Monday 15 June 2009

coal mine and cabot trail

miners museum

abbie our tour guide

bronte in his miners gear

looking out towards the ocean direction

some old mining equipment

cabot trail

fog through the mountains

ferry ride

views on cabot trail

more of the view on route

Saturday 13th June
Today we had decided that we would go to Glace Bay which was only about 20 kms from Sydney and do a coal mine tour. Glace Bay and the Breton Island is world famous for its coal mines which are mined out about 7 miles under the floor of the ocean. At the visitor centre/museum they had a replica mine where you could go down and have a look what it was like to be a miner in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. The tour was taken by a 72 year old ex miner who worked in the area before the mining stopped back in 2001.

The mine was actually dug out and the coal sold and money used to produce the tourist version of the mine. It was correct in all its dimensions but only went out just beyond the shore line. The tour was very interesting and enjoyable. After the tour we went back into the museum and finished off there before heading off. Next on our list for the day was to drive a scenic trail which went north to the top of Nova Scotia. This was their version of the Great Ocean Road if you like. It was called the Cabot Trail and on its own was about 300 km in length.

The drive was awesome, the scenery was magnificent and the views were incredible. We even had a ferry crossing at one point to get across one off the outlets of a river where it met the sea. This was at a place called English Town.

There was part of the drive at the northern tip where you crossed a mountain range to get to the western side. As it was getting closer to 5.00 pm and the day coming to a close the clouds had come in and we were driving through really thick fog. It was very cool to drive through but interrupted the view a bit. Once we got to the southern part of the route we turned off to a ‘back road’ to get us to New Glasgow which is where we were headed. This was a back road to say the least, it was small, bumpy and not maintained. It was a nice drive though and we did enjoy it. Not too long and we hit the main road, this time joining up with the road that took us to Sydney the day before. We had to back track a bit to get on our way back to the USA. Stopped at a small place on the way for dinner and had A & W burgers, the girl who served us was good and asked us questions about where we were from and where had we been while on vacation.

We had booked accommodation in Stellarton which is a suburb of New Glasgow. The motel was the Holiday Inn and was brand new, had fantastic rooms, plasma TV and a water slide! We did have a great night sleep at this motel. We did need to though as we are planning to drive 700 kms tomorrow as we head to the state of Maine.

1 comment:

Peterboy said...

Hi Richard and Bronte
Your Pictures are great Have fun lots of love Dad and Ula

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