Sydney to Baddeck

Yesterday's highlight actually came just before bedtime when we got a hold of Darren and Sue on Skype and got a look at our grandson, Justin. He sure is growing and maturing. Seems like forever since we saw him at Easter. We are sure looking forward to seeing him in July. Here is a picture Darren took earlier yesterday.



First stop today was the Miners' Museum in Glace Bay, just northeast of Sydney. They had a very interesting film about the labour conflict until 1925. Those miners had a tough life. The highlight, though, was a tour of a real mine. OK, it wasn't a real working mine. It was a mine that was specially dug for the museum in 1967. So it wasn't real extensive, but it was underground into a coal seam. In some places it was barely four feet high. That wasn't a problem for the school tour that came with us, but all the adults had to walk stooped over. Good thing they gave us hard hats. I knocked mine off against the ceiling twice. We had an excellent lunch there, splitting some seafood chowder and fish and chips. Then we were off to Baddeck.






In Baddeck, we took in the Alexander Graham Bell museum. Although it was very interesting, there wasn't much to take pictures of. It was a very pretty site with a park surrounding the museum. He came here once on vacation and liked it so much that he made it his summer home. It reminded him of his original home in Scotland. You can see why he liked it. It is a pretty little resort town in a pretty setting. One of the reasons Bell liked it was becasue it was cool here and he didn't like the heat. Could be warmer for me though. It was here that Bell and a group of associates engineered Canada's first powered flight in 1909. Because this is the 100th anniversary, there is an air show later this week. We were in the museum and heard the loud roar of a jet airplane flying low a couple of times. Finally, we went outside with a bunch of other patrons and observred an F18 practising his routine. That was an unexpected treat.








After the Bell museum we cruised around for quite a while half exploring and half searching for a place to stay. We finally settled on an old place right in the centre of town and checked in about 7. The attendant told us it was 150 years old and that Alexander Graham Bell had stayed there when he first came to Baddeck. (I bet they all say that!) It was very nicely updated and had a nice view of Bras d'Or lake - if you could look past the backs of the buildings in the foreground.








The desk person told us that the special in the restaurant was a lobster supper for $18.50. Although we were not very hungry, we decided after much debate that we just could not pass it up. What a great decision! Lobster, baked potato, cooked carrots, more cooked vegetables, and more than a dozen mussels (probably 18 - we didn't think to count in time). And it was all very well prepared. A great meal.







Since we weren't hungry in the first place, we really needed a walk when we were done. We explored the waterfront and found Alexander Graham Bell and his wife Mabel down there, so I joined them for a chat.







Weather was sunny today, but not particularly warm, a few degrees shy of 20.