July 22

Monday, July 22, 2013

An eventful day exploring the Cabot trail.

We woke up pretty early and had those delicious cinnamon buns again.  Nicolas ate

the largest breakfast ever. He likes breakfast food more than any other type.  We

then set out for the Cabot trail, passing though Mabou and Inverness, places we

liked so much.  The drive was rather promising, with sweeping ocean and mountain

vistas; kids were not screaming at each other the whole time, which is always a

bonus.  Nicolas found a poster with Dan the ranger on it in the Cabot trail info

center—everyone was excited. The Cabot trail itself lived up to the expectations;

similar to Acadia, but longer and with steeper hills.  Hope my car will make it

through.  Some of the mountains I had to traverse on the first gear.  At least I did not

have to run in front of the car.

Our first stop was the Skyline trail, about 5 milometers.  The ranger at the entrance

had an exhibition devoted to moose, I took a bunch of pictures with antlers.  Sasha

loved the moose poop made out of plastic; the ranger showed her the real moose

poop, too—it was laying nearby, since they have so many moose in the park.  The

trail was very beautiful, culminating with a boardwalk leading to the ledges above

the ocean cliffs.  On the way back, I walked with Sasha as usual, and made up a great

story to her about a girl named Bunny who had two long front teeth.  As we went

along, we saw a huge grasshopper; Sasha taught it to jump very high (she stepped

on it and it freaked out).  Then we bumped into Anna and Nick who were standing

on the trail, all excited.  A huge moose was right next to them.   At one point, it went

right past Nicolas, maybe two feet away.  Then I noticed another moose, with huge

antlers.  Definitely lots of fun.

From Skyline, we drove to Pleasant Bay and bought tickets for the Zodiak boat  to

see the whales.  What a crazy experience! The Zodiak went 27 knots per whatever,

bouncing through the waves really fast—kids liked the ride more than whales.  We

were the only people on the tour, so it was easy to see what we wanted.   At one

point, the whales surrounded us and one guy started swimming upside down and

splashing the water with his tails.  It was really funny.  We then rode towards the

seal and saw the beautiful coastline.

From there, we drove to the Meat Cove Campground, which had rave reviews from

campers.  It took us forever to get there, but it was totally worth it.  We pitched

the tent on the slope leading down to the cliff, with a beautiful bay below us.  The

scenery was simply amazing.  At some point, a pod of whales swam in a distance,

and we could watch them right from our campsite, while drinking local wine. Out of

this world experience.

End of the day odometer: 1243.3