Foiled at Fort Knox

Having crossed back into the US, we headed straight for an impressive sight we’d spied from the road when we’d made our way up the Maine Coast a month prior – the Fort Knox State Historic Site.

This is one seriously sturdy structure!

Constructed from 1844 as one of multiple defences designed to stop a British attack, the Fort came into action garrisoning troops during the American Civil War and the Spanish-American War, but never encountered a single threat from the water.

Its massive granite-walled batteries and fortifications are hard to miss from Highway 1 as you travel th Bucksport.

The kids got their run for the day, checking out the parade grounds, batteries, the spooky two-step Alley and the grassy hillsides.

The ‘Hot Shot Furnace’, designed to maximise the destructive power of cannon balls, was an interesting feature.

But I was a little disappointed...

Here I was thinking it was going to be the Fort Knox of gold bullion legend and James Bond fame.

Oh, apparently that one’s in Kentucky. Doh!

Kouchibouguac (otherwise known as the National Park we can't pronounce)

We're deep in the heart of French-speaking Canada, having cruised up the Acadian Scenic Byway on New Brunswick's east coast since we left Prince Edward Island.

Acadians were the French settlers who tried to establish lives in Canada's maritime provinces only to be forcibly deported from one place to the next by the British.

Centuries later, they now fly their flags from every house and electricity pole they can find; a replica of the French flag save for a yellow star symbolising the Virgin Mary.

A lot of the advertising and shop signage here is written exclusively in French instead of the usual approach of putting both languages on everything.

Here at the Kouchibouguac National Park this back-story of deportation is especially charged because the creation of the Park itself involved forced evictions in the 60s.

Fisherman, farmers and their families were made to leave their homes when the Canadian Government decided to establish a National Park here.

The Visitors Centre doesn't gloss over the politics of the Park's formation and tries to represent that time with fairness and sensitivity to the feelings of the displaced families. Still, I couldn't help but feel a bit of discomfort at the idea my experience of nature was at their expense.

After finding a campsite in the South Campground we tried to hike the trail the French so eloquently term "La Tourbiere", or as we English-speakers like to call it... "Bog".

Not 100 metres into it we were attacked by more mosquitoes than we've ever seen.

Our mozzie spray was no match and we retreated to Bessie and drove down the rode to the Kelly's Beach trail.

The short boardwalk crosses a salt marsh, a lagoon, a narrow islet, more of the lagoon and then a barrier island, with the beach on the ocean-facing side of the island.

The boys had an awesome play in the surprisingly not-freezing water.

As we were leaving the beach, Indy spoke to some arriving tourists, giving a graceful wave of his hand and in his most serious voice declaring: "Welcome to the barrier island..... Enjoy!"

In search of Green Gables (and lobster and potatoes)

I felt more of a sense of anticipation crossing the Confederation Bridge than I've felt on most of our adventures so far.

It wasn't because the Confederation Bridge is 13 kilometres long, making it the longest in the world to cross ice-covered waters.

And it wasn't because the destination, Prince Edward Island, boasted some particular wonder of the world I just had to cross half the world to see.

It was because P.E.I. (as the locals call it) provided the backdrop for much of my childhood dreaming and drifting, being the home province of my much-loved childhood heroine, Anne of Green Gables.

Sitting out and away from Nova Scotia and New Brunswick in the north-eastern part of Canada, I knew as a child that it was about as far away from Australia as you could get.

Yet I still hoped that one day I'd get to see the idyllic landscape that had inspired L.M. Montgomery to conjure this little character and her home village of Avonlea into being.

How awful then to arrive at the Gateway Information Centre and find red-headed plaits on everything from cheese to chocolates to travel brochures and beyond that, to find out that there are TWO musicals based on Anne's life currently playing on the Island.

Concerned that heading straight to the much-touristed centre of the Island might realise my greatest fears of Anne-over-commercialisation we instead took off for the less-visited western reaches.

The North Cape, otherwise known as the Canadian Oyster Coast, offered up a drive devoid of tourist trappings and was just what my soul was seeking.

The town of Summerside, while it had a pleasant-enough waterfront boardwalk that we scooted/biked along, didn't entice us to stay for long.

So onwards we pushed, stopping in to see if the Canadian Potato Museum might have something to entertain the kids.

We decided it wouldn't be their cup of tea, but they enjoyed the town playground and playing teacher in the restored schoolhouse while we picked up a bit of trivia...

Per capita, PEI produces more potatoes than anywhere else in the world.

And so began our gastronomic journey of PEI, because a lot of farms had roadside vegetable stands operating on an honour system and most little harbours we came across had a seafood retailer.

Suffice to say that on most of our six nights on the island, we ate a whole lobster for starters, sometimes with some smoked mackerel or salmon, then some freshly-caught fish with mashed PEI new potatoes (irish cobblers to be precise). Oh, and homemade pies and slices for dessert. Oh, and PEI preserves on our breakfast toast. Oh, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

So we came upon the Cedar Dunes Provincial Park beside which the West Point Lighthouse shines bright.

We scored an absolute beachfront site in front of which the kids played that afternoon and most of the next morning in water that was not freezing but which I wasn't even remotely tempted to dip into myself.

Up the western flank of this cape was where the drive became really beautiful instead of just quite nice.

The red-stained cliffs the Island is renowned for came into view about the time we saw the first of two huge windfarms.

Up at the tip of North Cape sits North America's longest natural rock reef (stretching out a couple of kilometres into the ocean) and on this gathers a colony of seals.

We could see the seals, although the distance meant that at first we thought it was a big flock of birds gathered out there.

After nighting at Bideford Provincial Park we drove east towards PEI's northern centre, known as the Green Gables Shore, and came across the kind of idyllic agricultural territory I'd always imagined.

We hadn't travelled very far when we found our next campsite at Cabot Beach Provincial Park.

It was close to the fresh fish dealer at Malpeque Bay (dinner -- tick!) and a playground (fun -- tick!) and a picturesque swimming beach (idyllic -- tick!)

The wind was pushing in strongly from the North so instead of swimming on Cabot Beach itself we walked its length, rounded the point and let the kids paddle in Darnley Basin, watching the little plovers picking for their dinner in the wet sand while the bigger seagulls fought over meatier fare on the exposed sand banks.

The next morning's drive through Darnley, Sea View, Park Corner, French River, Springbrook and New London offered up all things quintessentially PEI - rolling farmland, wildflowers, blue lakes and inlets and rivers aplenty.

Cavendish was where Lucy Maud Montgomery's childhood home stood.  It was also the home of her grandparents' cousins, whom she lived close to and would visit all the time.

This home provided the inspiration for Green Gables.

Anne's "haunted wood" was based on the spruce grove connecting the two properties and "lover's lane" was based on an old cow path rambling beside a brook stretching out from a different angle of the house.

Having closed my eyes to the rampantly commercial amusement parks and Anne-ified hotels coming in to town, I headed straight to Green Gables Heritage Place, which is run by the Canadian National Parks Service and which protects this "Green Gables" house.

If Anne was a religion, Green Gables would be its Mecca and I found myself waiting until a tour group had moved through before entering so as to have my own little spiritual moment alone in the house. (I'd already left Nath and the kids out in the van).

It seems so silly at 38 to still be so emotionally linked to a beloved childhood character but I can't explain it although I sense I'm not alone.

It's now more than 100 years since the first book was published and I spotted about four different generations of people visiting the site, all of whom might have feasibly grown up loving Anne.

Taking the strolls down Lover's Lane and the Haunted Wood, I tried to get a sense of the intense connection the author must have had with the island.

I felt the need to re-read the books and immediately started finding the descriptions so apt - the red of the roads, sandstone cliffs and plowed fields, the wildflowers all abloom, the lakes and their truly shining waters.

Forgive me if I sound a bit flowery but the Anne-lovers out there will understand(!)

Having had my 'fill' I allowed us to move on to the Cavendish section of the PEI National Park and we took a stroll along the boardwalk behind the moving dunes that front the ocean here.

The boardwalk stretched across the Lake of Shining Waters and then another stretched over the dunes to the beach at which the kids played in crystal-clear water.

We moved onwards, stopping in at North Rustico Harbour for our nightly fare and to admire the continuing beauty, and then on to the Brackley-Dalvay section of the National Park to camp for the night.

In the morning I jogged a 6.5km stretch from our site back towards Brackley with views to some exquisite salt marshes, dunes and perhaps PEI's most photographed lighthouse at Covehead.

On the 2km Reeds and Rushes walk we did together, the boys enjoyed seeing the whirligig beetles darting about and twisting and turning on the water's surface (reminded me of them actually).

Luckily they were in a racing mood and the mozzies couldn't catch them in their manic state.

As we drove up to the Greenwich section of the National Park, entering the Points East Coastal Drive, the scenery dropped away markedly, however the Park was worth the effort.

The 4.8km Greenwich Dunes walk was a real stunner, especially the lengthy floating boardwalk over a pond thick with bullrushes and birdlife.

Indy rode his bike over the section of the trail bikes are allowed, leaving it in the racks prior to entering the forest.

The end-point is a massive parabolic dune, one particularly striking feature in a landscape full of them.

Later we found a site at Panmure Island Provincial Campground for the night.

The next morning's drive back towards and through Charlottetown confirmed that the stand-outs of the island are the villages of the Green Gables Drive and the three sections of the PEI National Park, although I would hasten to add the western flank of the West Cape Drive for its completely untouristed ruggedness.

After almost a week on PEI, I didn't want to leave. It almost felt like having to say goodbye to a friend.

At least I have a few Anne books to keep me enraptured on the road.

Error of judgement in the Annapolis Valley

Strolling up and down and along the fortifications of Fort Anne, we had to stretch our brains a bit to take in the four hundred-odd years of its modern history including the 13 battles fought here and the seven changes of ownership between British and French.

The township of Annapolis Royal, where Fort Anne is located, also offered us a nice boardwalk stroll and an understanding of how French settlers built dykes to turn salt plains into arable land and developed their own Acadian culture along the way.

It's also the site of North America's only tidal power generating station and we learned about what's been achieved and what is currently impossible in terms of harnessing the Bay of Fundy's powerful, sediment-laden currents.

Heading north-east along the Evangeline Way we passed through farmland and small townships until, as we rounded the inlet created by the Avon River, we realised we were seeing another one of the Bay of Fundy's incredible low tides (but this time from the other side of the bay).

Red mud stretched out and down into every place you would expect water to be.

Just past Kempt Shore we found a campsite and thought we'd go down on to the beach for a spot of beachcombing on this low tide.

With the water's edge hundreds of metres away and no sizeable rock pools to worry about, we left the boys momentarily to their own devices.

That was a mistake.

The boys painted themselves with a thick layer of mud. 

Indy was apparently the instigator and Dash was his extremely willing accomplice.

(Really, what were we thinking taking two mischief makers down on to what is effectively a massive muddy puddle?)

Their smiles disappeared pretty quickly though when we explained that they weren't coming back inside Bessie until they got every last bit of mud off their bodies.

One long and very cold wash-off later, we were all back inside Bessie.

I reflected on the afternoon and realised that my little darlings and these powerful tides have much in common - you shouldn't turn your back on them for a second.

Kejimkujik

Kejimkujik National Park protects the inky dark waterways and Acadian forest at the centre of Nova Scotia.

The coffee-coloured lakes, rivers and brooks are some of the darkest waterways I’ve ever seen, having been stained by tannins as the water seeped through bogs to form them.

The canoe we hired for half a day from Jake’s Landing glided over the top of this dark, often mirror-like surface and though we knew the waters to be quite shallow and the aquatic creatures to be harmless, it was eerie not being able to see what lied just beneath the surface.

We paddled our way up the Mersey River past water lilies and banks lined with red maple trees (some of which are already starting to show Autumn's approach) and were lucky enough to see a painted turtle sunning himself on a log.

After a picnic, we headed back downstream and this time out on to Kejimkujik Lake and across to Kedge Beach.

The boys had fun testing out the buoyancy of their life jackets floating around in the shallows at the lake’s edge and had a play in the playground beside the beach.

We thought it might be fun to meet some fairies and so hopped back in the canoe and paddled our way over to Fairy Bay as the winds picked up.

While the waves added some excitement to our mission, we were disappointed to see an anchored sign indicating the area was restricted so as to protect petroglyphs found there.

Dropping the canoe back we all agreed that it had been a cool adventure and we understood why most campers in our very busy campground had their own canoes.

The previous afternoon when we’d arrived, we had walked the 1 km loop to Rogers Brook and had seen half a dozen leopard frogs.

The day after our canoeing we walked the 2 km return trail to the Mill Falls, following a very beautiful path beside the Mersey River.

Here the look of a long black coffee becomes more like a latte thanks to saponins, natural soaps in the water that form foam.

Our campsite, one of few that were available from the hundreds there, was very close to a playground where Indy and Dash had a couple of great sessions.

I even got a jog in, along the 6.4km return Slapfoot trail skirting the lake from the campground over to Jake’s Landing. I couldn't have asked for more - a fairly-flat trail, beautiful scenery, no bears – happy days!

We can see why this National Park is a favourite destination for Nova Scotians.

Atlantic Fishing

Lunenburg is a UNESCO-listed National Historic Site boasting buildings from the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

It was certainly nice enough and we adults enjoyed a tasty bowl of seafood chowder 'to go' down by the waterfront after we had finished checking out the town centre.

But the real action for us was at the Fisheries Museum of the Atlantic.

I wasn't too sure at first...

The entry room was an aquarium focusing on the creatures of the Atlantic coast and frankly it wasn't a patch on the ones back home (written by an Aussie aquarium snob!)

But everything else was impressive and we stayed for hours enjoying the exhibits and presentations.

There were two vessels moored at the dockside that we were able to board and stick our noses into every nook and cranny of.

The kids loved the sleeping quarters and the galleys and we parents loved imagining that the fishing nets they were pretending to be caught inside of were purchasable items at the gift shop.

I loved seeing the fish hold pens below the decks of the Theresa E. Connor, a salt bank schooner built in 1938.

After having seen "The Perfect Storm" a few years back, I tried to imagine this old girl out on the Grand Banks, trawling for the 193 tonnes of fish she could hold and facing everything the sea could throw at her.

The older kids enjoyed gently holding the sea stars and other intertidal creatures in the touch tank, however Dash's little monster grip proved a problem. And on to the next exhibit!

I asked the boys later what their favourite part of the day was and it was launching a model-sized schooner.

The presenter explained how the boats were built and launched and then completed afloat and the kids themselves got to progressively knock out all of the brakes holding the vessel back before watching it slide down the ramps into the water.

The Banks Fishery exhibits on the top floor mapped out the ocean currents and explained why the Grand Banks (off Newfoundland) are such rich fishing grounds.

The small exhibit about the 'August Gales' (massive storms during 1926 and 1927 which claimed 139 lives) and the Fisherman's Memorial Room were sobering reminders of the perils of working at sea.

The video about lobsters seemed to jump around a bit but was still fairly informative, although we parents could have done without the extended lobster coitus shots and the ultra-specific commentary, accompanied by a thousand questions from the peanut gallery.

Indy's questions were left-of-field but poignant as usual... "Where is he going? Will he ever see her again?"

(I'm sure many a lobster gal has asked the very same thing.)

Thoroughly enlightened, we headed back to our campsite just outside of Lunenburg to enjoy one final night with our wonderful travelling companions and a sensational side of salmon cooked over the fire.

Thanks guys! It has been unforgettable to share this adventure with you!