7/4/14 – Awoke early to the rumble on the roof of a downpour, but it was over quickly. By the time we headed out on foot for the10 minute walk to bus stop it was cool and foggy. The bus ride and 10 minute walk to the ferry transfer to the harbor in Halifax is the real bargain of the day - $4.25 total for one geezer and his younger gal.

Once there, we walked along the boardwalk, taking in the sights and browsing the shops, with the fog lifted and the sun peeking through on occasion. We sat for lunch at Murphys Restaurant, where I had a bowl of award-winning seafood chowder (gluten-free!) and Nancy had a delicious baby spinach, beet, goat cheese, and candied pecan salad.

We then returned to a self-guided walking tour of the area, historic churches, bell-tower, etc..

…including a GUIDED tour of the Lieutenant Governor’s house – one of the earliest buildings in the area. The current holder of this position – appointed as the provincial representative of the Crown - resides here with his family, and when Queen Elizabeth and William and Kate were in town, he vacates and it becomes their residence. Of the furnishings in the public rooms, there is a very uncomfortable-looking Chippendale ‘sofa’ worth $750,000.

We continued our walk, including the Farmer’s Market, Nancy yearning her garden, then stopped for dinner back on the Wharf at the Bicycle Thief Restaurant. Nancy had  ‘Fresh Halibut, Cast iron seared, Roasted fennel, mushrooms & Artichokes, truffled Mascarpone sauce’ and I had ‘Pistachio honey-crusted Atlantic Salmon, oven roasted, Wildflower honey, fresh herb beurre blanc’, both excellent!

We then strolled across the parking lot to the Smiling Goat coffee house, where I had a Chai Latte and Nancy had Latte, as we listened to the sweet sound of jazz. This was a venue of the Halifax Jazz Festival, and our entertainers were the Breagh MacKinnon Trio, students from a college.

There were some great performers later in the evening at the main festival venue, but we didn’t want to delay that long getting back to the campground, so back on ferry, hurry to the bus, then dragged back to our rig by nine. Call it a day!

7/5/14 – About 6 am the wind is picking up, so Arthur is arriving; it will be a day hunkered down in camp. The wind picks up, accompanied by fine driven rain, but as the wind keeps blowing harder, the rain abates. We were able to get camp showers and did four loads of laundry, while conversing at length with our Newfoundland neighbors about what to see and do there. It seems that Arthur turned a bit northwest, concentrating its fury on New Brunswick and PEI. Our camp host had us move out of the way of potential treefall into the tent sites, so no hookup tonite – not a problem. Tomorrow we are off, probably up the coast toward Cape Breton. Howling winds outside…