We've now finished the Nova Scotia leg of our journey, and begin to drive back to Quebec, which will be a bit boring. We have to get it back by Sunday morning at 11 to return the rental car.

Halifax was nice enough, though the lady we were staying with at the B&B was a bit of a talker. The Citadel in Halifax was similar to the one in Quebec, but more like a museum (the Quebec one was a working military base so lacked most of the pagentry). The Halifax one had a changing of the guard ceremony, bagpipers and fired a cannon at noon. The Citadel was incredibly well defended historically to stop the Americans from taking over the last British interests on the continent, especially after the War of 1812.

The Halifax Maritime Museum was also interesting, with exhibits on a huge explosion in Halifax that was the largest manmade explosion before the atomic bomb. Some 2,000 people were killed and half the town was levelled. A ship carrying explosives and fuel hit another large ship and caught on fire. Then it drifted right up to the dock where spectators gathered to watch it. All the spectators were killed instantly when it exploded, forming a mushroom cloud. The lesson is that if you see something large on fire, get away from it, don't watch it. The museum also had information about the Titanic, as the ships that were sent to recover the dead were all from Halifax, the nearest port.

We also drove to Peggy's Cove and Lunenburg, which were nice little towns on the waterfront, but the weather was rainy and foggy, so we did not enjoy them as much as we could've. We spent a couple days up in Cape Breton, about 4-5 hours north of Halifax. We went on a scenic drive called the Cabot Trail, which goes around the cliffs that are next to the sea. On both of the hikes we took we saw some moose, including two baby moose. At the end of the longer hike you could see whales down in the ocean, even though we were really high up. With my camera's zoom I managed to get a decent picture of a whale, which I'll put up here later. It was really neat seeing the whales, as there must have been over 30. There were whale watching boats down below right next to them, only meters away. If we had more time, I would've been interested in doing that too. Perhaps instead of driving, we should've flown from Quebec to get more days in Nova Scotia. I would've liked to spent more time on Cape Breton Island, and possibly the west part of Nova Scotia too.

Last night we drove back towards the airport, staying at Dolan's Inns in Pictou, which was a tiny waterfront town with a good atmosphere but an ugly factory across the harbor. Now that we've dropped off my parents we're going to start the long drive back.