Bay of Fundy and the Joggins Fossil Cliffs

So we left the Hopewell Rocks and headed north, through Moncton, where we didn't stop. RJH had to live there for a year, and it remains on his list of least favorite places, though he confessed he may be biased. We stopped briefly in Sackville, where I had to photograph the ladies' room sign for my stickmen-in-peril series. The men's room figure did not show any such signs of desperation, so it was a pretty funny comment on gender (& bladder size/propensity to stop driving to let the other person use the facilities, etc.). We stopped again for ice cream, which was good, though served by the world's least enthusiastic ice cream scooper. "I hate ice cream," she said, "and it's nothing by ice cream, all summer. I do like popsicles though." After the 2 minute tour of Mount Allison University, we went across to Nova Scotia and headed for Joggins.

We had read about the fossils, but were unsure of what to expect. It was almost 4 pm and we were worried about paying admission, closing time, and high tide, at this UNESCO World Heritage Site (for those keeping score, this was number four, after Peggy's Cove, Lunenberg, and the Hopewell Rocks). When we got there however, we found that there was no admission fee unless you go to the museum and we were free to explore on our own as long as we want, though we were given some stern advice about the tides as this is also on the Bay of Fundy. Incredibly, the museum at this amazing site -a site instrumental to Charles Lyell's thinking and hence to his friend Darwin's Theory of Evolution - receives no Provincial or Federal funding. RJH pointed out that there's really nothing stopping anyone from walking off with large pieces of fossilized Carboniferous (359 to 299 Million Years Ago) trees! I do think Canada should protect this place; it is part of World Heritage.

Actually, based on this stickman in peril panel, the warnings about walking the shoreline could have been more severe. In hindsight, we were too close to the cliffs, in an effort to avoid the rising tide. I started seeing fossils as soon as we got to the beach. Generally I use the geologist's trick of photographing rocks with something (a dime with the Bluenose, as this is Nova Scotia) for scale. It was very easy to pick out the coal stream in the cliff face strata. Click on any photo to see a larger version, or the full photo stream (where there are more fossils).






See! It's a tropical tree. Right there. Nothing for scale - it was regular tree-trunk size.













By the time we finished our walk, the museum was closed. Since we were concerned how far we could get before we would need a hotel for the night, we did not follow the coast along the Bay, but cut down to Parrsboro. We saw the coast from the highway and took a small road to the water, somewhere between Parrsboro and Economy. Because I'm silly I was highly amused by the town of 'Lower Economy'.





We spent the night in Truro (also on RJH's list of least favorite places), but we did manage to find a restaurant which wasn't serving fast food. I'm glad to report we never resorted to McLobster.

Bay of Fundy and the Hopewell Rocks

After a hardy breakfast in Sussex, we headed for the Bay of Fundy National Park. Ignoring Audrey the Annoying GPS Receiver's commands to continue to Moncton, we instead followed the road signs to the park, along a road she deemed 'unpaved'. It was paved, just poorly with plenty of badly patched bits. It was rather surprising that this was the official road to a National Park and UNESCO World Heritage Site (for those keeping score, this was UNESCO World Heritage Site number 3, after Peggy's Cove and Lunenberg... though it's more impressive when the Bluenose is around). Amusingly there was a big road sign about what Irving Forestry was doing for the environment; obviously, re-paving roads destroyed by logging trucks was not on the agenda. This being New Brunswick, if you tell the lady in the booth that you intend to drive straight through the National Park, they don't charge you at the gate.



We did see the industrious beaver, building by the side of the road.



Due to the immense tide there are large tidal flats, and all the boats in Alma appear to have run aground at low tide.



There appears to be a rule: if you go to New Brunswick, you must visit one covered bridge.



This really says we get 8 feet of snow here and do not wish to fall in the river and die.

When we got to the Hopewell Rocks it was still near low tide so we were able to explore a bit in the brilliant sunshine. I got sun burnt, but it was something to see. The wet sand was muddy and slippery, as was the seaweed. Wellington boots would have been a better choice of foot ware. The so-called 'flowerpot rocks' - bit rocks topped with trees, perched on small tidally eroded stems, were impressive.





I was collecting the 'stickmen in peril' signs on this trip.




The bird, according to the park ranger, is a peregrin falcon parent whose eggs hatched 11 days prior. It was certainly in a rush. We tried to get more shots of it, or its partner, flying. Then we went back up the cliff, washed off the mud at the convenient shoe-cleaning station, and went to see the nest from the lookout. You can see the falcon and baby falcons if you look carefully.



(There are more photos on my photostream.)