We are really enjoying Halifax! I couldn't possibly begin to list all the things we have done and learned in the last couple of days (although, we have learned that a GPS does not help the following car if we get separated lol).
On our first night here, we got to our vacation home and found a grocery store for food for the six of us for the week. The house is perfect for us - it sleeps eight, has three separate bedrooms and an extra bed in the second living room, and has two bathrooms, a large kitchen, and a full laundry. I don't know that I'll ever stay in a hotel again with a vacation home as an alternative, this is so comfy. For a full week, it couldn't be better. We're also within walking distance of almost everything, but we did rent vehicles for our day trips, and for days when it's pelting rain, like today.
On the first day, Adelle was up bright and early for her dialysis in Dartmouth and the Quintins and remaining Andersons spent the morning at the Halifax Citadel. What an amazing place! We learned mostly about it's defensive capabilities - it's an eight pointed star rather than a rectangle, so that the walls are harder to breach, and so that the guns point in all directions (no blind spots). Sneakily, they left a deliberate gap to lure attackers in....but had seven cannons hidden on the third floor of the barracks house trained directly on the gap. Such a neat place!
In the afternoon, we found our way to Pier 21, Canada's Immigration Museum. While it wasn't really exciting for the kids, the movie was very powerful and showed them how different people with different reasons for coming to Canada would have found their journey and their experience. I found it very emotional - not only did Pier 21 welcome immigrants, but it also said farewell to WWII soldiers, and welcomed them home, along with refugees and war brides.
In the evening we decided to splurge on a supper out and the kids tried lobster. It's still in our fridge :) While we were sitting on the patio, the fog rolled in like a carpet, and the day went from sunny and warm to....100% fog. It was impressive to watch.
Today we had a quiet morning in the house. When we finally had eaten enough pancakes, hashbrowns and bacon, we tore off across the harbour in a deluge to get to the Bedford Institute of Oceanography for a guided tour. They need more signs, because man, it was hard to see where to go! We finally found a nice person who opened one of the several locked doors we tried, and she led us to the main entrance (never would have found it). Our our started shortly and we were happy to discover we had a private tour, as the people we were tagging along on had had to come earlier! Serendipitous. We got to pick up lobster, crab, sea cucumbers, sea stars, oysters, and mussels; check out a pool of pollock, salmon, and a sturgeon, and see the experiment tanks full of enormous lobster. Very neat.
We came home and had a massive chicken supper before we set out for the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic. That's a place I might have to spend a bit more time at before we go - we didn't get a chance to see the Titanic exhibits at all, but we saw an amazing video about the Halifax explosion. We had no idea. When we were in the gift shop, the clerk told us her grandma lived four hours away and all the glass in their house shattered; another man told us that his grandma lived four or five miles away, and the blast blew the front door up to the third floor. Also, there is a cannon from one ship that was blown two miles away - where it still sits. The anchor from the same ship, weighing half a ton, was blown 2.3 miles in the opposite direction. It was the biggest man-made explosion before Hiroshima and killed two thousand people.
After the museum closed, we wandered the boardwalk for quite some time, one family heading closer to a cruise ship, one heading the other direction to see it from a distance. It was so big, it dwarfed the island in the middle of the harbour that has a lighthouse.
It rained buckets today; tomorrow is supposed to be decent, so we are hoping to head for Peggy's Cove and Lunenburg, and hopefully Blomidon Provincial Park to see the Fundy tides. Should be a fun day! Please check the page at https://www.facebook.com/KidsTrekTravelClub for a photo album of the last couple days. Check back tomorrow night!
We are a group of home educators from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan who believe education happens as much outside the classroom as inside. We believe that to truly know Canada and foster positive relationships between provinces, we need to experience the country firsthand. Please join us in learning about our country through our experiences - maybe we can inspire you to take a similar journey with us! We will be planning a new Canadian journey each year and you can join in!
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