Nova Scotia, wow, what a beautiful place. We arrived in Halifax to be met at the airport by Bruce and Anna, friends we met in Thailand who had travelled all the way from Vancouver to meet up. Amazin to see them again. Made it to the hotel bar just in time to prevent the staff from going to bed and had a good laugh catching up. Spent the next day getting our bearings and consuming huge buttery lobsters for which we were provided with large plastic aprons remeniscent of bin liners which were definately nessesary! At some point in the afternoon Bruce did his tour guide thing and came up with the suggestion that we ride the tidal bore up the bay of Fundy the next day. This is an estuary on the Northern coast where the tide is the highest in the world, 50 billion tons of water arrives at high speed up the channel causing 10 foot waves and the most amazing rapids. So game for anything we all agreed this plan (and this was before beer) and set off bright and early the next day. Arrived and got stripped off and into life jackets and handed our lives over to our raftman Kieth who looked a reassuringly mature and sensible ex-cop. By this point we were getting some sense of what we were in for and slightly hysterical. Mark had very sensibly decided that he would strap the camera into a ziplock bag and take pictures! Well, what a ride wow. holding on for dear life and getting very intimately aquainted with our raftmates we hurtled up the river riding huge waves, swinging around and riding them again. The river bank flies by and with the engine on the raft going flat out we were just standing still. Arrived back on dry land with a great sense of achievment, relief and a very waterlogged & Knackered Sony camera (5% silt in bay) - blast!

Check out riding the bore at:

www.tidalborerafting.com

Spent the next two nights at a magical place called Lovers Lane. a little wooden cabin right on the seashore. Mark was inspired to go fishing at 6am. I was invited but bed seemed a better option! Peggy's Cove where Mark proceeded to hurl himself backwards off the harbour wall (he insisted that Bruce pushed him, hotly denied by the accused) chipping but narrowly avoiding smashing up our remaining camera! Ate out, partied, and BBQ'd, went sea kayaking and generally fell in love with this amazing place. Sadly parted with our friends at Yarmouth and are now at Bar Harbour in Maine and set to go off exploring Acadia National Park. Whale watching this afternoon, yo!! Will update soon. Beth and Marcus the intrepid.