Hopewell Rocks

Thursday 8/7

Our preferred campground is still nice, but it is getting very expensive. My two night stay is $115 ca for a no service campsite. This morning, when I added my second night, I asked about avoiding the construction. I meant in Moncton, but she told me how to get around the coastal road construction as well. The coastal road work can be avoided using Albert Mines Rd. The Moncton mess is bypassed using the second bridge from the east. Leaving towards NS today, these routes worked great. My return during rush hour caused me to bail on the second bridge because the traffic backup on that longer route began a mile sooner.

Cinnamon Soul Cafe was my lunch stop. Lunch because they stop serving breakfast before 1230. I was that late because I had made coffee until it was ok. Three spoons, two stirs, and a full seven minute steep. After that, I hiked Hopewell Rocks at hightide 1120. Captured hightide from multiple overlooks. Plan to retake the same at 1800 low tide.

While the tides left Fundy Bay, I rode back through Moncton to the NS border. To see Fort Beauséjour (Cumberland). Every trip to NS I have passed this way, at times camping just down the street, but never knowing it was here. Actually, there isn't much fort remaining, but what is there is cool to see. Namely the earthen embankments, a fortified bunker system, and stone walls with musket defense portals. Everything was well constructed and more precise than I would have expected. For example, the shooting holes in a very thick stone wall only viewed out a couple of degrees. You only saw a small sliver of the world to focus on or to worry about getting shot from. Each hole's view shifted slightly, so a single person could walk along to find where a target might be. But a person in every slot would be focused on one spot, and combined, the group would have eyes and guns, everything in front of it.

I managed to reach Hopewell Rocks at hightide and retook photos from my same positions. Then I went to the beach and took my standard too many shots of leaning rocks and crowds.

Back at the campground, I bought: firewood, pork, noodles, an apple, and a Corona beer. While prepping the fire, I did laundry. Then, I cooked a good meal. I had rushed the coals, so after cooking, there were a lot of logs left to burn down. I tended the fire until nearly midnight. With all the forest fires, it felt serious. The grass is very dry and embers that popped out would burn the surrounding grass. I sat with a stick and diligently snuffed embers outside my in ground fire hub. It did make me wish they didn't sell pine firewood.

I was glad to have clean laundry for my Maine camping. And I now just needed a shower. Got that done in time to crawl into the tent at midnight.