Trek The Planet

Our final day on the Cabot Trail in Cape Breton Highlands National Park. Last night we stayed at Corney Brook again. We woke to heavy clouds and stormy seas. Cooler temperatures and the heavy crashing waves keep us out if the water this morning but we watched the seals play as we are oatmeal and drank hot tea. As we were finishing breakfast we noticed dark areas in the water moving towards us from the horizon and rushed to break camp before the rain hit us. Rather than face the Cabot trail in the rain again we decided to head south out of the rain, towards Halifax. We had a lot of miles to put on to get to Yarmouth for the ferry tomorrow. We did take our time to take in the beautiful sights and stopped for lunch at a cute little sandwich shop near the historic village and a quick dinner (and ice cream!) at a seaside seafood counter in Port Mouton. We settled into the Rodd Grand Yarmouth hotel for our first hot showers in a few days and a soft bed. Tomorrow we head home! ...

(Abby Writing…) We saw seals this morning as we ate our oatmeal in our campsite. They kept bobbing up their silky heads and swimming about! How fun! We took a dip in the ocean and floated in the crashing waves. The beach is covered in smooth rocks but even smooth rocks are hard when you crash into them!! Somehow the water in the gulf of St. Lawrence seems warmer than the coast of Maine but that doesn’t really seem possible. There is a freshwater stream outlet near the campsite however, and that is frigid! It’s great though to rinse off the salty sea. After our refreshing swim, we read books, watched the sea, and ate pancakes (lunch—not double breakfast). As we packed up the kayaks to venture out...it started to POUR! It was a foggy, viewless drive on Cabot Trail. When we found cell signal we booked the Cat home and accommodation in Yarmouth. Then guess what? The skies cleared!!!! We found a spot to launch into South Harbor and spent a couple hours paddling about. I was struck by ...

To start the day we made some oatmeal at the campsite and finished off the raspberries. We broke camp quickly and headed into Cape Breton Highlands National Park. The park costs $7.30 CAD per person per day. We made our way to Corney Brook campsite and had a good choice of sites. We have a great view of the beach and ocean. The sites are a little tight and open. Once camp was set and we had eaten some lunch we headed off to do a hike, Skyline trail. The trail was very well maintained and had boardwalk installed to help re-establish the fragile ecosystem on the top of the hills. We also went through a moose exclosure, a fenced off area to keep moose out while the saplings take hold. Next we walked around a bog (fen) trail that had a nature tour and then back to camp to hop in the ocean and then the very end of Corney Brook as it freed into the ocean to clean off the salt. The ocean was fairly warm and the brook was very cold! Next we were back into the sun to warm up again and re...

We had a great sleep at The Library Inn to catch up from a long day yesterday. Breakfast at the inn was great with fresh fruit and eggs. We finally got on the road around 10 and continued our pursuit of lighthouse in the island with the Eastern and southern shore. At one point we stopped along the side of the road and twice had people stop to check if we were broken down. The second was an old guy in a lawnmower on his way to mow the field around the old one room school. We talked to him for half an hour about life. We had a wonderful lunch of delicious wraps at Red's food truck in Montague. If you get the chance, don't miss it. We hurried to catch the ferry from Woods Island to Caribou. The ferry was great and we got to relax and enjoy Cow Ice Cream on the way. We reprised my previous trip here by making our wayto Inverness Beach Village to camp and back to Coal Miners Cafe for dinner. A local guy came by selling berries to campers so we bought a box of raspberries for bre...

Wanting to see as much of Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia as possible, we decided to bite the bullet and drive all the way to PEI on the first day. The day started out kinda rainy in Maine but by the time we got to the Canadian border iti was sunny and hot. We  saw some great lighthouse in the perfect evening light and found a roadside stand for some fish and chips that really hit the spot for dinner. We are staying at The Library Inn in Souris which is really cute with lots of books in the room. We're looking forward to seeing the town in daylight tomorrow.

A couple months back I had the chance to volunteer with Bridges , a program that helps build basic infrastructure in impoverished areas in Lima. I learned that people who don't have other places to go set up makeshift homes in the hilly outskirts of Lima. These makeshift communities offer a very hard life, even access to clean water means carrying water on foot from further down the hills as water delivery can't make it up to where these communities have sprung up without better roads. Without basic infrastructure the social programs that aim to help with community development don't apply. It's a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation, until the community qualifies as a legitimate community the help to make living conditions better are not available. This is where the Bridges program comes in. From building stairs to make access to hillsides better and improving dirt paths into navigable roads they help set up the basics to get the makeshift communities qualified as ...