Iona

Tuesday 1 October

For some reason we thought today was our departure day from Baddeck, so we started packing up and I sent a little note to our host, who immediately replied that he was surprised we were leaving a day early. On checking our itinerary (Why didn’t we do that in the first place?) we realised that we did indeed have another day here. So we remade our beds and headed out and about again.

Once more we made the ferry crossing at Little Narrows before choosing the long way round to Iona via Washabuck. There were lovely reflections in the water so we hopped in and out of the car a number of times as we kept seeing good spots. Fortunately we were on the back roads so no worries about all the stopping and starting. There’s not a lot at Washabuck, mostly just potholes, but it was right on a point that looked almost across the water to Baddeck.

We continued on over an even worse road to Iona and Baile nan Gaidheal, the Highland Village Museum. It was like a very small scale Gaelic version of Sovereign Hill, with people in costume in the various buildings telling you about life in their time. It followed the Scottish migrants from Scotland of the 1770s to Nova Scotia and then through time to the 1920s. Most of the road signs we see are in both English and Gaelic and there is even a Gaelic language college on Cape Breton Island. There are also many Gaelic cultural events throughout the year.

By the time we were finished there, we were looking for lunch as it was about 2.30. The pub next door had a little cafe/chocolate shop that could offer us something from their breakfast menu so we had that. The pub itself was not open. Lots of places are closing for the winter and there are very few little cafes about. What we see most is seafood restaurants offering lobster or fish and chips. Most
settlements don’t even have a convenience store so people must stock up when they go to the bigger towns like Baddeck. Too bad if you get home and realise you’ve forgotten the milk.

Back in Baddeck we finally made it to the Alexander Graham Bell Museum. What an amazing man and an amazing mind! The money he made from the telephone allowed him to continue his experiments into all kinds of things. He was especially interested in helping the deaf. He did lots of experiments relating to flight too and there is a reconstructed plane that he worked on with a group of similar minded men.

As we were leaving the museum we got talking to a woman who had just been delivering some little bottles of maple syrup to the museum shop. She told us all about her family’s maple syrup production process and gave us each a little bottle of maple syrup from her plantation down the road in Margaree. What lovely people the Nova Scotians are! The man we were talking to outside the pub offered to take us out in his boat this afternoon - because we had come so far. He’s trying to get in as much boating as he can before he has to pack it away for the winter. We declined that offer, however.

We both felt like a steak tonight but it wasn’t on offer at The Bell Buoy, so it was fish again. Coconut cream pie was on the dessert menu and it made me think of “Gilligan’s Island” so I had to try it. Nice, but I think once was enough.