Untroubled Paradise ’s turbulent past has given way to an idyllic present

got aboard the Air Nova flight for Halifax with my bike around town on my rented bike with my own gel-cushioned saddle crammed into my carry-on and my helmet dan- saddle installed. The town was lively at night. Teenagers gling from my arm in a plastic grocery bag. Apprehen- roller-bladed along the main street; children played in the sion and anticipation churned in equal parts in my little park across from the inn, with its flower beds and Vic- I torian gazebo; couples strolled along the waterfront, where stomach. Not about the flight, though this small commuter plane looked rather marginal lights and laughter spilled from busy restaurants and Author for flying over the North coffeehouses. Beside the harbor, a circle of granite Dorothy Atlantic to a foreign country. obelisks paid tribute to Lunenburg’s fishermen. Each Stephens had It was the Nova Scotia hills one listed the names of those who had been lost at some rough that I worried about. From sea. The center one bore the names of the ships that times ahead all accounts, they could had gone down. of her as she tests and observations I was released. The diagnosis: dehy- prepared to sometimes be long and steep Our first day’s ride took us along the coast to and unforgiving, rising Mahone Bay, a tiny village with one long Main Street dration and heat exhaustion. As I learned later, I had come from young middle age (40s and 50s) leave on her close to the third stage of heat-related illnesses: heat stroke, tour of Nova relentlessly one after another lined with shops and cafes and fresh fruit and veg- Nuts and Bolts to my 75. Almost all except me were Scotia. with little respite for tired etable markets. We cycled around the bay past sum- from which eight out of ten affected people die. fairly experienced cyclists. After we legs and bursting lungs. I mer homes hidden behind lush flower gardens and It was a hard way to learn a valuable lesson. It had been GETTING THERE: Air Canada/Air Nova rode all day, evening activities tended was only three years into stands of trees, interspersed with lovely views across a hot day, over 90 degrees, and I had ridden farther than I provides daily flights to Nova Scotia to be brief, but included an excellent this bicycle riding, after not the water of the graceful spires of Mahone Bay’s three ever had before in one day. I had taken frequent sips of from New York and Boston, and in performance one night of Thornton having sat on a bike for half famous churches. water from my water bottle, quite enough, I thought. I was partnership with Continental Airlines Wilder’s play, The Matchmaker, pre- a century, and I wasn’t at all On a deserted bit of beach seated on a weathered wrong. Sips are not enough. One of my fellow cyclists told offers connections through Houston, sented by the repertory theater group sure I was ready for this. dock and leaning against the pilings, my traveling me later that his rule of thumb is one bottle of water for Newark and Boston. Car ferries run in Wolfville. Many other companies True, I’d trained since companion, Marion, and I shared a picnic lunch of every hour of biking. The doctor’s prescription was to take from Bar Harbor and Portla offer tours in Nova Scotia. Consult spring, but only on the generally flat routes around my sea- fruit and sandwiches that we’d purchased in the little deli in calcium and magnesium every day, eat a banana daily, drink your copy of The Cyclists’ Yellow side home in Massachusetts. Mahone Bay. Later, after a swim in the bracing waters of Gatorade and lots of water. GENERAL INFORMATION: Call or write to Pages. If I’d known that a little more than 24 hours later, and the bay, we cycled on to Blue Rocks, the tiny fishing village I didn’t ride the following day — doctor’s orders — but Nova Scotia Information and Reser- not just because of the hills, I’d be in an ambulance on my where the movie “Dolores Clairbourne” was filmed. A kept our guide company in the support van instead. It was vations, P.O. Box 130, Halifax, Nova BED AND BREAKFAST INNS: We used the way to the local hospital in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, I breakwater of huge boulders protected the minute harbor rainy anyway, the route long and hilly, the road gravelly, Scotia B3J 2M7; 1-800-565-0000; e- following B&Bs: Boscawen Inn, 150 might have had second thoughts about climbing aboard that and its handful of boats from the wild wind blowing off the narrow and slippery. A good day to take time off. I was just mail: [email protected] Cumberland St., Lunenburg, NS, airplane. ocean, buffeting both us and the colorful fishing shacks on as glad to be in the van. For the rest of the trip, with the Canada B0J 2C0; 902-634-3325. Tat- Long known as a center of shipbuilding and seafarers, the slope behind us. Along the shore, the bluish gray rocks weather fine and cool, I took my calcium and magnesium TOUR OPERATORS: Our trip of seven tingstone Inn, 434 Main ST., the little town of Lunenburg on Nova Scotia’s south shore that gave the village its name were coated with golden algae tablets, ate my bananas, drank my Gatorade and lots of nights and six days was arranged by Wolfville, NS, Canada B0P 1X0; slides down hilly banks to the harbor. Bright red wooden that glowed like liquid fire in the rays of the setting sun. water, and rode 30-35 miles every day. I even managed to Vermont Bicycling Tours. The group 902-542-7696. Queen Anne Inn, 494 warehouses and shipyard workshops line the waterfront Led by Roch and Keeli, our two Canadian guides par make it up most of the hills. was almost evenly divided between Upper George St., , where the masts of large fishing schooners, including the excellence, we strolled down the hill that night to the Old Like many Americans, my knowledge of Canada was men and women, with ages ranging NS, Canada B0S 1A0; 902-532-7850. famous Bluenose II, bristle along the docks. Farther up Fish Factory Restaurant in the Fisheries Museum of the vague. I’d transited the Halifax airport once, on my way to the hill are elegant 18th and 19th century sea captains’ Atlantic, housed in a renovated and preserved former fish somewhere else; had heard of scenic, mountainous Cape homes, watched over by the , the plant. The portraits of former sea captains lined the walls, Breton Island at Nova Scotia’s northeastern tip; and seen local elementary school. Floodlit at night, this pride and stalwart, sunburned, white-bearded men who in earlier times photographs of the famously picturesque Peggy’s Cove; but most populous and important village of the French settlers joy of the local community, in a gleaming coat of red had sailed their ships to the far-off ports of Africa, the Far the rest of the province was a blank. Lunenburg, with its in this part of Nova Scotia, I stood under the beautiful and white paint, its red towers reaching skyward, East and the Caribbean in search of trade. rich history of stained glass window in the Church of St. Charles and lis- shipbuilding perches like a Victorian castle at the top of the hill. I was feeling reasonably well, I thought — tired, after 57 tened to the guide’s story of the expulsion of the French Lunenberg, built After our arrival by van from the airport, my kilometers of riding, but somewhat refreshed after a shower and seafaring, families known as the Acadians. Caught in the constant its colonial and on a harbor, has a fellow cyclists and I settled down with cold and short rest. I’d tried to ignore the hot sun hammering on warfare between England and France to grab territory in the rich history of drinks on the deck of the Boscawen Inn, my helmet all afternoon, and the headache and slight nausea Victorian archi- New World (this part of Nova Scotia changed hands seven shipbuilding and a restored Victorian mansion that had plagued me, but during dinner, when I stood to tecture, its busy times in 150 years of war) the French settlers became hap- seafaring. overlooking the harbor, to stretch out a cramp in my leg, I suddenly felt peculiar. waterfront, less victims. soak up the late afternoon “I don’t feel very good,” is the last thing I remember filled in the first On a day in September, 1755, they were summoned to sun and the view of fish- saying to Marion before sitting back down and passing out. of the blanks. the church by the current English military commander and ing boats, water and I sank into a world of fuzzy blackness, penetrated by From there, we told that they must leave Nova Scotia. English ships took green hills on the dim voices whose words I could neither comprehend nor crossed Nova them away to New England, Louisiana, the West Indies, and far shore. answer. When the world swam back into view a few Scotia to elsewhere. In the confusion, families were separated, some Later, after moments later, I was in a small anteroom and an EMT was Wolfville, on never to find each other again. They left behind their homes, a dinner of bending solicitously over me. I was bundled carefully onto a the north shore, their farms, their animals, everything but what they were fresh Nova stretcher, carried out to an ambulance past lines of curious and plunged carrying. It was a story of tragic proportions that inspired Scotia salmon, I townspeople, and whisked to the hospital, five minutes into Evangeline Longfellow’s poem, Evangeline. took a warm-up ride away. country. The village of Grand Pre and everything in it were I was lucky. The doctor and nurses on duty couldn’t At Grand burned after the deportation, but in 1922, the present have been kinder or more efficient, and after two hours of Pre (French for church, a replica of the original, was built on the old foun- “Great Mead- dation stones as a memorial to the Acadians. Bronze Nova Scotia ow”), once the By Dorothy Stephens plaques list the names of all the families who were deport-

Adventure Cyclist • August 2000 Adventure Cyclist • August 2000 12 13 ed. In all, there were 10,000 people in Nova Scotia who a gentle smile who had been a pupil in this one-room were removed from their homes and exiled. They fiercely school, as had his father, his grandparents and all his chil- preserved their culture and their memories in the remote dren. His delight at having me linger behind the rest of the places to which they were sent, and group to chat and to browse through his museum was after peace was declared between matched by mine at having the perfect excuse for a rest France and England in 1773, many stop, a drink of water, a power bar from my pack, and a returned to Nova Scotia. Their chance to use the vine-shrouded outhouse in back. descendents still live there today. We were making our way along the north side of Nova One of the Acadians’ legacies is Scotia and the Bay of Fundy to Annapolis Royal, the oldest the series of dykes that they built, permanent European settlement in Canada. It was founded an ingenious method of draining in 1605 by the French, thus predating Jamestown, Virginia, the salt marshes to wrest fertile by two years. On the edge of Annapolis Royal, I once again new fields from the ocean — witnessed the awesome power of the tides of the Bay of knowledge they may have brought Fundy. North America’s only tidal power station sits across with them from the coastal low- the mouth of the as it joins the sea and taps lands of Europe. Behind the dykes, the enormous flow of the river combined with the outgoing with the sea kept at bay, the rain tide. I stood above the water, watching the way it roils and gradually washed away the salt and pushes like a living animal, tumbling over itself in foaming sweetened the soil, creating rich eddies and whirlpools as it races through the sluice gates farmland at the edge of the sea. and escapes, generating more than 30 million kilowatt-hours Riding alone along the tops of of electricity each year. the grassy, 300-year-old dykes, I In Annapolis Royal I cycled slowly down the main might have been back in Evange- street, beautiful homes and gardens on either side, and line’s time. Timeless views of around the circular walk to the door of the Queen Anne Inn, farmlands and meadows, mudflats our home for the last two nights of the trip. An 18th century and salt marshes swept away on all mansion of turrets and tall windows, it looked like a white- sides. Below on my left, behind the frosted wedding cake. This small town of less than 700 dykes, were the Acadians’ bequest: inhabitants, once the British capital of Nova Scotia, has pre- At the broad bands of green cornfields and yellow ripening wheat. served over 100 historic buildings, many of them graceful Church of St. Wildflowers bloomed along the fringes; wild roses and pur- examples, like the Queen Anne, of Victorian or colonial Charles in ple thistles, goldenrod and black-eyed Susans, buttercups architecture. Grand Pre, and Queen Anne’s lace. Almost across the street from the Inn is the Annapolis the author On my right, the mud flats and steep-sided clay ditches Royal Historic Gardens, ten acres of spectacular beds of heard the far below lay empty of water now, at low tide. When the flowers that include many varieties of roses grown through- off on a short walk to nearby Fort Anne, one of Canada’s painstakingly took the three million needlepoint stitches that story of the tide turned, water would rush in from the Bay of Fundy, fill- out the centuries in various parts of the world. Acadian’s National Historic Sites, where the French constructed the resulted in a spectacular work of art. It was designed by a ing the ditches and engulfing the mudflats in some of the Exhilarated by the day’s ride, content after my hot show- original fort. We were met outside the fort by what looked Japanese artist from Halifax, who carefully studied Annapo- expulsion highest tides in the world. That day, the tidal range at Grand er, I wandered the paths through the gardens and along the from Nova like an apparition: a tall, gaunt figure in a black coat and lis Royal’s history before painting it on the needlepoint Scotia. Pre was an amazing 29 feet, but in parts of the Bay of adjoining salt marsh and bird sanctuary, lifting my face to trousers, top hat, and what he would later tell us were a backing. From there, the volunteer townspeople took over. Fundy it can sometimes exceed a staggering 53 feet. the last warm rays of the sun, the brilliant reds and golds of mourning scarf and sash. He was carrying a lantern, and A bus driver stitched the school bus; churchwomen sewed All along the Annapolis River Valley, where we rode the a bed of scarlet sage and marigolds dazzling my eyes, and with his black curly hair, black beard, and prominent nose, the church; and our own next day, the Acadians had planted and cultivated the rich thought that this was as close to perfection as I was ever he might have stepped out of one of Poe’s dark tales. The guide Alan, an Acadian soil. Late summer smells of sun-warmed hay and ripening likely to get on this earth. spell was only partially broken when he spoke. himself, applied the pink fruit rose from the fields and orchards of prosperous-look- That night, our guides had a surprise in store for us. “My name is Alan Melanson,” he said, “and tonight you wool to the pig on an ing farms. To reach this serene valley, we’d first pedalled up “Bring a sweater and flashlight if you have one, and are going on a tour of the Garrison Graveyard. Please fol- Acadian farm. and over Mount Hanley, a long, two-kilometer uphill ride wear comfortable shoes,” they said. “We’ll be going some- low me, and watch your step.” After a van ride back before the freewheeling descent down the other side. At the where after dinner.” He handed out lanterns and we followed his spectral fig- to the south shore the top was the Mount Hanley Schoolhouse Museum, tended by We dined on lobster in the Secret Garden restaurant, ure into the graveyard next door, our line of lanterns bob- next day, and a short 89-year-old Anton Barteaux, a slight, gray-haired man with tucked amid the flowers of the Historic Gardens, then set bing like nervous fireflies as we stumbled over the uneven bike ride over the hills to ground. Gravestones of slate, sandstone, marble and granite Lunenburg, our Canadian slanted around us, the materials changing with the centuries, venture was over. In Alan told us. spite of my bout with Some of those buried in the graves were soldiers who heat exhaustion, I was had been stationed at Fort St. Anne in the 1700s; others feeling pretty good about were women and children. Alan told chilling stories of the having survived the long days of riding, and about tackling After arriving hardships suffered by the soldiers’ families, for whom no so many hills. And I was also taking away with me some in Lunenburg, housing or food was provided by the military. A great many unforgettable images of this small piece of Nova Scotia, its the author’s died of disease and starvation. Like a reincarnation of one bountiful fields and coastal villages, its untroubled isolation group settled of those lost children, a ghostly little gray cat materialized from much of the rest of the world. ● into the Boscawen into the lamplight at each grave where we stopped, and Inn, a hopped up onto the stone. restored Vic- At the end of our tour, Alan took us into the Fort and Adventure Cycling member Dorothy Stephens is a freelance torian manion showed us the Heritage Tapestry that hangs on the wall. writer whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Wash- overlooking Eighteen feet long and eight feet high, it illustrated, in 95 ington Post, Los Angeles Times and Boston Globe. She took up the harbor. glowing colors of Persian wool, the 400 years of Annapolis cycling at the age of 72. Royal’s history. Over a hundred of the town’s residents helped create the tapestry, men, women, and children who

Adventure Cyclist • August 2000 Adventure Cyclist • August 2000 14 15