Tuesday August 21, 2018

I woke up early Tuesday morning, and stepped out on our deck to be greeted by the rising morning sun! What a way to start the day!

Awhile later I was greeted by the lady next door who offered a bright smile

 and hearty "Good Morning!"

We got an early start down the road, and stopped for breakfast at a little neighborhood restaurant. The owner was helping to serve because it was a hoppin' place this morning. He appeared to be a man about our age, so we were a bit surprised when he told us that his dad had just baked some fresh orange cranberry muffins! We had to try them.  And they were the BEST!!

 Marie and I each got an extra one to go!

We crossed the border into Canada at St. Stevens, 

which was decorated with these lovely hanging baskets, and headed East on Route 1.

It was another gorgeous day for driving!

In St. John we came to the Reversing Falls. The tides in the Bay of Fundy are so strong that when the tide comes in it pushes the river back upstream, creating a tug-of-war with the river, causing it to flow backwards. This causes rapids to form, peaking at high tide.  This happens twice a day.

The tide was out when we were there so we did not have the opportunity to see it . We are hoping to catch it when we come back through St. John on our way homeward.

 Here we are at one of the Falls viewing decks. We were watching some younger folks go zip lining across the river. Some of us thought it looked like fun!  But as we talked about it and contemplated it, we decided it might make our aches and pains worse! So we decided to only watch!

 This is the St. John River as it flows toward the Bay of Fundy.

 This is the place where the tide pushes through the gorge, confronting the river as the tide rises, .

 Today we saw quite a few of these signs. 

However, much to our disappointment, we saw no moose except these.

 As we drove, all the churches we passed were white.

  This pretty one was trimmed in black.

 After we left St. John we drove across scenic Route 111 to a charming village called St. Martin.

It is known for it's Sea Caves, but before we arrived there, we had to explore he village. 

It was small so didn't take too long!😌

St. Martin is a very colorful little village. It is easy to know what the important occupation is!
The tide is out!

 This lighthouse replica hosts a tiny visitors center.

 The two flights of stairs to get to the top were almost straight up!  But we made it!  We were instructed to come down backwards, but really we had no choice, as it was the only way to do it!

 From the top we had a good view of the covered bridge, through which a path led to a viewing spot where one could  watch the tide come in.

 Also in this cute village was a coffee shop where we got coffee and  a few pastries to share.

The blueberry scone and ginger cookie tasted great with coffee!

And then we had another guest take this colorful picture of us colorful ladies in this colorful village! 

On to the sea caves!

 This is the premier attraction at St. Martins.When the tide is out, as it was when we were there, you can walk on the ocean floor, out into the caves.  When the tide rises, the caves and caverns are filled with water.The tidal range can be up to 38 feet. 

We had fun playing with our shadows!

We didn't actually walk into the caves, 

as the one stream that we needed to cross was a bit too wide for us. 

None of us wanted to get our feet wet, or worse yet, fall on the rocks!

We thought this looked like a fossilized dinosaur egg!😁

 We hung out there across from the cave entrances for a bit, enjoying the sight, then slowly made our way back to the car.  It was a real good work-out for our legs, after sitting in the car for so long!

 Our Creator painted such a lovely sky for our enjoyment today!!

 We drove further past St. Martins, hoping to drive the Fundy 

Trail, but when we got to the entrance of the National Park, we learned that the drive would take longer than we had time for.  We had no reservations for tonight, and no cell phone service to make reservations, so we turned around and retraced our steps through St. Martins back to Route 1. When we got into cell phone service again, we pulled off the road to find lodging for tonight. And we could hardly believe it that we again kept getting the same response to our calls. 

"We are full for tonight." FINALLY we found rooms in Moncton at Howard Johnsons!

On the way there we ate at Mavericks Steak House.

 Fancy food, with a fancy price!  Rib-eye steak and steak tips fajitas. Tasty!

 When we arrived, the outside of the Howard Johnsons looked rather unkempt. However, the rooms were nice, clean and comfortable, although not updated, 

However, having been afraid of needing to  sleep in the car, they looked rather inviting!

The evening was almost gone, but with the waking hours that I had left, I wanted to  work on my blog. However, the wi-fi was so poor that the pictures would not download.  So around 8:30 I loaded up my computer and camera and headed down the street about a block to Tim Hortons where I knew I would have strong coverage. The pics downloaded OK but then my computer was giving me trouble, which was very frustrating.  Also, after not blogging for a year, I forgot how to do it efficiently, and had to re-learn that part. So I was there for 3 hours and had not gotten a whole lot accomplished!

Needless to say, I was tired and frustrated!  So I drove back to our motel, only to find my parking place outside our room was taken, so I needed to park farther away. AND as I was trying to find a place to park, I saw a young man looking in another guests windows!  I had encountered a peeping tom! When he saw that I had seen him, he non-chalantly sauntered out to the sidewalk. I was NOT going to get out of my car then, so I drove away and came back, only to find him in front of the same wiindow, looking in through the crack in the curtains. I drove around the block and came back the third time, to find him doing it again! But this time he got into his car and sped off down the street.  So I Parked the car, grabbed my stuff and walked as fast as possible to our room.  I was so nervous I could not get the door opened with my key!!  But Margie was still awake and came to my rescue! I was thanking the Lord I was safe, but didn't stop shaking for a long time! I had a short night of sleep!