After five days at sea, we stop in Halifax, Nova Scotia today. We arrived early due to the emergency medical evacuation that was required for the ill passenger. We had to anchor in the harbor until another cruise ship left this morning that was staying overnight in Halifax, and was occupying our spot at the pier. At about 7:00 AM, that ship had departed, and we moved from our anchorage to the pier and tied up.
We ate a larger breakfast this morning, it was both the usual breakfast sandwich, plus a yogurt Parfait with granola. We are meeting Mike and Barb today to spend time touring around Halifax, and then eating lunch at their house later in the afternoon. They had told us to eat a large breakfast due to the late lunch they were scheduling.
The ship started letting off passengers at 8:00 AM, but Mike and Barb had set an 8:30 AM time to meet them at the cruise terminal after we got off the ship. We were there at 8:30 AM, but had been a little confused on the exact meeting location, whether it was inside the terminal or outside. Apparently there was a little traffic near the port, and that caused them to be slightly delayed. After just a little delay, we ended up seeing them drive up in the parking lot across from the terminal entrance.
Coastline At The Swiss Air Memorial
It was good to see them, it had been a few years, but it seemed like yesterday. We spent the morning driving out to Peggy’s Cove, a popular tourist attraction lighthouse on the coast. First, we stopped at the 1998 Swissair plane crash memorial, and walked out to the coast to visit the granite stone monument.
The plane had crashed five miles off of the coast in 1998, due to some type of fire in the airplane. We are not sure that the final definitive cause of the crash was ever found, but it was catastrophic, and over 200 passengers were killed.,
Peggy’s Cove Lighthouse
We could see that the Peggy’s Cove Lighthouse was not far away up the coast from here, and that was our next stop. Boy was it popular. There were three cruise ships in port today, over 7,000 total passengers, and I think all of them were now at the lighthouse on a tour bus.
We barely squeezed into the parking area, and got out to take photos of the Lighthouse. There were signs everywhere warning about not walking on the black rocks, which was the designation for wet rocks. It was calm today, so there were no crashing waves, but sometimes the waves can actually reach the lighthouse itself if it is rough. Over the years, several people have been washed away and killed due to venturing out too close to the crashing waves. There was no worry of this happening today from any sea waves, the only possibility might be from the “waves” of tourists.
Barb, Chuck & Stephanie at Peggy’s Cove
We actually had to move some barriers to get the car out from around all of the parked buses, and eventually made our way out of the parking lot. There were more buses still arriving as we left, we did not know where they were going to park.
We drove to some other areas along the coast, some small fishing villages, and then some areas where some of Barb and Mike’s families had lived in the past. Mike and Barb are both from Nova Scotia, and have never lived anywhere else.
We then headed back into the city and drove around some of the sights there, and then stopped by a seafood market to pick up the order of cooked lobster that they were serving for the lunch. Afterward, we toured some of the downtown areas as well as Citadel Hill.
We did not have the time to walk around the fort at Citadel Hill, only to drive around it in the car. It was disappointing that so many large and tall buildings now obstructed the view of the Harbor from Citadel Hill, which is the highest point in Halifax, and was built to protect the harbor during past wars. There had been height restrictions on the buildings in the past, but those had been lifted and now, because of new construction, you can no longer see much of the harbor from Citadel Hill.
Coastal Halifax
We drove through some other neighborhoods, and finally arrived at Mike and Barb’s house, which is on one of the highest points of land in Halifax, other than Citadel Hill.
Their house is in a historic area, and the houses there were quite interesting. Mike had done a lot of work to the house over the years, adding some more space, and opening up the third level.
Eating Great Lobster
It was time to eat, and Mike cracked our two pound Maine Lobsters, and Stephanie and I were given an apron to help protect us from the lobster juices. The lobster had been cooked that morning before we picked them up, and they were super fresh, and tasted great. We also had potato salad, garlic bread and melted butter, along with some white wine. It was a fantastic lunch.
After lunch, we got a tour of the house, and then it was time to head back to the harbor area to walk along the boardwalk there and walk back to the ship.
The Boardwalk in Halifax
The boardwalk is quite long, and goes from the downtown area all the way to the cruise terminals. It was a nice walk, and there were quite a lot of stores and restaurants built in some of the old harbor front warehouse buildings.
Unfortunately, this area is also being impacted by new construction, and the new and too tall buildings certainly were taking away from the historic waterfront look.
Barb, Mike, Stephanie & Chuck in Halifax
It took us about 45 minutes to walk down to our ship, and after our farewells to Barb and Mike, we headed back into the cruise terminal. Stephanie and I did a little shopping inside the terminal and then boarded the ship. We dropped off our gear back in the cabin, and headed up to the outside decks to watch the sail away.
The weather had been nice all day, but was now a little cloudy and cool in the wind. The ship left promptly at 5:00 PM. We spent some time on our balcony and then on the stern of the ship as we left the harbor, and cruised along the rocky shoreline.
Leaving Halifax Harbor
We headed down to Vines for a glass of wine, and we learned that the ill passenger had actually been one of the bartenders there, Joseph. He had some emergency surgery, and was recovering in the hospital in Halifax, and was supposed to be fully recover. It was some type of internal bleeding, but of course, no one knew the details. He was a very well liked person on the ship, and everyone seemed to be concerned, but glad he was going to be OK.
We headed to the Horizon Court Buffet for a small dinner, we were still full from the lobster we had eaten at our late lunch. We decided to head to the magic show at 8:00 PM in the Princess Theater, but stopped off first at Crooners for a beverage. We snuck into the back of the theater, and it was not crowded in the standing area in the back like it had been for the comedy show we had seen the other day. The magician was good, but he was too far away for us to see him very well and there was no video on the screens to help us to see better. We stayed for most of the show, but left a little early and headed back to Crooners. There were no seats there at the bar, so we headed over to the Princess Live Bar and spent the rest of the evening there visiting with Fabian and Marco, the bartenders there.
At about 11:00 PM, we called it an evening and headed back to the cabin. It had been a great but tiring day.