Beaches, beeches

Okay, here we go. I have made a pledge to post at least once a week all summer. The theory is that if I get into the habit of posting regularly, it will become an actual habit.

Yesterday was the first day of summer, and although summer temperatures haven't quite come to New Brunswick yet, I figured I could try to conjure up some summer with a post about beaches. Because nothing says summer like "laying out" on a beach.  (The quotations are because laying out is grammatically incorrect, but it just sounds so much better than "lying out".)

So, my parents were just in town and we got to do some touring around the maritimes. And if there is anything the maritimes has in abundance, it is beaches! We went to beaches in both Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick.

Our first beach stop was in on the north shore of PEI, in the PEI National Park (map) or close to it. It was a cold and windy day, and right when we got to the beach, it started to rain. Definitely not beach weather. For some reason, I thought it was hilarious that it was JUNE and still so damn cold. I tried to take pictures of myself all bundled up, freezing to death on the beach IN JUNE to share with my American friends. Unfortunately, I am the world's worst self-portrait taker. I attribute this to my freakishly short, T-Rex-like arms. And the pictures weren't really capturing the freezing-ness of the situation.

Then my dad suggested that he just take the damn picture with his iPhone, which actually worked out quite well. You can definitely see how cold and dreary it was on the beach.

The beach itself was quite pretty, and I can imagine it would be delightful on a sunny day.

Two days later, however, we went to a different beach in New Brunswick, specifically Parlee Beach (map) in Shediac, and it was a glorious day!

Parlee Beach (previously coined the most un-fun beach) is on the Northumberland Strait, which boasts the "warmest waters north of the Carolinas" so Dad decided this was the place for him to have his first swim in the Atlantic Ocean.

Apparently, the brochures lied, and it was almost as cold as the Polar Bear Swim in the Pacific Ocean, so the "swim" was very brief due to the numbness of his feet.

I still have not swum in the Atlantic Ocean, but since I live here and could technically do it any time I want, I felt that there was no need for me to go in on this particular day. As I have been informed by a fellow Sackvillian, summer doesn't really come until the end of July. Maybe then it will be warm enough to actually justify going in the water.

Fire Hydrant Signs?

One of the first oddities I noticed when I came to Sackville to look for a house was that all of the fire hydrants have little fire hydrant signs beside them.

I had never seen this before, and I am not the sharpest tool in the shed sometimes, so it took me a while to figure out the purpose of the sign. To my credit, it wasn't like I was sitting there trying to figure it out; I just noticed that it was different and made some casual semi-conscious assumptions.

At first I assumed that it was because New Brunswick is bilingual and it makes more sense to just have a picture than to have words in French and English.
Then I thought maybe it had something to do with some sort of disability - like braille or something. (I repeat, I am not the sharpest tool in the shed.)
But then I thought, WAIT, why would you need a picture of a fire hydrant when the fire hydrant is right there in plain sight? This made no sense.
That is when, to my horror, I realized that at some point the snow was going to be so high that all the fire hydrants would be buried!!!! The sign is there so that firefighters can find the hydrants when they are covered in snow.

I am not going to make it through this winter if the snow is higher than fire hydrants.

Bay of Fundy, Take 2

New Brunswick is just so pretty. While Brad was visiting, we had the opportunity to go back to the Alma area and stay in an adorable cabin overlooking the Bay of Fundy.

Isn't it cute, y'all?

Jane, who owns Cleveland Place B&B also owns this gazebo/cabin, and let us take it over for the night.
 This is the view from the cabin. The first bit of water is actually a marsh, but beyond that is the Bay.

The first thing we did upon arriving was walk down to the beach. The tide was out (but on it's way back in as we quickly discovered) and we were able to walk out quite far. The boys loved it - and so did Nova. She ran around like a crazed animal chasing the waves and gulping down massive amounts of sea water before puking it all back up again.

That night, we hunkered down in the cabin and played some games. I played scrabble for the first time ever! I have always wanted to play, but the opportunity had never come up. I wasn't very good at it.

And D took to long too place his words.

Brad totally won. Then, as a reward, we let him sleep in the loft, which was octagonal shaped like the cabin.

On our way back to Sackville the next day, we stopped at the Hopewell Rocks, one of the best places to see the tides change. During low tide, you can walk on the ocean floor. We were there at high tide, so we just got to look at the water. It was still pretty cool. At low tide, you can walk under the18 ft high archway formed by the biggest rock...

 It was a delightfully sunny day, and we walked around the park checking out all the viewpoints.

 See, people, you should totally come visit me! It is lovely here in New Brunswick.

Impromptu road trip!

Last night, I noticed on Facebook that a fair maid was in need of some electrical work. She lives almost 2 hours from Sackville right beside the Fundy National Park (Aside: I was recently informed that while everyone else says Fundy as it is spelled, Newbies say "Funday.") Now Sackville is also on the Bay of Fundy, but not the good part. There are no beaches in Sackville and the views, while pleasant, are not breathtaking. For those who don't know, the Bay of Fundy has the highest tides in the world, which is what draws people from all over the world to see it. I have been dying to go visit Jane and to explore Fundy park, so I offered D's electrical services for this morning. Shameless plug for D's company here: http://www.onsiteelectrical.ca/

First of all, the drive from Sackville to Alma is the official Scenic Fundy Drive that basically involves all the way up and all the way back down an arm of the Bay of Fundy. Although it is totally inefficient, the views of the water and the hills and the trees and the mud made up for it. We arrived at the fabulous Cleveland Place B & B shortly after 10 am, with Nova in tow. D was able to remedy the electrical issues in about 15 minutes while I chatted with Jane, and then me, D, and Nova were off to explore. I didn't think to bring my camera when leaving the house, and it wasn't until about half way through the trip that it dawned on us to take pictures with our cell phones, so most of what we saw is undocumented.

We began with an easy little jaunt just off the highway that was a loop through moose and beaver territory. We saw a couple of beavers, but alas, no moose. We really wanted to see a waterfall, but we didn't want to work too hard for it, so we found one that was not too much of a hike off the road. It was very cool to see, and I wish I had a picture of it to share, but unfortunately the picture is only in my head. I guess people will just have to visit me so that I can show them in person.

Next we drove to the end of a road that took us to Point Wolfe. This is where I realized that I could, in fact, take pictures. We stopped just outside of a covered bridge to snap this shot, which was only just the beginning of the awesomeness.

We drove down the road until it ended, parked and then walked through one of the trails where we were delighted with this view.

On the way into Alma, the bay looked to be at a fairly high tide. Here it must have been on its way out. (I am mostly guessing because I have no idea.) We could see people down on the beach on the right, and decided that it was time to dip our toes in the water. So we headed down.

Almost there:

Beach!

Nova had her first ocean experience. I don't think she could tell the difference as she still gulped down the water like crazy and then barfed it back up just like he does when we take her to the lake.

And just so I could say I did it, I stuck my feet in that freezing cold water!

I loved being at the beach, but definitely did not love having to climb all the way back up...

On the way home we took the extra-scenic route down Hwy 915, where we detoured to Cape Enrage, which definitely lived up to the hype in the tourist brochures. It was an amazing view and we could even see blue water beyond all the brown, which made it seem like the real ocean. It was also damn windy, and damn cold, so we did not stay very long.

Thanks to Jane for all the destination recommendations!

Full Status Newbie

Friday was a sad day for me. It was the day I traded in my Texas driver's license for a New Brunswick license. My plan was to just lie and say that I had lost my Texas license because I really wanted to keep it for sentimental value. Unfortunately, my illegal plan was foiled.

Becoming a full status Newbie caused a lot of rage for D, and I got sucked in too. It all began when I was at work and D went to register his van that he had imported from Texas. At Service New Brunswick (SNB, where one goes for all of their New Brunswick needs), he was told that he had to have insurance on the vehicle before he could register it. He then went to an insurance agent where he was told that he couldn't get insurance without a NB driver's license. So, he went back to SNB to get his license. Apparently they have a system that is connected to all North American DMVs and when the woman at SNB entered D's driver's license into the system, it said, "cannot find a record" or something like that. Apparently, if there is a problem with the system, it usually says "system down." Because it was not saying, "system down" the SNB woman became suspicious that D's license was fake. She told him that he would have to get Texas to fax confirmation of his driving record. D called the Texas folks who are responsible for such things and the woman told him, "We do not fax to Canada." Really? There isn't even a country code involved. Just dial 1 and the fax will go through!

This is when I get a furious phone call from D spewing obscenities. I suggested that we both go in together, with our matching driver's licenses and our driver's abstracts that we had gotten from Texas before we left. That would perhaps make her believe that his driver's license wasn't a fake. She entered my license number into the system and it also came up as "cannot find record" also. I guess this was a bit more reassuring since both licenses were not coming up in the system. Our driver's abstracts were dated for May 25th, which was 5 days before we left Texas. This was also not acceptable because "anything could have happened between then and now." She suggested we get Texas to fax new ones. We explained that the Texas folks "do not fax to Canada." She could tell we were getting really frustrated, so she called the head office to see if the abstracts were acceptable. After about 20 minutes and several transfers of her phone call, she got the approval to issue us new driver's licenses. This information was conveyed to us with the very stern warning "When the system is back up and they investigate your licenses, if there are ANY issues, your NB licenses will be revoked immediately." She made us feel like criminals. WELCOME TO NEW BRUNSWICK!

After our marathon session at SNB, we went to get insurance, and then came back to SNB to register the vehicle. The whole process took about 5 hours from start to finish, but now we are official Newbies.

Also, can I nominate NB for the worst license plate slogan in Canada?

The Journey Pt 4 - The Finale

The next two days of driving to get to Moncton/Sackville were fairly uneventful with the exception of sitting in traffic in Montreal for 90 minutes!! What a waste of my life! I have never had the pleasure of driving in Montreal before, so I didn't really know how bad it could get. I should have known, since everyone I have ever talked to about driving in Canada has told me that Montreal has the worst drivers and the worst traffic. It was only 3 pm, so we thought we would just miss rush hour. Fools! By my calculations on Google maps, the route we took was 44 km and should have taken about 30 mins. It was pure torture. On the positive side, it definitely made me happy that I was moving to a small town where there is no rush hour.

Quebec had some of the most interesting and unique road signs I have seen. Unfortunately, by the time I had figured out the wackiness of a sign, it was too late to find my camera. I was able to find a picture of my favorite sign on the internet, though (although now I can't find the source.) It means, "Watch out for strong crosswinds." I feel this could have been conveyed without using some weird Bigfoot-looking dude. Do the Quebecois really believe wind comes from a hairy monster?



We stayed in St. Apollinaire, which is near Quebec City. (A few days later I found out that my credit card had been duplicated, and I suspect that occurred at the hotel.) Even though we were on the other side of the St. Lawrence from Quebec City, the next morning we had to deal with a TON of traffic again both near Quebec and Levis. Not only do I loathe traffic, the van could not handle all the constant braking with all the weight it was towing.

As we got further towards the Gaspé Peninsula and closer to New Brunswick, the scenery became more and more hilly and green. The green of the hills and the blue of the sky and the water were so bright and vivid. It was beautiful. The van, however, loaded to the gills and pulling a uhaul that was also loaded to the gills did not like the hills as much as I did.



I really wanted a big, grand "Welcome to New Brunswick" sign that I could use for a picture commemorating my entrance to my new province. On the route we took, however, there was no big sign, unless I completely missed it. I was really looking for it though. Oh well, I decided to settle with this sign commemorating our arrival.


Except that we needed to spend a week in a motel in Moncton before we got to move into our new house. Bor-ing.

So, I guess I am a Newbie now

So, I have officially lived in the lovely province of New Brunswick for approximately 2 days. Since I am currently living in a hotel and really have nothing better to do, I decided to start a blog. My plan is for this to be about my experience adapting to life her in NB, and the oddities I experience here. I did this when I first moved to Texas (which can be found here http://lisadawn462.spaces.live.com) and was able to keep it up for about a year and a half. Let's see how this one goes.

I moved here for a faculty position in psychology at a small university, and I am thrilled to bits about my new job. I just completed my Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin, and I am already homesick for Austin, which adds to my homesickness for Vancouver, which is where I was born and raised. So, I have lived on the west coast, the "third coast" and now on the east coast.

I am beginning my life in New Brunswick harbouring (<--- look, I am allowed to spell like a Canadian again) the following stereotypes: 1) East coasters are really, really nice 2) French and English people don't hate each other here 3) Life will be nice and slow and more enjoyable. We shall see how these preconceived notions hold up. I will post about the road trip from Texas to New Brunswick soon, but for now, I will leave you with a few pictures about what I love (and miss) about Austin.

This is what my folks, and I saw downtown Austin after my graduation - A rat riding a cat riding a dog.


This was taken at Eeyore's birthday this year - It's Leslie's butt. Leslie is Austin's most famous homeless transvestite.

On a more serious note, I really, really miss my friends in Austin. And my friends and family in B.C. Starting over sucks.