Our second city in Nova Scotia was Halifax, the capital city.  We went to Halifax on that long ago trip to Nova Scotia that I mentioned previously.  The only thing I remember from that trip, however, is the excellent Maritime Museum of the Atlantic.  The museum is so good that Tom and I both remember it clearly 30 years later.  We didn’t feel like we needed to take time to go there on this visit.

Instead, we started our morning in Halifax with a hike up from the harbor area to the Citadel on the top of the city.  Halifax is a real city, with 520,000 people.  The Halifax Waterfront is one of the delights of Halifax.  It is a long boardwalk with tons of shopping and restaurants.  There are fun statues, reflecting the Halifax sense of humor, and lots of benches and places to people watch.

Tom and I saw the drunk lamp posts and the wave.  When we saw the wave in the morning, Tom posed underneath it.  When we passed it in the afternoon, dozens of children were climbing all over it, despite the signs that said “No climbing on the wave.”  We saw immigration statues and war memorials.  In addition, there was colorful artwork all over the harbor area.  Lots of fun to check out all the ins and outs.

 

 

The Citadel is the historic fort on the top of Halifax.  It has been used for defense of the city since the 1700’s, when Halifax was first settled by the British.  They felt they needed a presence to counteract the French presence at Louisbourg to the north.  The British sent 2,500 settlers to the area in 1749.  Although the British established a fort on the top of the hill as soon as they arrived, the town was never attacked.

Today the Halifax Citadel is managed by Parks Canada as a National Historic site.  It is set up as if it is 1869 and there are soldiers and artillerymen manning the fort.  One soldier was guarding the entrance to the Citadel, another was directing visitors as they came in.  We saw a group of new recruits being trained and they drilled for over two hours on the parade grounds.  One soldier gave an Enfield rifle firing demonstration.  There were tours of the grounds led by guides who spoke French or English.

Tom and I watched the movie, which was very disorienting.  The movie was in French with English subtitles.  The narrator of the movie, who we could see occasionally, was speaking in English and you could hear her when she was the person on the screen.  In addition, a dad was reading the subtitles aloud to his children.  So I was hearing French, reading English, and hearing English spoken after I had read it, sometimes by two people.  I probably would have been better off to wait for the English language movie.

After the movie we went through the two museums.  The first was a museum about the different soldiers who were stationed at the fort over the years.  The second told the history of the fort and the town.  Both of the museums were very interesting.  We spent a lot of time in the one that showed the four stages of the fort and talked about the history of Halifax.

At noon they fired a canon out over the city.  It only took two artillery men to fire it, as opposed to the canon teams we are used to from the 1700’s.  All the visitors to the fort stopped what they were doing and got into position to watch the canon firing.  It was a very satisfying boom that echoed off the skyscrapers of downtown.

Once we watched the canon firing, Tom and I headed back down the hill to the harbor area.  We were meeting a friend who lives in Halifax for a late lunch.  Ryan Brookman was one of our Mogadore Scouts and he traveled with us on a lot of scout trips.  He has now been married for 13 years to a woman from Nova Scotia and has dual citizenship.  Ryan trained as a civil engineer and is now one of the partners in the Shaw Group, which does building projects all over eastern Canada.

We met Ryan at Salt and Ash Beach House restaurant down in the harbor area.  We sat outside, which was great while we waited for Ryan because we could watch boats going back and forth in the harbor.  Ryan got there about the same time it started raining.  Everyone else left the patio area, but we were protected by an umbrella, for the most part, so we stayed.  By the time we finished our excellent lunch, the rain had stopped.

It was wonderful to see Ryan again.  We had not seen him since he moved to Nova Scotia so it was good to reminisce and catch up on what is going on in his life.  He seems really happy and loves his job, his wife, his daughter, and his life in Halifax.

After lunch, Ryan walked us back through the harbor area to where we could board our ship.  It was fun to walk with him because he pointed out the newest areas and the things that his company had built.  He even pointed out some projects that he was responsible for.

Halifax was our last foreign port.  Things are gradually feeling more familiar.  First by returning to North America, and then by returning to the United States.