Road Trip Report: Maine and Martimes

[Mdcastle]

General Route- I-95 to Portland, Yarmouth Ferry, NS 103, Back roads along the Atlantic Coast to the Causeway to NS 4, NS 105, NS 104, Woods Island Ferry, PIE 1, NB 2, I-95

Dollar wanted $10 a day to rent an EZ-Pass, so I passed. I had to detour to avoid the Tobin Bridge southbound, but I wonder how long until enough roads switch to the point I'll have no choice but being horribly price-gouged by the rental company.

The Fairbanks house is something neat to see along 128, it's the oldest scientifically documented house in the US.

Enjoyed having my phone for navigating through Salem.

Got to see the LL Bean store. Notes on the Portland-Yarmouth ferry are in the Canada board.

If you're thinking about following the marked scenic routes along the Atlantic beyond Halifax, don't. Besides probably doubling the time as opposed to the expressway, some of the roads are so bad I scraped the bottom of the car trying to take them at posted speeds. I eventually started to weave back and forth depending on which lane was in better shape, and saw other cars doing likewise.

Cape Breton Island was just beautiful with the fall colors. The Sydney Holiday Inn screwed up and had us down for a single room, I refused to take it so they had to put us in a water view room which was the only double they had left.

I realize that Canada doesn't overbuild roads like the US does sometimes, but it would still be nice for the North American freeway system to extend onto Cape Breton Island, and maybe even to Sydney as a Super 2 if there's not enough traffic on the Island itself.

Canadian "Moose Warning" signs really do get the point across. Also, I spent 4 years in frustration trying to learn French because learning a language was something we were "supposed" to do in High School. I hated every minute of it, had zero aptitude for it, and never got even close to conversational. However I'm OK at reading basic phrases to the point I don't have to mentally translate them, and often caught myself reading the French instead of the English on the highway signs.

Things were actually slow going in Charlottetown. They might have to think of building some interchanges on the bypass eventually. Although the Maritimes are really jumping on LED streetlights, I enjoyed seeing low pressure sodium lights in the field, something I haven't for many years.

Even though I don't like sideways traffic lights, the shaped lenses on Prince Edward Island were unique.

Was not impressed much with northern Maine and New Brunswick. Yeah, it was nice scenery, but it was the same kind of scenery a couple of hours north from my home, and the leaves weren't as pretty as in Nova Scotia.

I called the rapid flashing green arrows "seizure lights". My sister called them "disco lights".

Maine has retrofitted all their high mast lights with LEDs. Stopped as soon as we crossed the border to plug the Sim card back into my phone (I had pulled it out to disable the phone upon boarding the ferry earlier).

[Mdcastle]

Transportation Photos Here https://www.flickr.com/photos/26956281@N02/sets/72157646698014374/

[1995hoo]

Nice pictures. Too bad you weren't able to do the Cabot Trail. Given the fall colors in the pictures you posted, I'll bet that drive would have been spectacular.

When you refer to the scenic routes beyond Halifax, I assume, based on the map you posted, you took the Marine Drive? That's one of two major scenic routes I've never used in Nova Scotia. The other is the portion of the Fleur-de-Lis Trail around the southeast corner of Cape Breton Island, and the proprietor of the Louisbourg Harbour House told me it's the worst road in the entire province. My parents drove the Marine Drive back in 1998 or 1999 and stayed a night or two at the Liscomb Lodge (one of three provincial-run resorts, along with the Keltic Lodge in Ingonish Beach and the Pines in Digby). They really liked the resort but didn't comment on the road. I wanted to go that way last time I was up there but couldn't make it fit the schedule.

[leroys73]

Enjoyed the pictures.  I drove up there in 1975 from Oklahoma sure has changed. I hope to make it again this next summer by motorcycle.

[Tom958]

I especially liked this one. Neat idea.

[Pete from Boston]

I especially liked this one. Neat idea.

I took the van over ($4 fare vs. $40 toll to drive then, since gone up), and during the wait for the return van, this segment was my primary entertainment. 

This forum surely represents the market segment among which this monument design tests best (though honestly I can't remember what my control-group girlfriend had to say about it all these years later).

[oscar]

I especially liked this one. Neat idea.

I took the van over ($4 fare vs. $40 toll to drive then, since gone up), and during the wait for the return van, this segment was my primary entertainment. 

This forum surely represents the market segment among which this monument design tests best (though honestly I can't remember what my control-group girlfriend had to say about it all these years later).

For everyone else, there's the Anne of Green Gables statue elsewhere in the Gateway Village complex.

[Pete from Boston]

I especially liked this one. Neat idea.

I took the van over ($4 fare vs. $40 toll to drive then, since gone up), and during the wait for the return van, this segment was my primary entertainment. 

This forum surely represents the market segment among which this monument design tests best (though honestly I can't remember what my control-group girlfriend had to say about it all these years later).

For everyone else, there's the Anne of Green Gables statue elsewhere in the Gateway Village complex.

I thought she was on Cape Breton.  Anyway, we didn't stray from the pickup point.  Even though we were the only ones riding, the guy must have been required to leave at set intervals, and there was some unclear wait period involved. 

The van was great, though, for being able to sightsee/take pictures.  Someone else drives, and you're sitting up high with lots of windows.