I got up just before 9h to yet another in the streak of unusually lovely days with clear air, perfect for photography. This is the week I had devoted to visiting Cape Breton’s beautiful east coast and I had hoped to spend the night in St Peter’s, a great spot for exploring the area.
The Trans-Canada Highway is being repaved from Whycocomagh to Mountain Road in Blues Mills and I ran into construction delays there, where the pavement has been grooved for paving and shoulder work had temporarily closed one lane.
I turned onto Riverside Road and drove south to Highway 4. When I reached Cleveland, I recalled a road with fine views I had first discovered last fall; given the weather, this was the perfect day to capture them. So, instead of turning towards St Peter’s, I drove towards Port Hawkesbury and beyond MacIntyre Lake, I turned onto Barberton Road, apparently little known even to those who live in the area. A paved road, It runs north from Highway 4 to the Long Stretch Road in Askilton; on its northern end, it descends a long hill with fine views of the highlands to the north and east, reaching as far as Glendale. As I had done from the Riverside Road on, I stopped frequently for photos; Barberton Road is very photogenic, lined with great stands of yellow and white wildflowers on its shoulders (and some trees I wished I could have seen through), as well as those great distant views.
¹ Posted on Sunday, 2 July, for Tuesday, 27 June.↩
What river flows down from them across the fertile plains?
No one answered these questions. The highlands are known as the Big Ridge,
which form part of the eastern edge of the “Great Southern Interior Plateau” and belong to the Creignish Hills.
The River Inhabitants flows down from its source between McIntyres Mountain and Camerons Mountain,
crosses the Trans-Canada Highway at Glendale, and continues on its course to Inhabitants Bay,
an arm of Chedabucto Bay. This view is from Riverside Road in Princeville.
Name the crossing roads.
Shelly Campbell named West Bay Road and Stella MacRae named Riverside Road. Both are correct.
Official usage and Google Maps both label the road crossing Riverside Road the Cenotaph Road,
though local usage, as I understand it, uses West Bay Road for the portion east of Riverside Road
and Cenotaph Road for the portion to its west.
making the valley through which it flows very fertile.
This is the River Inhabitants at the junction of Highway 4 and Riverside Road in Cleveland.
This is MacIntyre Lake, seen from the side of Highway 4.
growing in very inhospitable ground, are visible in this photo,
but it was a riot of small flowers, yellow, white, and blue/purple.
This photo was taken along the rails of the Cape Breton and Central Nova Scotia Railway
a short distance from Highway 4, which is visible by the signal lights.
What little train traffic there is doesn’t seem to bother them.
The Wildflowers of Nova Scotia guide names this as “tufted vetch”,
also known as cow vetch, bird vetch, and Canadian pea, while a very knowledgeable friend calls it crown vetch.
Anyone who can name this road gets full props! I discovered it for the first time last fall and
detoured to capture it on this beautiful day.
No one answered this one: it’s the Barberton Road with the Big Ridge rising in the distance.
This view looks to the northeast towards West Bay Road.
The white dot right of centre is the church seen above in photo [#2].
That identifies it as McIntyres Mountain.
At the bottom, I turned left onto Long Stretch Road and took it to Crandall Road, currently badly “washboarded” on both sides, where I crossed the upper waters of Little River, a diminutive stream here not too far from its headwaters in the Lexington area (the last time I had been there some years ago, I hadn’t even realized what this stream was).
crossing into Cape Breton easier. What is it?
Linda Rankin answered this one as “Porcupine Mountain”, a local name for what appears on the maps as Cape Porcupine.
A good portion of it was blasted and made into fill over which the Canso Causeway now runs,
connecting Cape Breton to mainland Nova Scotia.
In Port Hawkesbury, I had lunch at the Fleur-de-Lis Restaurant: my favourite maple nut salad bowl, as superb as always, with two large fish cakes and the best beans I’ve had anywhere in Cape Breton. After taking care of a couple of non-urgent errands, since I was there anyway, I finally started off towards St Peter’s.
As I drove down the 104, I recalled the lovely day I spent hiking at the Little River Reservoir a couple of years ago and decided to walk out to the dam, just 200 m (⅛ mi) from the entrance on the 104, marked by a blue DNR gate just east of kilometre marker 289. Once there, I was unable to resist crossing the dam and rephotographing the outflow of the reservoir and the river below the outflow, graced with a lovely 3 m (10 ft) waterfall. It was a lovely day and I greatly enjoyed revisiting this beautiful place so few know about (I learned of it from second edition of Michael Haynes’ Hiking Trails of Cape Breton).
You’re looking at the eastern half of the Little River Reservoir.
but instead a causeway over which the St Peters Branch Line, a now abandoned railway, once ran.
The reservoir continues on the far side of the causeway as far from the causeway as it is to it on this side.
This is a big reservoir! And a beautiful place to visit.
it’s at least as tall as many of the mature trees in the area below the dam.
this one is to the left of the first view of the reservoir.
that receive the outflow of the Little River Reservoir.
The metal grates allow one to look down at the base of the tunnels.
The structure here could be used to shut off the water flow altogether
if it was necessary to keep the water levels in the reservoir high enough
for the pumping station on the far side of the St Peters Branch Line causeway
that once upon a time transferred its waters to Point Tupper.
Note the horizontal cement structure running across the right side of the photo,
seen in the next photo from beyond the end of the tunnels.
singing joyously of its newfound freedom as it cascades down.
When I returned to the car, I noticed a car parked across the road and another blue DNR gate, so I crossed the highway to speak with the gentleman there. He had no relation to the DNR and didn’t know if the road beyond the gate was private or not, but he said to go ahead and explore it; like me, he thought it might follow along the Little River (later study of Google Maps revealed that it ends on the Port Malcolm Road near the bridge over Little River, but does not parallel the river as I had hoped; I still hope to check it out sometime).
I continued on towards St Peter’s and ran into construction just down the road and again further on; I was delayed both times. I drove across the fine new bridge over the canal in St Peter’s and continued on to Joyce’s Motel where I had intended to stay and found a No Vacancy sign out; I checked at the office and was told they were full up, even though no vehicles were around. I assume the road construction workers had booked all the rooms. This is the one night this trip I hadn’t reserved a room, as I didn’t know whether I’d be in St Peter’s or Louisbourg or Reserve Mines when I made out my schedule. I could have driven back to Port Hawkesbury, a distance of 44 km (27 mi), or could continue on towards Sydney, a distance of 86 km (53 mi), and chose the latter as it would leave me better positioned tomorrow to see the east coast. I’d normally have gone to Louisbourg, but the place I usually stay there is changing hands and I wasn’t sure it was even open for business, so I pulled into the overlook at Irish Cove and called my go-to place in Reserve Mines; they had available rooms and I reserved one for the night there. The drive north on Highway 4 is a beautiful, undulating one along and often high above the shores of the Bras d’Or Lake, offering glorious views, but the clear skies of the early afternoon had given way to mostly overcast ones and I didn’t stop for photos.
Once at the end of the 125, I decided to stop at the Swiss Chalet for supper: its chicken soup was superb; I also had egg rolls (I’ve had much better) and the beef on a kaiser roll, that came with a dipping sauce and rice pilaf, all fine. I then checked in to the motel in Reserve Mines, read and relaxed a while, and then worked on Thursday’s account, which I completed and posted. I was in bed by 23h30.