The Grand Canadian/
American Adventure
Day Eight PEI to
Halifax
Rain!!! The first day of our trip that it has actually been
raining, fortunately it didn’t really put a damper on things (pardon the pun)
as the only thing we had planned for the day was the 300km journey to Halifax.
We arrived in town just after lunch. Actually we are staying in Dartmouth just
across the harbour from Halifax and on advice from some nice people we had
breakfast with, we parked the car, jumped on a ferry and went to the Maritime
Museum of the Atlantic, where we spent the wet afternoon.
Halifax is the Easternmost Port in Canada and by virtue of
having a deep harbour, it remains ice free all year. Halifax has a long and rich maritime history
both as a trading port and a naval one. The British Navy used it as a base in
its battles with the French over ownership of Canada and to defeat the
Americans in the War of 1812. It was also one of the main ports that convoys
formed up in and set sail from during both World Wars. However probably the two
main events tied to the place are the Sinking of the Titanic and the Halifax
disaster.
The Titanic Disaster; Halifax was the closest port to where
the ship went down and became the place where the recovery effort was mounted
from and also where the survivors and bodies were brought ashore. A number of
the bodies are buried in the city’s cemeteries. The maritime museum has a large
and interesting exhibition on the disaster and is set to be one of the focal
points of the 100 year commemorations next year.
The other major event
related to Halifax is the explosion in 1917 of the ammunition ship Mont Blanc.
This occurred when the Mont Blanc and another ship collided in the Harbour. The
Mont Blanc caught fire and drifted into a pier and exploded. The subsequent
explosion laid waste to more than 2 sq miles of the city’s waterfront and took
the lives of 1650 people and left 9000 injured. It still remains the largest
man made explosion outside of an atomic blast.
Now we are off to dinner in the hotel restaurant as it is
too wet, windy and wild to venture out – unless of course you are aged 10 and 8
and then it is not too cold to swim in the outdoor pool with a wind chill of
approx 10 C – this is meant to be summer remember!!!!
Stay tuned for tomorrow’s instalment as we explore the
Citadel and surrounds of Halifax.....
Cheers
xxxxx
