Today was an exciting day.  I found proof of my theory that rocks blow out the asphalt in roads just like the mushrooms blow out the asphalt on my driveway!

Almost ready to pop.  You can see the rise in the road made by the rock.  Also, with every day that passes we see more and more colour in the forests.  Things are starting to get very pretty.  The yellows will probably be the last colour to appear but even gold with the frequent orange and red will look very nice.

We left Fredericton and drove 112 km west and north to the little town of Hartland.  We did this for only one reason; well, two reasons.  The number one reason was to see the longest covered bridge in the world.  Number two reason was to enjoy some more New Brunswick scenery, which we did by following the St. John River via Highways 102 and 105 rather than Route 2, the freeway.  We were displeased to find the bridge closed to traffic as we wanted to cross it.  John said he wanted to drive across so he could sneak a kiss.

Covered bridges were called ‘kissing bridges’ because they were enclosed and young couples out for a drive could sneak a kiss without any parents or nosy neighbours as witnesses.  The bridges were really covered to protect the wood decks from rain, snow and ice.

After photographing the bridge we crossed the St. John River on a longer newer bridge and drove back down the other side of the river on the freeway.  We had planned to turn off at the small town of Canterbury and follow route 630 south to Andersonville but the road turned to gravel within a couple of km.  We were not going to go 40 km on a gravel road so we retraced our route and picked up the freeway again as far as Longscreek which is only about 30 km from Fredericton!  Then we took Highway 3 to Highway 1 to St. George.

At St. George the Masgaguadavic River flows through a very narrow gorge.  This gorge has been dammed for hydroelectric power and the water just roars through it.  At the other end of the gorge the bridge has a pedestrian walkway with an opening on each side that allows you to cross to the gorge side and stand on a little jutting platform to take photos.  Rather nice of them I thought! (Of course it was probably done in self defence to prevent an accident caused by inattentive people walking on the narrow bridge.)

We took a little drive around St. George before heading out.  St. George is called The Granite Town for their red granite quarry.  Stone from this quarry was used on many projects, such as the Parliament Building in Ottawa and a cathedral in Boston.

It was an 18 km drive west along the coast from St. George to St. Andrew’s-by-the-Sea.  St. Andrew’s was settled by United Empire Loyalists in 1783 following the American Revolution.  Many of their houses were dismantled, barged across the river from Castine, Maine and reassembled.  More than 250 homes in the historic district are 100 to more than 200 years old.  Main Street is 8 -10 blocks long of beautiful buildings and the houses stretch back for 4 -5 more blocks.  Many of them have plaques telling when they were built and by whom.  Tomorrow we explore.

When we arrived in St. Andrew’s we chanced upon the West Point Blockhouse, one of the few remaining blockhouses in Canada.  It was damaged in a fire in 1993 but the citizens and Parks Canada (it is a National Historic Site) repaired it.  It  was built by the community to protect themselves from privateers during the War of 1812-14.

John makes all our hotel reservations and I was wondering why he had booked us into a B & B when there were so many hotels available (St. Andrew’s has long been a holiday resort town).  When we located the Inn on Frederick and opened the door to our room I knew why.  Gorgeous place. It is huge with nine guest rooms.  The Inn is owned and run by a young Korean family who came to Canada 5 years ago and settled in St. Andrew’s after spending an hour having lunch here.  Jay would like to move west in about five years – for the fishing!