Digby, Nova Scotia

On Monday we left Truro and headed west along the northern coastline of Nova Scotia to a little town called Digby. 

You can find it on the map in the upper leftr hand corner.  Their claim to fame is “Digby Scallops.” 

Digby, with a population of 2,092, overlooks the picturesque Annapolis Basin.  The main industries of the area are fishing and tourism.

The Town of Digby has been an active fishing community throughout the years and is famous for the delicious scallops harvested from the local waters. With a waterfront location on the shores of the Annapolis Basin, the area offers clear, crisp air and, of course, spectacular viewing of the incredible tides (27ft. to 32 ft.) in the harbor (sorry, there is that word tide again!).

We came here primarily for two reasons:  1) scallops, of course, and, 2) whale watching.  On Monday night we walked into town from our CG and found a nice restaurant that had an outdoor dining area that overlooked the bay.  We had scallops and they were delicious.

We took a 20 minute walk along a trail into town and all along the way we saw these flowers?plants?  We picked some at various stages of growth and put them in a vase.

On Tuesday we drove further west to Freeport, NS for some whale watching.   If you look at the map again, you can see Freeport almost at the tip of that thin peninsula to the left of Digby.

We had to cross one inet to get to the island where Freeport is located. 

Cost was $5.50 to go over and nothing to come back.

We found Freeport and found our tour boat.

We had about an hour to wait so we had some lunch at the restaurant where you buy your whale-watching tickets.  We each had a small bowl of haddock and scallop chowder.  The fish bits were so big that they stuck out of the chowder.  And was it ever delicious!!

At 1 PM our boat left and we headed out into the Bay of Fundy.

It took about 45 to get out to the first place they expected to find whales, but, unfortunately, there were not there.  So we headed further out to another location.  And here we were not disappointed.  A mother humpback whale and her baby were seen in the water.  

We must have followed them for over an hour.  They would go under and then come back up.  They even went under our boat.  The baby would roll over and slap it's fins in the water.  At one point it was so close that a few people on the boat got wet!

The guide said that they are as curious about us as we are about them. 

 Unfortunately, it came time to leave and we headed back.  About half way back the captain spotted something in the water ahead of us, so he slowed down until we got along side. 

SHARK!!!

We watched it (actually mostly just the fin!) for a few minutes and then it turned and went under the boat.  We got a good look at it – the captain said it looked like a maco shark but that in his 21 years of whale watching, he had never seen on this big!

We had planned to leave today (Wednesday) but realized that our batteries in the trailer need to be replaced.  There is a Interstate dealer here in Digby but he only has one on hand.  So we are waiting until tomorrow when he gets another one.  Our current batteries are original (5 ½ years old) and it's time to replace.

So, tomorrow, after we get the batteries, we will be headed around the western edge of Nova Scotia to a town called Shelburne for one night and then on to Lunenburg for the weekend and then on to Halifax after that.