In August 2018 Bob and I and my siblings and their spouses went on a cruise together from Boston to Quebec. My dear husband can never let an opportunity for additional travel go by, and I was longing for some time with our youngest son who lives in New York City, so we planned a four-day pre-trip rendezvous in Maine and New Brunswick.
Our plan was to meet at JFK airport, have a brief layover, and fly to Bangor, Maine, together. However, upon approach to JFK, Bob and I hit a terrible thunder storm with some of the most dramatic lightning I've ever seen from a plane window. We had to circle around the outside of the epicenter of the storm for an hour, and then when we finally landed, so did everyone else, making an unloading bay hard to come by. Two hours late, we finally met our son in the airport . . .
. . . but of course our connecting flight to Maine was THREE hours late because of the storm. By the time we finally got to our hotel in Bangor, it was 4:00 AM, and the hotel had closed out our prepaid room at 3:00 AM because we hadn't shown up. It took another 45 minutes of haggling to get that resolved, and at 5:00 AM we collapsed, exhausted, into our beds.
Of course that meant our planned departure time of 8:30 AM didn't happen. Instead, we got on the road at 10:00 AM and headed for the Canadian border and then our whale-watching tour in St. Andrews, New Brunswick, scheduled for 1:30 PM. It was a 2.5 hour drive, so we thought we were fine.
Yeah, right.
Did you know there is an Atlantic Time Zone that's an hour ahead of the Eastern Time Zone? We didn't. 10:00 was really 11:00, and now we were pushing hard to get there. Whenever we've crossed the Canadian border in the past, it's been a friendly wave through. Of course, that didn't happen this time when we were in such a hurry. Nope, we were sent to a "special inspection" area at the side of the road, where we waited and waited and WAITED until finally someone gave us the go-ahead.
We headed northeast, deeper into the bay. The scenery was rich and seemingly untouched, with heavy forests lining the banks:
There were a few lighthouses and other signs of habitation, but it looked like a lonely place to live:
We had felt lucky to see a few whales on a boat trip outside of Homer, Alaska two years before this trip, and I suspected we'd be lucky to see even one whale on this trip. However, it wasn't long before our cruise guide pointed out a fin in the distance:
We were able to get much nearer:
Look closely and you can see the length of the whale under the water:
Except it's not a whale, it's a sunfish, the heaviest known bony fish in the sea:
Darn.
However, it wasn't long until we had several really good sightings of several whales, just about the time we drifted into some fairly dense fog. In the distance we could see what looked like a rubber raft full of people. Then suddenly in between our large boat and that little boat, an ominous humped back rose out of the water:
We got some spectacular views of this fellow going down for a deep dive:
The people in the little pontoon boat seemed pretty cool with the fact that a huge (up to 33 tons) whale had just gone under their boat.
Then suddenly there were TWO humpbacks swimming in the direction of the boat. Paddle faster, guys! I could hear the music from Jaws playing in the background of my panicked thoughts:
Closer and closer:
Two, or possibly THREE whales hungry for a meal:
I'm not sure how, but somehow the little rubber raft of people escaped bodily harm.
By the way, later on we did see two of the whales breech, or come up out of the water in kind of a ballerina leap, but it was really hard to get a photo because we didn't know where to be looking. Because the whale is coming up from a deep dive, it just suddenly emerges, and by the time we could get our cameras pointed in that direction, it was already on the way down.
We kept on motoring down the bay, and I could understand why there are lighthouses on the shore. I think the fog is a fairly frequent visitor.
Eventually we passed through the fog, however, and came upon some very unique rocks:
Awww, cute! A seal was enjoying a cold bath:
Time to eat some lunch!
You'd think they would really know how to cook lobster in a restaurant next to the harbor where there appears to be a lot of lobster boats coming in (judging by the traps strung along the pier), but it was only ho-hum.
The lunch was far from memorable, but we were hungry, so we appreciated whatever we could get.
From the end of the dock looking back at St. Andrews:
St. Andrews is a cute little town, but we were ready to move on.
Our plan was to meet at JFK airport, have a brief layover, and fly to Bangor, Maine, together. However, upon approach to JFK, Bob and I hit a terrible thunder storm with some of the most dramatic lightning I've ever seen from a plane window. We had to circle around the outside of the epicenter of the storm for an hour, and then when we finally landed, so did everyone else, making an unloading bay hard to come by. Two hours late, we finally met our son in the airport . . .
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| Goofy boys |
Of course that meant our planned departure time of 8:30 AM didn't happen. Instead, we got on the road at 10:00 AM and headed for the Canadian border and then our whale-watching tour in St. Andrews, New Brunswick, scheduled for 1:30 PM. It was a 2.5 hour drive, so we thought we were fine.
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| A lovely drive with beautiful scenery |
Did you know there is an Atlantic Time Zone that's an hour ahead of the Eastern Time Zone? We didn't. 10:00 was really 11:00, and now we were pushing hard to get there. Whenever we've crossed the Canadian border in the past, it's been a friendly wave through. Of course, that didn't happen this time when we were in such a hurry. Nope, we were sent to a "special inspection" area at the side of the road, where we waited and waited and WAITED until finally someone gave us the go-ahead.
Check in time for our whale watching trip was actually 1:00, and we knew we wouldn't make that, so I called the company, Quoddy Link Marine in St. Andrews, and kept them apprised of our location. They actually held the boat full of tourists for 15 minutes until we ran down the pier and hopped on.
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| The arrow points to Saint Andrews, where we caught the boat. (Google map) |
I'm not sure which is the greater miracle: that they held the boat that long or that no one boo-ed us or even gave us dirty looks as we boarded.
There were a few lighthouses and other signs of habitation, but it looked like a lonely place to live:
We had felt lucky to see a few whales on a boat trip outside of Homer, Alaska two years before this trip, and I suspected we'd be lucky to see even one whale on this trip. However, it wasn't long before our cruise guide pointed out a fin in the distance:
We were able to get much nearer:
Look closely and you can see the length of the whale under the water:
Except it's not a whale, it's a sunfish, the heaviest known bony fish in the sea:
Darn.
However, it wasn't long until we had several really good sightings of several whales, just about the time we drifted into some fairly dense fog. In the distance we could see what looked like a rubber raft full of people. Then suddenly in between our large boat and that little boat, an ominous humped back rose out of the water:
We got some spectacular views of this fellow going down for a deep dive:
Then suddenly there were TWO humpbacks swimming in the direction of the boat. Paddle faster, guys! I could hear the music from Jaws playing in the background of my panicked thoughts:
Closer and closer:
Two, or possibly THREE whales hungry for a meal:
See the whale diving right next to the boat??!! Why wasn't anyone screaming in terror? This isn't Flipper, you know:
I'm not sure how, but somehow the little rubber raft of people escaped bodily harm.
By the way, later on we did see two of the whales breech, or come up out of the water in kind of a ballerina leap, but it was really hard to get a photo because we didn't know where to be looking. Because the whale is coming up from a deep dive, it just suddenly emerges, and by the time we could get our cameras pointed in that direction, it was already on the way down.
We kept on motoring down the bay, and I could understand why there are lighthouses on the shore. I think the fog is a fairly frequent visitor.
Eventually we passed through the fog, however, and came upon some very unique rocks:
Nesting seagulls add their "paint" to the colorful designs:
Awww, cute! A seal was enjoying a cold bath:
Eventually we turned around and made our way back to the dock.
Time to eat some lunch!
The guide had recommended Spears as a good restaurant. Our son pooh-poohed the choice, reminding us that we were in a tacky tourist area, but we didn't know where else to go, so we stopped there anyway.
You'd think they would really know how to cook lobster in a restaurant next to the harbor where there appears to be a lot of lobster boats coming in (judging by the traps strung along the pier), but it was only ho-hum.
From the end of the dock looking back at St. Andrews:
In our brief time in Canada I learned that it is very green.
ReplyDeleteBest whale watching experience we've had. I would love to go out again.
ReplyDelete