Last day in New Brunswick

We spent the morning organizing the last 12 days of our trip - deciding not to go any further into the Maritimes but rather start to work our way back to Ottawa. We've put on lots of miles and really don't want to add even more for the return trip. We are leaving our 'vacation rental' tomorrow morning and enjoyed having a home in Fredericton. We left town many of the days but didn't have to pack up in the morning or find a new place to stay for the night. A luxury. We've enjoyed New Brunswick but realized it is really best to visit here in the summer. Things are all but closed down (after next weekend, they all will be) and most highlights involve beaches and summer festivals. It looks like a really fun place to bring a family for a summer vacation.
Once organized, we headed out of town to King's Landing, a "Heritage Park-like" Loyalist settlement. It was applefest so there were apple-related activities to join in with. People in costume lived their parts - in the homes, the general store, the blacksmith's, the barns, etc. The blacksmith asked where Bill and I were from and wondered if we got there on Franklin's ship and if we knew where he was....

These lovely percherons still pull wagons every day and plows occasionally

The houses were picked up and brought here from the valley before the dam was built

The St John River is now a dam behind the settlement

Magnetic Hill - something to write home about?

End of the day and we had to go a ways out of our way to get to Moncton but how could you resist the lure of Magnetic Hill?? The fact that we were late (in the day or year) meant the toll booth was closed - and there were no cars in the lineup that looked like the many-laned line-up at the ferries.
To have to pay as well as line up in the fourth or fifth lane for the thrill of this adventure.... well, needless to say, we were glad we could skip that part.
So what you can see here is the road we just coasted up (down?) in neutral. You get to the bottom (top?) and put your car in neutral. It just starts to move and actually picks up a bit of speed before getting to the top (bottom).

Hopewell Cove and Shediac

Shediac - Lobster Capital of the world.....

We headed out early yesterday to catch the low tide in Hopewell Cove on the Bay of Fundy - a couple of hours from here. We timed it perfectly and rushed down hill to the lookout before heading down to the bottom of the bay to join an hour-long tour. The guide was fabulous and filled us with facts and stories. Did you know that the amount of water that rushes into the Bay of Fundy in one tide change is the same as the total amount of water falling over Niagara Falls for one year and seven months!!
There is no slack tide. By the time the water hits the end of the Bay, the ocean is pulling it back out and by the time it reaches the ocean, the tide is pushing it back in. We were two days late for the super moon's total effect so the tide change today was a paltry 1.0 foot to 46.3 feet!
While waiting for the tide to come back in after walking on the floor of the bay, we drove up the coast to Shediac for lunch. Bill had a lobster and I had a wonderful seafood chowder.
Then back to Hopewell Cove Provincial park for another tour (from the lookout - much shorter!)
Drove back through the interior of New Brunswick where the trees are in full colour! A confirmation that we are going to get our fill before we leave.

Low Tide

High tide

More tomorrow....

Had a wonderful and full day - Hopewell Cove to watch the huge tide change in Bay of Fundy, lobster lunch, magnetic hill. Back to Fredericton and tired. Pictures, etc. tomorrow

Mactaquak pictures

Amazing, rectangular holes left by pileated woodpeckers. Holes are about  3"x4" What kind of giant bugs were they finding? They were throughout the forest. 

New beaver home

New dam location

Old beaver home - not nearly as spacious as the new digs

Original Dam. Dead trees in middle from flooding. This will all eventually turn back into meadow

Well dam, that was a good day!

After 24 hours of record rainfall in Fredericton we woke up to clouds but no rain so decided to head out to Mactaquak Provincial Park.  We weren't sure what the trails would be like but we had been encouraged to see the beaver ponds and this was our chance.

The park was designed to help soften the blow of the flooding of the valley and displacement of several thousand residents with the building of the Mactaquak Dam in 1968. We crossed the dam which provides 20% of New Brunswick's power and only read later that there is a problem with "expanding concrete" and the original 100-year life of the dam has been downgraded by 40 years. (So, 68+60=...) Politicians are currently having to make an unhappy choice: replacement, repairing while downgrading the power component, or returning the river to pre-dam state. Each of the three will cost a minimum of $2 billion.

So, we went to the experts. The original beaver pond had also run into issues. The pesky little rodents had eaten the bark off all their favourite poplar and beech trees in the area so abandoned the dam in 1985 and moved upstream. We ran into a local (human!) just after arriving and were told that the newer dam is the biggest in the world (Not!) I think he said that one of the beavers was too (possibly?) He gave us valuable advice about how to navigate the pathways - much damage and flooding of trails has happened in the last 24 hours. This along with horrible damage inflicted by Hurricane Arthur in 2012 that they are still trying to repair must be so discouraging.
But we had the most heavenly walk - went about 5K as we sought out the BBDITW. We eventually found the larger ponds with a giant beaver house in the middle. No sign of tail smackers but some clear evidence of their chewing. It was great.

Mactaquak Dam on the Saint John River

The biggest? What do you think?  We didn't actually see this guy but figure if the NB's can brag about the biggest, best, highest,  etc, we can fudge our story too!

With weather like this, it must be the maritimes

So a rainfall warning is covering New Brunswick. We knew it was coming so planned indoor attractions for today. We were soaked every time we ran from car to building, and at home, watched the pools of water collect on the golf course - seagulls and ducks have taken over the entire 13th hole!!

We had an interesting tour of the NB Legislature. We've read and heard different stories about how Fredericton was chosen as capital - political maneuvering seems to have entered into it but the politically correct version is that its position away from the coast made it safe from attack from the Americans who were very much a threat at that time. Saint John was the obvious choice for every other reason but the naming the city after the King's second son might have also worked in Fredericton's favour....

I then walked across the street to the Lord Beaverbrook Art Gallery for an hour or so while Bill had coffee in the neighbouring restaurant (favourite of the Members of the legislature we were told).

Our landlady just texted us and hoped we hadn't lost power.... The rain is expected to carry on until early morning and there is a wind now too. But Fredericton is used to being flooded. We've seen many pictures showing people travelling down streets in their boats in past floods. And that doesn't compare to the stories about Hurricane Arthur (2014) that knocked down centuries old elm trees and explains the blow-down we noticed in Odell Park the other day.  A woman in a small store told me about the snow that has been so high the last few years she had to keep raising her OPEN sign from the window sill to the middle to the top of the display window to keep it above the drifts outside. They are a brave lot these Maritimers.

Legislature - renovated to reflect original Victorian decoration

Central staircase built of cherry wood with no supports

One of two crystal chandeliers - fell while being cleaned, it took two years to find replacement crystals.