Wednesday, May 8, 2019

St. ANDREWS, NEW BRUNSWICK.

Day 12 – You’d think we flew to Europe or something; one hour’s time change & we’re all confused. We thought we went to bed early but it was really late & now I thought we were up early & it’s not early. When we get to Newfoundland & Labrador, I think the time changes again. It was 37 degrees this morning, whatever time it was when we got up, windy (which made it feel much colder) and sunny. It rained much of the night.

All day it was crisp & clear, so sunny; it didn’t look cold until we stepped out the door. Quite windy, it remained in the upper 30’s for most of the morning. At 11:30 we left to go into St. Andrews to the health store for fresh, organic produce. On our way out of the campground, we stopped to see if their machines were fixed so that we could pay for our stay.  It was $150, Canadian currency, for the three nights, full hook-ups, right on the water. Not too shabby! On the way to the store, we drove several small streets looking at the homes. The town is quaint and very well-maintained. It’s a very popular seaside resort in the summer with its narrow streets, colorful houses & shops, inns, B&Bs, historic sites, parks & gardens. Some of the houses are more than a hundred years old.

The campground takes up the entire end of the peninsula with water views on three sides. Tides cycle every 12 hours & 25 minutes, going from low to high tide and back to low again. What goes around, comes around. This area is part of the famed Bay of Fundy. Our land is, too.  It appears to be even more dramatic here. (They have bus tours that stop near the campground to let people “walk on the ocean floor” at low tide.) There are benches all along the waterfront for people to sit and relax, viewing the scenery. Below are low tide pictures & high tide pictures from in front of our campsite.

Click any picture below to see a slideshow.

St. Andrews is the same way with balconies and porches at restaurants for outside dining over the Bay. People are out & about, walking the street, riding bikes, and with this beautiful, sunny day, cold or not, the town was happily bustling. Summer must be soooooo crowded with the narrow streets, parking on both sides, plus the bike riders.  We can’t imagine that. Many boat tours, whale watches, etc. leave from here. Some of the whale watches are in Zodiac rafts. Rob and I did that many years ago out of Nova Scotia. It was totally awesome!

At the health store, we browsed & were impressed what a nice, well-stocked store it was for a small town. But when I asked about fresh produce, the woman working patted my arm and said, honey, we don’t have produce yet this early in the year, maybe in a month. Ohhh, I said.

We needed lettuce and tomatoes for our sandwiches. We were also looking for some map books of Atlantic Canada and/or the individual provinces of Atlantic Canada. I’d called book stores in St. Stephens, St. John, and St. Andrews and nobody carried them. These stores were, for the most part, used book stores or rare book stores. Antiques are big here. Visitor’s Centers weren’t opening until later in May. But one super-nice lady suggested they might be carried at the larger gas stations that had stores which served travelers. Wow, what a smart lady. An excellent idea.

No super gas stations stores or super-big supermarkets in St. Andrews, we drove back to St. Stephens about ½ hour from here (where we crossed the border from Maine into Canada). A bigger city and less touristy than St. Andrews, they had what we needed. We stopped at the large Irving gas station and went inside the store. There was a whole section of maps and road atlas books. YAAAA. Thank you super-nice lady from St. John.

When we got back to the car, I was looking on the phone for where a grocery store was, and Rob was looking at our new street map of St. Stephens. There was a knock on my car window.  I rolled it down and a woman, noticing that we were obviously looking for something, asked if she could help us find anything. We must’ve looked like lost tourists. Hee hee. I guess so. NY plates, kayaks & bikes, and a Bernie 2016 bumper sticker on the car. Hee hee. We said yes, do you know where we can get any tomatoes? She laughed, and said you won’t find many fresh tomatoes this time of year but there are markets in St. John’s and you might find some tomatoes there. I mean, how nice was that?! (St. John’s is about 1 to 1 ½ hours from St. Stephens.)

We drove down King Street looking for a decent-sized grocery store. The phone had advertised the Atlantic Superstore. We found it. It was a large supermarket, plus. Like a U.S. Walmart Superstore. The supermarket, while not a health store carrying all things organic, had some tomatoes grown in Canada and some lettuce. YAAA, again. We drove back to St. Andrews via a smaller highway, more along the water. Very lovely. Nice towns. Back at the RV, we were starving and made a late lunch. Then we took a nap. The girls are loving all this nap time!

The high today was 52 degrees and it remained sunny and windy. Right now we have two  Pumpkin Chocolate Chip loaves baking in the oven, and it smells amazingly good in here.