Waterfalls, 40-Foot Tides, and the BioBus

Tuesday. May 28, 2013
Sunday morning, May 26^th, we left St John to head for Fundy National Park. The rain stopped for the most part and we actually saw a few patches of blue before the overcast moved in again. We fueled up for the first time at a Canadian station that sells by the liter, so at $1.28, the price looked really cheap! Actually, it came to $4.87 a gallon. Not too bad. We paid that in California. On the way to Canada Route 1 we came across a road partially washed out by the rains. Huge puddle and potholes in the one lane the traffic was being funneled into.

As we drove east toward the park the sun broke through once or twice, but we still had a few showers and gray skies. The system still hadn't cleared out. We saw farms and hills and beautiful shades of yellow green foliage contrasted against the dark green of the evergreens, as the countryside here is waking up to Spring.
Leaving Route 1, which headed away from the coast after St John, we exited and took the road due south into the Fundy National Park and toward the coast. The rain started again and we were on potholed roads. Arriving at Chignecto North Campground, the only one open this early, we lucked into the shoulder season rate of $25 for water and electric. We could have full hook-ups for a few dollars more. We were assigned a site and went back and exchanged it for one closer to the wifi antenna, but, it has been inconsistent. It went away this morning and now that we want to post this, we can't. But, we are camped in a quiet grove of birch and fir trees. Across from us is parked the Bio Bus. Greg had an encounter with its occupants, so I'll let him add an addendum. We used the rest of the rainy, cold day to sit and relax.

Yesterday, Monday, May 27th was STILL cloudy and overcast. There was a chance of showers, but we thought we could get in a hike anyway. Our first stop as we drove out of the Caledonia Highlands and to the coast was the overlook that brought us a view across the Bay of Fundy to Nova Scotia. The Park is a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, so the Canadian and the United Nations flags were flying there. We drove to the visitor's center and got some good advice on which trails to hike. As we came out the rain started and the wind picked up, so we decided to go to Alma for an early lunch and then try to hike.

View of Bay of Fundy and Nova Scotia

 Alma is a small town down the hill, on the edge of the park and directly on the Bay. There is a fishing harbor, a few motels, and several restaurants and shops. Only a few were open this early in the season. We checked out the touristy motel and restaurant, with the touristy prices, and decided to first go to the local convenience store and government liquor store. Greg settled on some local beer from Moncton, north of here, Pump House Fire Chiefs Red Ale. The young woman clerking commented that alcohol in Canada is much more expensive than in the US. I said that I guessed that because of that you have to drink less, and she said, “No, they just work more to pay for it!”. We asked her advice for a good place to eat, and after convincing her that we didn't want the touristy place, but where the locals like to go, she sent us down the block to the Harborview Market, because they have the best seafood chowder.

Alma Harbor, High Tide

Milk with Greg's middle name

Greg had a great bowl of the chowder and I had beef stew. (I'm really hating having a seafood allergy about now!) After lunch the rain stopped so we drove back into the park to the covered bridge over the Point Wolfe River and parked for the Shiphaven Trail. It was still overcast and windy, so we bundled up, slickers, gloves, hats and all. There was originally a dam, lumber mill, and shipbuilding at Point Wolfe. The tide was halfway in, so we stayed off the beach and hiked the trail through the woods. At the adjoining Point Wolf Beach trailhead, we dropped down to the beach, but the water was too high to walk on the gravel bars, so off we went again. We took the Coppermine Trail out to the headland and along the cliffside and back down the Shiphaven Trail to the parking lot. The path around the headland was often steep and wet from the rain. We had to ford several streams, but had small bridges over a few waterfalls. It took us several hours and we had a good workout, and beautiful rainforest to hike through. We had the trails all to ourselves.

Modern Covered Bridge - Bigger than the old ones!

Point Wolfe River at high tide

Red Spruce forest

Point Wolfe River at half tide

Back at the campground we saw an unusual hawk which we haven't been able to identify and a Snowshoe Hare sporting a brown coat for the summer. We had a quiet evening and hoped for blue skies for Tuesday.
This morning the clouds cleared out FINALLY! We've been in mostly rain for more than two weeks. Eight days straight of rain since the day before we left Acadia National Park. Today was beautiful! Tonight the Canadian Maritimes are having widespread frost warnings. The newscasters said they can't remember when that happened last, this close to June. We decided it's because we're here! We keep bringing the cold with us everywhere! Oh, by the way, we have two TV stations here in the boonies, after not getting any in the middle of the city of St John! Haven't figured this one out!

This morning we wanted to get out earlier so that we could go back to Point Wolfe Beach and walk the Point Wolfe River floor at low tide. Before we could leave, Greg had to troubleshoot an electrical problem. We found out later, that our rig was fine. We weren't getting full voltage into the rig, so our surge protector shut down all power to the rig. There was a regional brownout in New Brunswick that caused the problem. Okay, we just had to wait it out.

We drove back to Point Wolfe and walked back down the cliff and then out onto the riveri9 bottom and out to the Bay. At that point the tide was starting to come back in again. The tide here is 40'! We watched it creep in from the Bay and push against the waters of the river flowing out. I stopped to take photos looking back up the creek and turned around. In that short time, the water sneaked up behind me and I had to move quickly to keep my boots dry. We walked back up the river bottom and marveled at the high tide line on the cliffs, and the barnacles, snails and seaweed that live out of the water for hours twice every twenty-four hours.

View of Fundy Sunshine!

Park Visitor's Center

Point Wolfe River at LOW tide, Looking out at the Bay of Fundy

Looking Upstream

Barnacles and snails waiting for high tide

Seaweed sitting high and dry

Small sea cave in phyllite bedrock cliff

Rare and Beautiful Beach Breast of New Brunswick!

We left the river floor and hiked back up the cliff. Then we drove to Herring Cove and checked out the view across the Bay while we ate lunch. Next, we wanted to see one of the biggest waterfalls in the park. We drove to Dickson Falls and hiked into the gorge to a gorgeous falls! The park had constructed a boardwalk and bridges along and over the falls. While we were enjoying the falls a bat flew near us and landed on the boardwalk a few feet from us. It seemed really groggy since it was sunny mid-day. After a while it flew over onto a rock face on the other side of the falls.

Dickson Falls Boardwalk

Tired bat resting on boardwalk

Fiddlehead ferns

On the way back we stopped at the visitors center to report the bat sighting. The park was anxious to know about specific wildlife sightings and bats were on the list. The naturalist will be notified. There is concern about white nose disease that's killing off huge populations of bats farther south.
We returned to the campsite to find out that the low voltage problems we had in the morning had been fixed, but we still aren't getting an internet connection. Tomorrow we are moving on to Blomidon Provincial Park in Nova Scotia on the other side of the Bay of Fundy. The visitor's center as we enter Nova Scotia should have wifi, so hopefully you are reading this post now, because we were able to get it online.


Bio Bus (by Greg)
When I was out disconnecting our power cord from the campground power, I heard clattering and frustrated noises from the campsite across the driveway. Agatha, the crew leader for the Bio Bus called over to ask if we were also out of electric power. I went over and explained that our surge protector had indicated an under-volt condition and cut off our power and that there was not a problem with their rig or their individual campsite. I asked about their research and where they were traveling.

Agatha leads a crew of three summer interns (maybe grad students?) that are based out of the University of Guelph in Ottawa, and they will spend the summer collecting, preparing and shipping samples of insects and other arthropods to Guelph for DNA analysis. They will sample from all the national parks in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland. Their special emphasis is to study biodiversity using DNA Barcoding to confirm the presence of known species and identify new species that are hard to differentiate from other similar appearing arthropods. The arthropods are critical since they form some the lowest levels of the food chain in the stream and other ecosystems in the Acadian and Boreal forests of Atlantic Canada.

The research sounded interesting and the idea of a big road trip for a summer internship sounded like a lot of fun. I think the biggest challenge is fitting two men and two women into the camper/laboratory and learning how to get along. Judging from what smelled like beer fumes (maybe it was sample preservatives?) coming out the door, they were managing pretty well. There is a pretty good website and blog at www.Biobus.ca.

BioBus

Part 2- December in Florida or What to Do in Florida If You Can't Camp on the Beach!

This is a continuation of our travels in Florida in 2012 before I began blogging in January. See the posting “Back on the Road and Looking Behind Us at 2012” for the first part.

Before we left Crooked River State Park in Georgia, we discovered that we had a flat tire. Our back axle has duallys, two tires together on each side. We had valve extenders put on at the infamous Chantilly Mercedes Benz in order to make it easier to read the tire pressure and fill the tires. After leaving we pulled into the nearest truck stop and got in line for the truck service bays. After the mechanic managed to break off a fake lug nut on the purely decorative wheel covers, he discovered that the valve extenders had been screwed onto the old short valve extenders which allowed the air to leak out. After fixing the problem and refilling the tire we were on our way to Florida. (The valve extender problem was never completely fixed until we returned to Maryland at the end of March.)

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

We stopped at the Florida Welcome Center for a map and had our free cups of fresh orange juice. I would love to know how many decades they have been doing that. I remember getting it as a child when we traveled to Florida! We left the interstate near Gainesville and drove through the countryside to Manatee Springs State Park for three nights. We had read that the manatees were just beginning to come up the Suwanee River for the winter and we thought we might see them.

The hot springs allow the scuba divers to access the underground caves. The day we arrived the access was stopped for the winter, because the manatees come into the pools for warmth. On all three days we hiked out to the pier on the river and on two days we saw manatees. One day we saw a pod of five, and the next day a lone one that came close to the pier. Our other discovery was turkey vultures that migrate south to this spot for the winter. There were hundreds, perhaps thousands of them. They roost in the trees overnight where the warmth from the hot springs rises up. Incredibly clumsy birds, they don't fold their wings before they land on a limb, so there's a lot of crashing into trees and knocking other birds off perches. There also seemed to be an elaborate pecking order. We stayed on the pier until dark fascinated by the noise and and spectacle. So ugly and ungainly!

Greg did some bike rides in the woods and took me on my first real mountain bike trail ride. He also rode into the nearest town, Chiefland, seven miles away, to return phone calls. That was our first experience with spotty phone coverage. He got a lot of strange looks from the locals as he lounged about the bank lawn in his biking clothes.

The campground and the facilities were very nice and we enjoyed camping in the sand, live oak woods and palmettos. The only downside was the large group of University of Florida students that showed up after dark and partied at their campsites all night. I wasn't thrilled to look out my window the next morning and see a guy roll out of the car he had slept in and pee on a tree!

Swim stairs at Manatee Spring

Boardwalk along the Manatee Spring outfall out to the Suwanee River.

Firewood delivery

Turkey Vultures fighting for roosts in the warm air rising up from the warm spring.

Turkey Vulture warming up in the morning sun.

Manatee

Cyprus knees

 Saturday, December 1, 2012


Our next stop was Silver River State Park in Ocala. Manatee Springs was near the Gulf Coast. We drove back into the interior of the state. The park is located next to the old Silver Springs resort which appeared to be run down and for sale. (I later read that it has been bought by the state and will be combined with the state park.) There were hiking and biking trails down to the river and through the park. We took advantage of those and Greg discovered that I can't ride in the sand. (I won't elaborate on my tantrum!)

We left after three nights and stopped at a WalMart nearby. While we were there we got a phone call from the campground host who informed us that we left the surge protector on the electric post. Campground electricity can be erratic and the surge protector keeps us from accidentally frying our wiring. It could have been a very expensive lesson if we hadn't gone back for it. They cost $275! We haven't left it behind again!

Silver River about one mile below Silver Spring

Bike/walking trails

Racing canoes

Gopher tortoise on a mission

 Tuesday, December 4, 2012


Our next drive took us east through the Ocala National Forest to Tomoka State Park near the Atlantic Ocean. We were hoping to be able to ride our bikes to the beach. The park is on the mainland and Ormond Beach is on the barrier island across the Halifax River (the Inter-Coastal Waterway) from it. The campground looked similar to all the parks we'd camped in since Georgia; live oaks, sand, palmettos and Spanish moss. The fog rolled in from across the inlet on and off all but one of the five days we were there. But, it was a calm, quiet, private site and we enjoyed it. Two evenings near dusk, we had an osprey sit up in a dead tree behind out site. We walked and rode our bikes around the park. Two days Greg rode the bridge over to the beach. I didn't feel confident to go over the steep drawbridge, and ride in the traffic. We did ride the paved bike path through the park and through the adjoining waterfront community. While we were here we discovered that we could get local TV stations by raising our roof antenna. Then Greg discovered how to connect on the back of the TV so that we could hook up the ROKU to stream Netflix. Suddenly we had entertainment options!

Tomoka campsite

Sand roads through park

View from park across the Halifax River (Intracoastal Waterway) to Ormond Beach

Greg looked all around the rig for the source of a persistent squeak - it was this osprey right overhead!