Newfoundland - not quite there...made it.

 Having left the Walmart parking at New Glasgow, NS, we made the 230km trip to the KOA campground just 22km west of North Sydney ferry terminal.

Of course the drive meant crossing onto Cape Breton which some people seem to hold that  it is a separate province, if not country, from Nova Scotia! As we crossed the Canso Causeway stopped in at the Nova Scotia Cape Breton welcome centre fro where we had a good view over the Strait of Canso, or at least, some of it.

 

 

View of the site from across the narrow inlet

Views of the inlet and bridge from our site.

Our site was high up on a hill with quite a tight turn to reverse into the site. If the procedure was misjudged it could have seen us tumbling over the ledge and down the steep embankment!

We were only at the KOA site for two nights so we naturally wanted to make the most of the only full day we had in this area. 

So it was that we headed off towards Glace Bay where we collected some pebbles to bring home and decorate as momentoes. We then headed further south to Port Morien Cliffs Municipal Park where we found a sandy beach though we stayed halfway down the steps to the beach from the road and made use of the chairs. Spent 45 minutes or so watching a few small fishing boats come into the small harbour.

 

.....but we were not the only ones there.....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Port Merion we continued down route 255 to Port Mira. Here there was a much larger, sandy beach and there were even life guards posted. I did go for a paddle but it was too cold for me to swim properly, I'm used to an indoor pool! Mainly we simply enjoyed the view including more small boats entering one of the countless inlets along this coast.

 

After a couple of hours at the beach we started making our way back to the campground but stopped in Sydney to see what was there.

Before getting back to the campground we stopped at a roadside food truck for fish and chips....yum! It was in a parking lot adjacent to Brogan's Seafood on route 305, on the coast.

The next morning we were up at 7am and away from the KOA site by 8.40. We arrived at the ferry terminal and 9am where we waited patiently in the car in the pouring rain until we could board. The car and trailer were measured by Marine Atlantic at 38 feet though I had booked 40 foot and actually measured the length as 39 foot 4 inches. Once boarded, we headed up to the passenger deck and got settled in for the crossing. It rained pretty much all the way across as well as being very misty though the sea itself was calm. We disembarked from the ferry at 6.45pm (Newfoundland time), arrived at J.T. Cheeseman Provincial Park by 7pm and set up in heavy rain. Welcome to Newfoundland!