We came for the foliage and that's what we got. Trees, trees and more trees in every shade of yellow, orange and red. New England is coverered in forests and very attractive, mostly white timber houses. Lots of lakes and rivers but very little wildlife. Most of the birds have flown south leaving only some geese, seagulls and eagles. We've seen lots of squirrels, chipmunks and a few raccoons but, despite hundreds of roadsigns warnings, not a single moose. We live in hope.
We have done some lovely walks in The White Mts of New Hampshire, Arcadia NP in Maine and Cape Cod.
Thanks to the strength of $A the sost of living for us is quite good. Food and petrol are very reasonable but the economy is very sick.Unemployment is over 9% meaning 15 million are out of work. People are losing their houses and struggling to survive as many do not qualify for any government benefits. Very tough.
We are now in Nova Scotia, Canada for a while. Much more expensive here and suddenly much colder.An Arctic wind means we are now wearing all our layers. Autumn is much more advanced and the trees are past their best. But its very beautiful with lots of rugged coastline and fishing villages and certainly similar to Scotland in some ways. Gaelic is taught in some schools and the town names are mostly Scottish...Inverness, Glencoe, Aberdeen, Dingwall and so on. There are lots of Macdonalds and other Macs.But the land is still thickly forested and only sparsely populated in many places.
Next day Success. We have had along day driving the famous Cabot Trail on Cape Breton Island. Very scenic. For about 3 hours we drove through the Cape Breton Highlands NP and stopped several times to walk into known moose habitat. We saw fresh moose poo and tracks but still no moose. Then beside the road a group of people were looking at something in the distance. We stopped and there were 2 moose bulls. Not exactly a close encounter and the photos wont win any prizes, but better than nothing.
Our next goal is a bear...
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