Charlottetown to St.John

After leaving Quebec we had our only confirmed sea day as we proceeded down the St.Lawrence River. The weather was quite cool but we managed to walk a couple of miles round the deck and spend some time in the gym. Email connection was patchy so that was out of the question.

Thursday saw us arrive Charlottetown at 0800, a small town on Prince Edward Island. The island only has a population of 33,000 but is swelled by many tourists in the summer. It is Canada´s smallest province but has significant historical connections. The first European to land here was Jacques Cartier in 1534 but settlement only began 200years later when the island was called Iles Saint Jean. In 1769 it was renamed Prince Edward Island after one of the sons of George III.

Charlottetown is known as Canada´s birthplace after the historic conference of 1864 which resulted in the formation of Federal Canada. The Province House where it all happened has been restored and was well worth the visit we made to it.

The other claim to fame of PEI as the locals call it is as the setting for Anne of Green Gables and the birthplace of its author Lucy Maud Montgomery.

We toured part of the island on an opentop bus and then wandered round the very pleasant town visiting the Province House and one of the largest churches in Canada, St.Dunstan´s Basilica.

On Friday, after a short overnight crossing to Cape Breton Island, part of Nova Scotia, we were due to anchor off Sydney and tender ashore (Eurodam got the only berth) but a storm was brewing, the wind was up and due to increase so the Captain aborted the call for safety reasons. A great pity as it would have been good to have visited two Sydneys in the same year!

After the unscheduled sea day at slow speed in windy conditions we arrived on Saturday morning at Halifax the capital of  Nova Scotia and berthed alongside! Off on our tour of the town and harbour in an amphibious DKW unfortunately the weather was against us and we had heavy rain all morning  Luckily the afternoon was fine to allow us to walk around part of the town and waterfront. Said to be the second largest natural harbour in the world to Sydney, Aus it is a pity it is not nearly so scenic and modern development has done it no favours.

Halifax has three main claims to fame. The first is the main entry port for thousands of migrants from Europe in the early 20^th Century.

It also was the main landing port for bodies from the sinking of the Titanic in 1912 and many are buried there.

Also in 1917 an ammunition ship collided with another in the harbour, causing a massive explosion which devastated much of the city and killed thousands of people. This is the reason why little of the original architecture is in evidence near the shoreline and has resulted in a disappointing appearance.

Next port on Sunday was St. John, New Brunswick a pleasant town with a population of 125,000. Situated on the Bay of Fundy it is famous for its massive tidal range. We visited the Reversing Falls round about low water and it looked like serious rapids as the St.John River flows to the sea. It seems amazing that approaching high water the sea water tide becomes stronger than the river and the river flow reverses.

Being a Sunday the town was quiet but some of the shops had opened specially for us! In the afternoon we even saw the sun for a while! This was our last Canadian port of this cruise.