near the waterfront. Not much more to see by our standards, and we had two more days before we boarded the ferry to Digby. Then we witnessed the reversing falls on the St. John River. What a force when the incoming tide acually forces a large river to flow upstream for a period of ~45 minutes, and then struggles to maintain the force for another 15 minutes during the "slack" tide until it finally loses the battle and the river begings to flow downstream again. Another saving grace for Thursday was a neat little coffee shop named the Magnolia Cafe and where we had a coffee and desert. Then we decided to go to the movies, found the theatre easily with our waitress' directions and saw "The Expendables". What a gory, great movie! Stallone and his friends at their finest!

A Carnival cruise ship docked in St. John Thursday. Locals say about 4-5 cruise ships per week dock and stay 8-12 hours. What a huge boost to the economy with 2000 - 3000 people per ship all summer and fall. Talked with a woman off the the ship..said they started in New York City, up the eastern coast (5 day cruise), with only two ports of call; first being Halifax, second and last, St. John, with the remaineder of time at sea. Didn't appeal to either of us. Fun lady to talk to though.

Friday found us driving to what we thought was a thriving artist community, Gagetown. Two potters shops and an Irving gas station. And one of the shops was closed. Then to Sussex for a glimpse at some old covered bridges. We didn't find any covered bridges, but did come across a huge mining operation, now closed, owned by Potash. One of the means of getting across the St. John river is ferry.

Pulled across the river using a cable stretched between shores, the ferry holds three cars and makes the crossing in about 3-4 minuites, and free. There are about 7 of these between St John and Frederickton, really neat!!  Vicki really liked the warning. 

We finally found covered bridges in St. Martins on the Bay of Fundy.

 There we walked along the beach and in the water and saw caves creatred by the wave and tide action over millions of years. We had our GPS on our travels today so not many Which Ways today.

Tomorrow we go to Digby.