Terri and Peter's RV Adventures

If you ever want to go to England in an RV, come to New Brunswick in late May! It continues to be cold (in the 40’s), foggy or cloudy and alternating between a steady light rain and drizzle. We decided to just dress right and get out in it, which we did today. The good news about being here before June is that no one else wants to camp in this weather (imagine that!), so our campground emptied out this morning and we are practically the only ones here. It’s about 5% occupied, if that. We have this whole “cul de sac” area to ourselves; no neighbors for several hundred yards on either side. Just trees, the salmon river and us.

We stopped by the information center and got some ideas to shape our time here. We aren’t feeling overly ambitious and yet want to explore the area. There was a small walk around a pond called “Medicine Lake” that has signage in English, French and the language of the First Nations tribe that lived here. The descriptions on the signs about the way they use plants for medicine was a collaborative effort with the First Nation tribe. It’s so refreshing to see how out front they are in recognizing the First Nations, that this was their land and their culture, language and traditions deserve recognition and celebration.

We returned to our trailer to watch the stirring service for our friend who shockingly died earlier this week. It was as close as we could get to being in our community during such a sad time and I’m glad we had Starlink and could join in at least virtually.

It was 3 pm and still drippy and grey but we rallied the troops (the dogs and ourselves) and drove 30 miles through lush green rolling hills and thick fringes of forest showcasing the wide range of expressions of green: from a pale, light green from new growth leaves to a rich, deep, dark pine green of the evergreens. Maybe it’s early in the season, but I saw few grazing animals and even fewer tilled soils so I’m not sure how this land is used. There’s a lot of it and aside from the occasional white clapboard, black trimmed window farm and country houses, our two lane country road took us along its winding, circuitous ribbony way, leading us for 30 miles to the “must see” Hopewell Rocks.

Hopewell Rocks is a cluster of curious formations shaped by the dramatic tides in this area. Bay of Fundy has one of the most extreme high and low tides in the world. We were able to get to Hopewell Rocks at low tide, allowing us to walk on the rocky bottom for a ground level look at the extremes of this place. The rock formations were massive and some looked straight out of Jurassic Park. It was good exercise and this excursion gave us an excuse to see more of the countryside. I could easily see All Creatures Great and Small (the Public Television version) being filmed here.

Returning to camp, we decided to play around with our camping reservation dates, maybe shaving off a few of the seven we’d planned, and going to Halifax, Nova Scotia for a day or two and then get closer to our ferry landing in North Sydney, Nova Scotia (Cape Breton Island) to avoid any stress of getting there on time for our Friday night sail. It’s nice to have options and even if we lose a little money, the cost of the Parks Canada sites are quite low and going to a good cause so we’d be ok with that. Keep you posted! In the meantime, it’s us in the middle of a cold, drippy but beautiful, quiet, wooded place in the wilds of New Brunswick!