New Scotland

We are anchored in a scenic bay of Bras D'Or Lake, not far from an old marble quarry called Marble Mountain (map).  We're having a quiet afternoon and evening aboard, just soaking in the scenery, and it's a good time to catch up on the blog, since it's too scenic here to want to do it under way.

A panorama shot from tonight's anchorage, about 200° or so. My camera can not do it justice.

Shortly after I last posted here, we arrived to Pictou, Nova Scotia. As is so often the case, we're too big for the marinas here, and while we certainly could have anchored and tendered ashore, we'd read that the marine terminal offered no-frills dockage for a reasonable flat rate, so I gave them a call. The rate has gone up, and they quoted us $60 for the night, but that seemed a reasonable trade-off for being able to just walk off the boat.

The Pictou wharf. I actually shot this on departure, in better light; on arrival the water was chaotic with mackerel.

We arrived to find the pier deserted, with a lone bald eagle sitting atop a bollard fishing. The water was teeming with mackerel, thousands of them, breaking the surface in huge boils. Our arrival scared the eagle off, but he did not go far. As we were tying up (map) the port manager arrived to unlock the gates; clearly they do not get many ships here nowadays.

We had the whole wharf to ourselves.

We headed down to Harbour House Ales & Spirits for dinner on the patio. Afterward we strolled most of the small town, passing the maritime museum and its ongoing replica restoration of the ship Hector, which brought some of the first Scottish settlers to this part of Canada in 1773. Nova Scotia literally means New Scotland, and the influence is everywhere in the province, and especially so in Pictou. We've already encountered Canadian accents here that could be appropriately be described as a brogue.

From our dock we could see the Canadian Coast Guard Cutter Capt. Jacques Cartier on the hard at the shipyard. The brand new fisheries enforcement vessel has been plagued by problems since delivery.

We ended our short tour of town at the Cherry on Top ice cream shop before heading back to our private wharf. At sunset I went back out stag to walk the remaining few blocks of the town, passing the old railroad depot and quite a number of  small B&Bs, all of which were sporting No Vacancy signs, which surprised me a bit. The much larger and perhaps more touristy town here is New Glasgow, another dozen miles or so upriver.

Vector looking diminutive at the wharf built for ships up to 7 meter draft.

Sunday we dropped lines and headed back out into the Northumberland Strait for one final crossing, pushing through beam seas to Cape George Point, where we made the southward turn into St. Georges Bay, which put them right on the nose. That had things improving steadily as we made our way toward the southern shore, and we dropped the hook in flat calm at Pomquet Road (map), an anchorage just east of Pomquet Island and Pomquet Point, near the community of Bayfield. There's a lobstering port here with a processing facility that has an attached restaurant, but it is dark Sunday and so we had a nice dinner aboard.

The historic rail depot. Damaged by fire in the 90s, well after the railroad left, it was restored with community funds and now houses a small market.

Monday we weighed anchor for the fairly short cruise around the corner into the Strait of Canso, which separates Cape Breton Island from mainland Nova Scotia. The 200'-deep strait was closed off in the 50s by an enormous causeway between the two land masses; a Seaway-sized navigation lock allows vessels to pass through. A swing bridge carries the highway and a rail line across the canal.

Hovering in the Canso Lock, looking toward the highway/rail swing bridge.

The water level difference was only a bit more than a foot when we transited, and rather than have us tie up we just hovered mid-chamber for the whole operation. Just 40 minutes later we were dropping the hook in Ship Harbour at Port Hawkesbury (map), on Cape Breton Island. This is actually a moderately busy port area that is part of the Strait of Canso Superport.

Vector all alone in the enormous Ship Harbour.

We had a quiet afternoon on board until dinner time, when we splashed the tender and headed ashore at the marina. We paid $2 per hour for two hours of day dockage and hoofed it up a rather large hill to town, where we had a very pleasant meal on the deck at Miller's Tap & Grill, in the Maritime Inn. Afterward we walked over to the supermarket for a few items before descending to the marina.

I had the oatmeal stout from the local on-island brewery, Big Spruce.

On our way out of the marina in the dink we spotted a sailboat at the dock with whom we've been playing leapfrog since Rimouski, Patience VII. After exchanging waves we pulled alongside to trade stories. Among other things, we learned that Canada does not allow duplicate vessel names in its registry, so the other six boats named Patience belong to other Canadians. They are turning south from the Strait of Canso, but perhaps we will see them again in Halifax.

Important safety warning inscribed on the back of the pint glass.

Patience VII was staying put right there in Port Hawkesbury until the outside weather improved, but since we planned to divert to the Lennox Passage we decided to weigh anchor in the morning and see how far we could get. Things got a bit bouncy on the Strait after rounding Bear Island, and we had a choppy hour crossing the mouth of the strait until we were in the lee of Janvrin Island. After that we had a comfortable ride along the Passage and through the swing bridge that connects Isle Madame to Cape Breton Island.

Sunset over the mainland side from the marina at the port. Life boats and davits are training aids for the local maritime school.

Given the forecast and how choppy it was in the relatively protected strait, we stopped well short of the exit of the Lennox Passage, turning to starboard at Eagle Island to drop the hook in the very protected Poulamon Bay (map) on the Isle Madame side. We had a very comfortable night and a quiet dinner aboard.

The forecast yesterday was only a slight improvement, with at least one forecast showing steep three-footers at the exit of the passage. But we opted to weigh anchor and see for ourselves, with the option to make an about-face and return as far as D'Escousse Harbor, which has a yacht club dock and a restaurant. We did find three-footers, but it was a longer-period swell and mostly astern, so we pressed on into St. Peters Bay and thence to the eponymous canal.

Jerome Point light, approaching St. Peters Canal (left).

We had read that you could spend the night on the lock guidewalls when the lock is closed for the day, but it turns out you can stop there any time. So even though it was early in the day, we tied up at the south guide wall well ahead of the lock (map). As we were arranging lines a lock operator from Parks Canada came by in a Mule and asked if we were locking through, then welcomed us to St. Peters, giving us directions to town.

Vector tied to the guide wall. Note the large pins quite landward of the wall; it took some creativity to get secured.

We took a stroll out to the waterfront trail along the bay after we were all secured. Then I offloaded the e-bike and did a whirlwind spin through town, stopping at the Carquest auto parts and cleaning them out of 1/2" heater hose, and making additional stops at the hardware and dollar stores. I then checked out the restaurant options and the marina and anchorage on the other side of the peninsula before heading home by way of the provincial park across the canal.

View from the other side as I returned from town. The lock gate walkways are open to the public so you can just walk across; during our stay we saw people fishing from atop the gates while they were swinging.

At dinner time we walked along the canal wall to what I though was the nicest and closest dinner option, the pub and dining room at the Bras D'Or Lakes Inn. We were there before 5:30, but even so, as we were waiting for the hostess to find us a table, the snippy manager came out to say they were not accepting any more diners for the rest of the evening. A couple of Inn guests who were also waiting and, heaven forfend, had no reservation, were told to come back at 9pm -- even for take-out. We made a hasty retreat to re-group.

All the hydrants in town were colorfully decorated by local businesses. This one is in front of the fire station itself.

We ended up walking to the other end of town and eating at MacBouch bar and grill. A very casual menu heavy on fried foods, but they had cold local drafts and some sandwiches, and that was good enough. We once again hit the local grocery on the way home. All in all a very nice stop, and it was lovely to have a free place to tie up.

This morning we dropped lines just as a couple of boats were locking out  of the lake, and we glided through the lock, canal, and swing bridge before emerging into the lake. It is just as beautiful here as we had heard through various sources. There are so many beautiful anchorages, and we spotted this one on our way to one we had heard about a tad closer to Marble Mountain. Since we had no plans to hike to the old quarry or even go ashore, we opted for the solitude over a more popular anchorage.

In the lock chamber as the lake-side gates are opening. There are double gates at each end because neither pool is always the high pool -- it's tidal on both sides.

We'll spend a couple more days in the lake before heading back the way we came. There are two exits from the lake to the north, and it's tempting to go that way and loop around to Sydney, but that puts us in big water and it's a lot of extra miles. It's going to be tough enough waiting on passage windows along the Nova Scotia coast, without adding the entire east coast of Cape Breton as well.