June 17, 2019 - Yarmouth, NS

June 17, 2019

We had a whole day in Yarmouth and we began by having a continental breakfast in the dining room of the Lakelawn, served by Matthew with elegant table settings, cloth napkins and opera playing in the background. What a great way to start your day! 

It rained like the devil through the night and we woke to a sopping, dripping world and dense, grey skies. Matthew assured us the weather was supposed to improve with the day so we decided to make our first stop the Sweeney Fisheries Museum so we could be indoors for awhile. 

We didn’t know what to expect but the the Sweeney Museum was such a wonderful surprise. W. Laurence Sweeney was just a young man of 19 when he started the wharf, docks, fish processing plant etc in Yarmouth over 100 years ago. At it’s peak, it was the largest employer in Yarmouth. The museum was originally put together by the Sweeney family and was eventually gifted to the town of Yarmouth.

What is unique about this museum is that 90% of the material used in the museum is authentic, carefully preserved sections of the original buildings which have been scaled down and filled with authentic artifacts. They even built a 1/4 scale Coastal Freighter which is authentic in all details and filled with original artifacts. The entire display is interactive and you can touch and handle everything there which greatly changes the visitor’s experience from passive viewing to truly being part of it. 

Each little “building” is maybe 50-100 square feet and set up to represent various parts of the waterfront. There is a fish cutting shed, a supplies store, sail loft, smoke house, carpentry and machine shop, a steam engine shed, a marine slip, a ship’s stores, a cold storage and freezer as well as a scaled down version of Sweeney’s office which houses his actual office furniture and other paraphernalia. They have an archives which one could spend days in, perusing old photos and articles. This little museum is so cleverly done and we would highly recommend a visit here for sure.

By the time we were finished with the museum, it was time for lunch so, on the recommendation of the museum staff, we wandered over to The Shanty, a unique little cafe which is part of a social development project. There are several independent living homes in Yarmouth for adults with diverse abilities and development. The Shanty and the The Store Next Door are part of a social project where people can get an opportunity to work and develop their life skills. The food at The Shanty was excellent and we went next door to see the workshop where people make all manner of crafts including very cool Adirondack chairs from old hockey sticks donated by the arena and by Canadian Tire. In fact, The Store Next Door won an award for their work in upcycling materials that would otherwise end up in the landfill so not only are they a great social project, they’re also community leaders in environment efforts. Well done Yarmouth!

The weather continued to improve so we rode out to the lighthouse at Cape Forchu. En route, we stopped to take in the magnificent beach of Outer False Harbour, a shallow harbour that has a pristine slow sloping beach that curves gently around this little bay. As we were enjoying this lovely spot, we noticed a woman making her way along the shore with a large garbage bag, picking up plastic as she went. As I looked along the tidal wrack line, I saw an old, shrivelled up helium balloon (people!!! Don’t release helium balloons!!!) so I picked it up and brought it to her. We ended up having a wonderful conversation. Her name is Jane and she moved to Cape Forchu 6 years ago and, at that time, she said you couldn’t see the beach because of all the garbage brought in by the tide. Over the years, she’s become passionate about cleaning up the beach and she and a few others have taken on about 23 kilometres of coast in the Yarmouth area that they clean. She comes EVERY DAY in order to stay on top of it and, in the past 6 years, she’s picked up over 7 tons of garbage, most of it PLASTIC! (For those of you who know me, you’ll know I’m on a rampage about plastic these days...) Jane and I had an instant connection about our mutual passion she told us about how, while it’s taken a bit of time, the local fishermen and women have gotten on board and they now have a program called Ship to Shore (or something along those lines - I’m not sure I’m remembering it exactly) where all the local boats now have bins for recyclables which get picked up rather than all that plastic being chucked into the ocean. Jane is a rockstar in my books and I was so happy to meet her. To everyone reading this blog, be like Jane. Find your own way to help our poor struggling planet and all the creatures on it who are bombarded by our pollution. Go Jane!

We carried on out to the lighthouse which is a lovely site managed by Parks Canada I believe. You can wander the whole site on very nicely maintained paths and there are many Adirondack chairs placed here and there on hills and rocks where you can sit and look out over the Bay of Fundy. Lynn and I found two of them and sat for half an hour, just soaking up the rays and listening to the waves on the rocks. IT was so peaceful. It was very nice to just slow down a bit and not feel like we had to go, go, go...

Later, we toured through the town and visited the beautiful Frost Park in the middle of town which overlooks the water. There is a huge, magnificent fountain in the middle of this lush park and it’s also the site of a very old cemetery. There are some headstones with dates in the mid-1700s and one old stone has been partially encompassed by a tree that was planted beside it. We drove just north of Yarmouth along Lake Milo which has a lovely park along the shore and two big fountains near a gazebo. Yarmouth is a really lovely little town. We can understand why so many people (many from Ontario) are moving here.

We ended the day at Rudder’s Pub which is also a brewery. It was the best dinner we’ve had so far on our trip. Of course, more lobster for us, topped with flights of their in-house beer which was deee-licious! We thoroughly enjoyed our stay in Yarmouth and would come back again for sure.