Today was strictly a scenic day. No heritage villages, houses or museums. We toured around Digby a bit after checking out of our bed and breakfast and then headed down the Digby Neck. The Neck is a long narrow peninsula running parallel to the south-west shore of mainland Nova Scotia. It measures roughly 40 km long and 5 km wide. With the Saint-Mary’s Bay on one side and the Bay of Fundy on the other, Digby Neck is nearly surrounded by water. There is a lake midway that, surprisingly, is called Midway Lake. We stopped there to find a couple of geocaches.

The tide was coming in as we were driving back up the Neck to go to Yarmouth for the night and this bay was full of water. The tides are high and come in fast.

When you get to the end of the Digby Neck you can take a 10 minute ferry over to Long Island and the town of Tiverton. Long Island is separated from Digby Neck by Petit Passage. The ferry is supposed to run on the hour and half hour but they were going back and forth every time there were a number of vehicles waiting at each side.

It is easy to see the high tide mark on the ferry dock.

The ferrymen wasted no time. As soon as the last car was on board, the ramp was raised and off you went. There is quite a strong current in Petit Passage between Digby Neck and Long Island and the ferry looks like going sideways as it comes across.

We drove the length of Long Island which is 15 km long and 5 km wide and is primarily made of basalt rock. No nice beaches on these shores. At the end of Long Island you cross Grand Passage on another ferry to Westport on Brier Island. Brier Island is 6 km long and 2 km wide. Both Long Island and Brier Island are well known whale watching spots. 12 different species of whale enter the Bay of Fundy during the summer.

A young couple from the Czech Republic stayed at the B & B in Digby last night and we chatted to them at breakfast. They are heading home to Prague after a 2 1/2 year work/tourist stay in Canada. They did a whale watching tour yesterday and saw 16 whales and three breaches and were pretty happy about that.

When you get off the ferry at Westport on Brier Island you must immediately turn right or left. We went left and drove up to the end to the Coast Guard station and the Westport lighthouse.

On our way back to the town of Westport we saw one of the whale watching zodiaks heading back from a tour. Everyone is wearing full-body survival suits for protection from the frigid water in the event anyone falls overboard.

The ferry is heading back to Long Island with another batch of vehicles.

Every hydro pole had a seagull perched on it as we approached Western Light.

Since Bier Island is the most westerly point of Nova Scotia and juts into the Bay of Fundy with a very rocky coastline there are three lighthouses on it. One on the north, one on the west and one on the south. This is the Western Light. At this point the Bay of Fundy officially begins to the right and the water to the left is the Gulf of Maine. It is the third oldest lighthouse in Nova Scotia and still operational through a fully automated system. This is also a popular sunset watching spot.

We had lunch at Western Light and then drove back to Westport and over to Peter’s Light which guards the mouth of Grand Passage between Brier Island and Long Island.

Peter’s Light is inaccessible but has welcomed ships to Westport Harbour for generations. There are very rapid currents surrounding it from Southern Point. It is a bird sanctuary.

We headed back into Westport in time to catch the 2:30 ferry back to Long Island, then the ferry back to the community of East Ferry at the end of Digby Neck.

Once we got back to the top again we left the peninsula and headed down to Yarmouth for the night. Tomorrow we drive to Lunenburg which is on Mahone Bay where Oak Island is. We watch the Curse of Oak Island treasure hunt series on History channel and were planning to go on one of their tours, but this summer it is closed. Maybe after 10 years and who knows how many millions of dollars spent on the search they may be finding something? We will have to wait for the next season to find out but are disappointed we could not go to the island.