Day 3 - Digby & Brier Island

Hello! Bonjour! Hallo! Cześć! 

The last twenty-four hours we've had the pleasure of experiencing the Nova Scotia fog!  It's been cool to see it last throughout the day; coming in and going out like the waves.  It was another hot and humid day today!  We began the day by decorating the seats in the bus for our friend, Ryleigh, who was turning 11 today!  She got sung "Happy Birthday" at breakfast, again at the morning tour, enjoyed a treat in the afternoon and everyone got birthday loot bags this evening before bed!

We began our day by driving to Digby from Yarmouth to meet Greg and Danielle from GAEL tours.  Once again, we were surprised to be treated like royalty as the Mayor of Digby had come out to greet us and bring us gifts (two pins from Digby & a tour guide booklet).  Perhaps you'll remember the video we showed at our planning meeting back in June about the tidal pool adventure?  It was amazing!  Greg and Danielle were both so passionate about their work and were so good with the girls; they showed the most excitement we've seen since being here!  The tour was right on the Bay of Fundy; one of the world's most important ecosystems.  They began by showing us a tide pool above the high tide line (likely caused from sea spray) where we used magnifying glasses and mini aquariums to view the floaters and a crab exoskeleton.  

We then proceeded to a lower tide pool.  The girls were enthralled with the periwinkles (a type of snail) which they were encouraged to pick-up and observe.  Some got so attached, they gave them names and began singing to them to "keep them happy!"  Green crabs were another highlight; many of the girls were willing to hold them in their hands.  We saw beach peas, seaside plantains, and seaside goldenrod as well as Nova Scotia's provincial mineral stillbite.  We all had a chance to observe a barnacle feeding too!

We then got our "seaweed legs" and learned how to walk down into the long, dense seaweed (known as the rockweed zone) to observe the ecosystem which just 6 hours earlier had been under over 10 feet of water.  We learned about four types of seaweed: nori, Irish moss, sea lettuce & the "tastiest" seaweed (the one we sampled) dulse.  

 The view from Point Prim Lighthouse after the fog lifted.

 The view with partial fog...

 Seaweed under a magnifying glass

Point Prim Lighthouse

Beach peas & Seaside plantains

Greg instructing the girls

Periwinkles & barnacles

The bryozoan "lemon weed" - an animal not a plant!

Tia feeding her friend the periwinkle!

Julia with the edible (dried) pulse on the left and the "fresh" dulce on the right.

After our tidal pool tour, we began our drive to catch the ferries to Brier Island.  Our amazing bus driver Brad had been quite nervous about whether or not our large coach bus would fit on the smaller ferries.  Thankfully, it did!  We are so lucky to have him; he's been absolutely amazing!  

When we got to Long Island, we stopped at Balancing Rock a volcanic natural rock formation.  The hike in was 1.7km and ends with a steep 248 wooden stair descent to the shore.  When the molten lava cooled 200 million years ago, it cracked the volcanic rock into large rectangular pieces.  Although it appears as if Balancing Rock could topple at a moment's notice, it's withstood the test of time!  Despite the warm temperatures, the girls were rockstars and hiked without complaining.  We surprised them with birthday popsicles!  Yum.

We then proceeded to catch our second ferry to Brier Island.  Once settled into the lodge, we walked into the small village and overtook the gift shop and then the restaurant (which had closed for the evening so that they could accommodate us!)

We finished the evening with a presentation about the different whales that can be found in the Bay of Fundy.  Shelley, from Brier Island Whale and Seabird Cruises, was amazingly patient and was willing to answer all of the girls' questions.  We're all really looking forward to tomorrow morning's whale watching tour!

To conclude for the night here are a few pictures of our daily happenings... everywhere we go, we're delivering Girl Guide cookies and a thank you card!  See Simone & Madison in the picture below at Tim Horton's today.

And our evening journaling...how many people can you fit on a double bed?!  When you're squishing 30 people into one room. - the answer is A LOT!!