June 26 (day 49) to July 1 (day 54) – Cape Breton: history and music

We headed directly from the North Sydney ferry terminal to visit the Fortress Louisbourg National Historic Site.  The fortress was a major French fishing port and strongly defended fortress from 1713 to 1758 when the British defeated the French here and destroyed the fortress.  A large portion of the fortress and community have been reconstructed and is now the site of an outstanding living history exhibit.  It’s the largest historic reconstruction in North America, and the interpreters – actors dressed in period costumes – bring the history of this significant French post to life.  We were treated to French hot chocolate and an 18^th century dinner, a real treat. This is a Parks Canada historic site and the quality of the interpretation was every bit as impressive as Colonial Williamsburg in my view.  It’s a must-see site on Cape Breton for visitors.  We picked an RV park at random and should have moved on when we saw the rusted pickups, relatively poor maintenance and heard banjo music coming from some kid on the porch, but stayed for one night anyway.  Despite our initial impressions a local emerged from his trailer to help us get the coach into our site and was enthralled to watch us disconnect our GMC before reminding us that he was there whatever we needed.  That’s the same hospitality we found in Newfoundland. 

Fortress Lousiburg National Historic Site

From there we headed to one of our favorite campgrounds in this area, the Baddeck Cabot Trail campground for the first of many evenings of live music.  Three campers who formerly had a band together offered up three hours of terrific music at a small stage right in the campground - most enjoyable.  Coming back a few days early from Newfoundland and arriving in Cape Breton we stumbled into their second annual KitchenFest – an 8 day festival of local music and food with live music every day in many venues throughout the cape along with restaurants showcasing dishes from local food sources.  The fest is organized by St. Anne’s Gaelic College dedicated to the reawakening and preservation of the Gaelic culture and we attended the opening concert there, as well as a couple of KitchenFest concerts along the western coast as we slowly made our way south – one at ‘The Red Shoe Pub’ in Mabou, NS which is famous for traditional Cape Breton music, and one at the Celtic Music Interpretive Center in Judique, NS.  The talent and music we’ve seen has been outstanding.  We are always impressed with the Maritime culture that opens their hearts to visitors.  

Another wonderful KitchenFest concert

We made friends with our waitress Marissa at The Red Shoe Pub who told us her boyfriend was a lobster fisherman near where we were camped at Port Hood and encouraged us to go see him when he came into port from checking his traps the next morning.  We met her friend Craig at dockside and asked about buying some lobster.  He opened a crate fresh off his boat and said pick out what you want.  We boxed a few and asked how much we owed him – not a cent was his reply.  Here was a fisherman who made his living depending on what his traps brought in and he just ponied up our pick and he wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.  What a joy these folks are!  Back to the RV park where they had a loaner lobster pot and we were headed for some mighty fine eating!

Chaco meets her first lobster

Ready for another walk!

It’s Canada day (July 1^st) and we’re now camped in Canso, NS where we’ll attend the Stan Rogers Folk Music Festival this coming weekend.  We look forward to more wonderful immersion in acoustic music, beginning with the informal jams that have already started a few RVs away from us.  Sweet!