Peggy's Cove Area Festival of the Arts: Opening Night and Paint Peggy's Cove

Three years ago I had the great idea that we should host a small, weekend arts festival at Bay Hammocks. A few artists creating art on the lawn, some music and perhaps something for the kids.

So I phoned a couple of artist friends. "What a great idea" they said. "but there is not much to paint at Bay Hammocks. Why don't we go out and paint Peggy's Cove? We will help organize it." Good idea.

Then I phoned Sarah Irwin, a friend, an artist and the co-owner of The Finer Diner, a popular restaurant down the Peggy's Cove Road in Hackett's Cove. "I think we should have a studio tour" said Sarah, "I will help organize it. I will call my artist friends and we can meet here at the Finer Diner to make plans."

The next day I bumped into Paula Fredericks at The Bike and Bean coffee and bike shop. Another local hang-out. Paula is the owner of Cornucopia Marketing, a marketing and website design company and Acoustic Roof, a business the puts musical artists and house concert hosts in contact with each other. "I can organize a musical event and do the marketing for all the events." She said.

And then Bay Hammocks, The Finer Diner and supportive friends Geoff Le Boutillier and Jan Miller chipped in some money.

And The Peggy's Cove Festival of the Arts was born.

This year the festival opened with a great reception at Shining Waters Marine, organized by Sarah and her committee and last weekend was the third annual "Paint Peggy's Cove".  With 38 artists in the village and out on the rocks painting and chatting with visitors. Following are a few pictures:

The  crowd at the Opening Reception

Lots of art for sale at silent auction

You could fish in the Fish Tank to win the item of your choice from the auction table

Five of our member artists created "fresh fish" while guests watched and discussed the process.

And then at Paint Peggy's Cove:

A temporary art gallery was created using a rented Mongolian Yurt

Paintings the participating artists brought from their studios was displayed for sale on the walls

Pods in the centre were erected to display the fresh art created during the event

Over 40 volunteers were on hand to help the painters, bring finished art to the yurt and explain the event to visitors to Peggy's Cove

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation did a piece for the evening news

Claire served great hot dogs

Lovely music at the entrance to the Yurt

All in all a fun weekend. 

I am really looking forward to this weekend's studio tour and the musical concert featuring the Hupman Brothers and Ian Sherwood on Saturday night. You can buy tickets for the concert here. It promises to be a fun evening.

You can follow more of our adventures on our facebook page

To contact me click here

Overnight Guests at Bay Hammocks

Last week we hosted our first guests through the Boondockers Welcome website. (click on the mailbox to the left for more information). Last year we hosted three RVing couples at Bay Hammocks and really enjoyed meeting them and hearing their stories. This time was no exception. Except our guests were not the usual Rvers who stop here.

Meet, from left to right, Illia (sorry, I know this spelling is wrong - simply a best guess), Alex and Hannah from Australia. Alex and Hannah are brother and sister, Illia a friend of Alex. They traveled across Canada from Vancouver and are now on their way to New York City to meet up with Hannah's boyfriend. Then plan to circumvent the US before returning to Vancouver and on home to Australia.  They purchased the VW camper in Vancouver and will sell it there when they leave Canada. Alex is a mechanic so they have no worries about keeping it in operating condition.

We enjoyed hearing about their experiences and sharing travel stories over a glass of wine in the Adventure Bus.

Arch suggested that they sleep in hammocks in Bay Hammock's shop as it was forecast to be a very chilly night. Which they did. And enjoyed a warm night's sleep, deemed the most comfortable of their trip.

One slept in the EarthFriendly rope hammock, which we make, one in the colourful cotton hammock from a craft cooperative in Nicaragua and I think Hannah slept in the camping hammock in the background.

After they left the next morning I stumbled upon this photo on the internet:

The perfect vehicle to tow behind their camper don't you think?

Safe travels Illia, Alex and Hannah. Have fun!!

You can follow more of our adventures on our facebook page
To contact me click here

Lost in Lost Creek

 It took us 10 days to drive home from New Orleans but here we are, home and parked at Bay Hammocks.

We drove diagonally across the US from Louisiana to Maine, which meant we spent a lot of time in the Appalachian Mountains. A beautiful drive if you stay on the beaten path. Beautiful and scary if you don't. And one day we strayed.

We spent the night at Harrison Bay State Park in Southwestern Tennessee and the next morning decided to take the scenic (but 4 lane) route through the mountains to Pigeon Forge, our next stop.

Getting out of the park and back to the highway was going to be tricky. And we new the GPS would back track us by several miles to get on I75 so we did not use it. Instead we used the map to choose an alternative, and shorter, route. Which was fine. The road was a bit narrow but it took us through some pretty country. And Arch got to drive the Adventure Bus up and down a small, winding (and mercifully short) mountain road.

We came to the ramp for I75 and passed under it and started looking for the turn onto highway 441. After driving several miles we realized we missed it. And there was no where to turn a 38' motorhome, towing a car on a dolly, around. So forward we went.

The road was good but very narrow with not much protection to keep you from going over the edge:

In some spots there was a low barricade. Which looked very low from the passenger seat of a motorhome:

In other spots trees served the purpose:

And in other spots, barb wire was employed:

Even when protecting us from ravines such as this:

You may not see the fence in the trees but it is there.

At the top of the mountain we were greeted by this sign:

Very aptly named town. We wondered if we should drop in and say a little prayer before heading down the mountain. Which we knew we must do.

The drive down was even more scary. But the country side was beautiful:

 With several old abandoned houses along the way:

This one had a plaque describing its history (I assume) but there was no spot for us to stop and check it out. Looks like a school house.

Eventually we found highway 441:

This was almost enough to make us turn around and head back into the mountains.
You can follow more of our adventures on our facebook page
To contact me click here

Florida Sunshine

When I was a child, growing up in a small Nova Scotia fishing village, oranges were a special treat. We called them Florida sunshine. One was always included in our Christmas stocking and I remember Mom using them to make marmalade in February.

Avon Park, FL, where we spent a month, is situated in the centre of Florida's citrus growing area. There are thousands and thousands of acres of citrus trees growing along what is called "the Ridge" or "Florida's Spine". This area, also called The Highlands, is around 200 feet above sea level and the land on either side slopes down to the Atlantic Ocean to the east and the Gulf of Mexico to the west.

The groves are readily accessible from the roads and before the harvest ripe oranges lay at the base of each tree. Apparently these are gathered as juice oranges and it is against the law for passers-by to pick them up. A stiff fine is involved so no one does.

Just north of Avon Park, in Lake Wales, is this huge juice production plant:

And across the highway, an information centre:

We were anxious to learn more about citrus fruit growing and production so off we went to spend some time there.

It turns out that this is a grower-owned cooperative called Florida's Natural. The co-op has 1000 grower members who own more than 50,000 acres of citrus groves in Central Florida.

On the grounds were examples of the different orange and grapefruit trees grown in the area:

Inside excellent displays and a movie told us the story of citrus production in Florida. Did you know that the first citrus seeds were brought to Florida by Ponce de Leon in the early 1500's. It took about 15 years for trees grown from those seeds to produce fruit. Today, a the small tree started from a seed is grafted with branches from a mature tree and will produce fruit in three years.

Blossoms, green fruit and ripe fruit all appear on the tree at the same time.

Additionally, the fruit must be ripe when picked. This means that each orange must be picked by hand by people climbing ladders with large bags strapped around their shoulders.

The bags are then dumped into larger containers which are taken to a central gathering point where they are loaded into trucks for delivery to processing and packing plants:

After the harvest this huge trimmer is used to trim the trees so the new growth gets the sun:

The trimmers go very quickly through the grove trimming the sides and tops of the tree:

We were disappointed that there were no orchards close to Avon Park open for us to tour so all the orchard pictures above were captured along the highways, whenever we spotted some action. The fellow driving the tree trimmer above actually backed up when he saw us pull over, so I could get a picture.

We are now in Moore Haven, the heart of sugar cane growing country and I understand that there is a tour we can take to learn about this Florida industry. We did not know that Florida grew sugar cane so are looking forward to that.

On the Road Day 6 to Day 23

It is time to bring you up to date with our trip so far - it has been quite a ride!

Day 6 to 8 Cape May, New Jersey
Once we were moved to a quiet spot in the campground we really enjoyed Cape May. It was very touristy but our first opportunity to get out on the beach and that was fun - cold but fun.

Tara was anxious to get in the water but it was way too cold wade in with her.

Day 9 to Day 12 - Jane's Island State Park in Maryland
We took the ferry from Cape May to Lewes, Delaware then a short drive to Jane's Island State Park on the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland.

This was Arch's first experience getting The Adventure Bus on a ferry. He did great. After the Tappan Zee Bridge any narrow spot is possible!!

We loved Jane's Island State Park. It is a very under-used park in an out-of-the-way location and the area was fascinating. We enjoyed many opportunities to meet local people and learn about the area. The town of Crisfield was next to the park and has been really impacted by the US recession. Many closed businesses, unfinished condo developments, etc. Additionally, at one time there was a big plan to run a ferry across the Chesapeake to Crisfield, thus making it easier for visitors from Baltimore and Washington to get there. This didn't happen but resulted in much over-development of the area.

Farm stands still operate on the trust system here

While at Jane's Island we drove across the state to spend a day at Assateague National Seashore for a picnic and a walk on the beach.

Miles and miles of beautiful beach. This part was for people (and animals) only, but further south was a large area (miles) where you could take your vehicle on the sand - with a permit. A lot of surf fishers do this.

This horse was enjoying a swim at Assateague National Seashore

More on our visit to Jane's Island here

Day 13 and 14 - First Landing State Park, Virginia Beach

Our trip from Cape May to Virginia Beach started well -  another beautiful day. We were motoring along, then bang! A blow-out! Arch drove slowly along the side of the road until we found a place to pull off. We thought the day was lost. Road side assistance was a couple of hours away. Then along came Sammy.

He was on his way home from a medical appointment (kidney dialysis), noticed our flat tire and pulled in to offer his services. His business is changing truck tires and moving trucks around. And he had all the equipment to change our tire in the back of his truck. We decided to forego roadside assistance and hire Sammy. The tire was changed in a flash and in 30 minutes we were on our way.

Crossing the 17 mile Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel was like driving on the ocean. We crossed this before but high up in a motorhome you see so much more and the experience is really different..

Although at least 4 experts, including Sammy (he thinks we hit something on the road that caused the tire to blow-out), told us our tires are fine but, we knew they were old so decided to put 6 new ones on The Adventure Bus while in Virginia Beach. Expensive but worth it for peace of mind.

We did not enjoy Virginia Beach. The folks at the state park were more concerned about enforcing rules than supplying services and they charged $5 per night PER PET. We paid the $15 for Tara but did not tell them about Princess. So we were not sad to leave when they closed the park because of the approach of Hurricane Sandy

.

Incidentally, Tara and Princess are doing great.

Waiting for the tire to be changed - she lies on the floor when we travel

Princess wants to know what is going on

We are calling her Princess Super Kitty now. She loves The Adventure Bus, mostly sleeps on the bed while we travel but occasional comes to sit with me and watch the world go by.

Day 15 and 16 - Falls Lake State Park, North Carolina

We went there to get out of Sandy's way. Falls Lake is a beautiful park just 10 miles from Raleigh-Durham area and proved to be a great spot to stop. The cities are beautiful and easy to get around. We used this stop to spend more money and get re-connected to the rest of the world via a Verizon MiFi device. We love it. We purchased the device and pay as we go for internet.

In avoiding Sandy we missed our stop on the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. The park we reserved a spot in was closed. This was a real disappointment as this is a beautiful area.

Day 16 to Day 18 - Wilmington, North Carolina

As they were closing Falls Lake State Park for the season on Oct 31 we left and headed back out to the coast. Wilmington barely escaped Sandy so we booked a night at the KOA there and off we went. We are not crazy about private campgrounds - they tend to be very crowded - but we did enjoy this one. It was quite a treat to have cable TV to follow Sandy, a really great laundromat and free internet - lets us save our Verizon time. When it became apparent that the campground at Cape Hatteras was not going to reopen anytime soon we decided to stay here for two more nights.

So we spent one day exploring Wilmington, a beautiful, historic city. Rebecca, you would love this vintage clothing shop:

The shop was closed. This is only the part of it that was out in a little art & antique market we stumbled upon:

I bought a scarf. It is very pretty but I think I bought it just so I could slip my money under the door:

This stop also gave us our first chance to play golf:

Because we leave Tara in The Adventure Bus we can only play 9 holes and finding courses where you can do this is not easy but we did find this funny little one between Wilmington and Kure Beach. It also operated on the trust system. We seem to be running into a lot of this. Wonder if it would work at Bay Hammocks.

Day 18 to 23 - Myrtle Beach State Park, North Carolina

We are back on track and really enjoying our stay in Myrtle Beach. The beach is gorgeous, of course, and it is warm enough to let Tara go out in the waves. Once again there are horses on the beach.

Lots of them. On Saturday, 1200! A fund-raiser of some sort for the Heart and Stroke Association.  Boy, did they make a mess of the beach - horse poop everywhere. But by Sunday the tide had washed it all away and the beach was usable again.

We found a great golf course to play - 27 holes divided into 3 nine hole segments. Short and fast. Perfect for us.

And the State Park in probably the nicest so far:

The 1/2 K entrance was second only to Fox Harb'r

It has a private beach and fishing pier

And we can walk along the beach to the commercial area - it is about 1 mile

We could easily spend another week here but leave tomorrow for Hunting Island State Park, also in North Carolina, and more adventures.

Incidentally, to enlarge the photos, simply right click on them.