1 of 12
Maine Blueberry Country
2 of 12
Lobster boats in Alma - low tide.
3 of 12
Lobster boats in Alma - Bay of Fundy
4 of 12
Bay of Fundy rock formations - low tide
5 of 12
Bay of Fundy beach - low tide
6 of 12
Bay of Fundy beach - 6 hours & 48 feet later
7 of 12
Bay of Fundy beach - high tide
8 of 12
Chariots of Light motorcycle gang
9 of 12
Chariots of Light - a "different kind of biker"
10 of 12
Lobster traps in Canada
11 of 12
Signs in Cape Breton - English & Gaelic
12 of 12
Sunset on Gulf of St. Lawrence
We said good bye to the giant Maine blueberries (see photo) and crossed into the Canadian maritime province of New Brunswick, headed for the tiny coastal village of Alma (smaller than Alma, GA!).
This wide spot in the road is all about fishing, like most of the villages along the winding coastline of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. Alma has a circa 1950s motel and a couple cabins. The one we stayed in - tiny but clean - had a TV with rabbit ears!! The recommended restaurant was in the back of a convenience store (!!) that stocked an amazing collection of items needed for canning. Outside was a working pay phone booth with a phone book hanging from a chain. It was certainly a step back in time!
But the picturesque harbor was the heart of the town, literally and in spirit. Colorful hulled boats were tied up to a dock stacked with wooden lobster traps. This was a change: the traps in Maine had been made with wire.
But these boats were not bouncing gently on the waves....they were sitting on reddish-orange sand about 30 + feet below the dock. It was low tide in the Bay of Fundy where the tide can rise and fall as much as 50 feet twice a day...the highest tides in the world.
Actually the boats were propped up on little boxes tied to the keel with rigging. The boxes keep the boats from tipping over as they sit on the ocean floor. They sit waiting, like the fishermen, for the tide to turn.
Life here revolves around the tide. Only during that narrow window of just a few hours can the fishermen maneuver through the narrow channel and navigate the rocky coastline to check their lobster traps ...and then return.
Of course, the timing changes daily and thus so does a fisherman's schedule. The tide that turns at 10 am today will turn at 4 pm just a few days later.
"Time and tide wait for no man" was never truer than for the lobster men of Alma.
To fully appreciate this drama, we drove up the coast a bit to Hopewell Rocks. We arrived at low tide, climbed down several flights of metal stairs (it IS a tourist attraction) and went out onto the sand. (See before and after pictures.)
Walking the beach for maybe half a mile, we were surrounded by towering, weird rock formations carved by thousands of years of erosion. At eye level, much of the rock was heavily covered with kelp. But looking up 70 feet, these "flower pot" rocks were topped with grass and trees!!!!
After walking around taking a ridiculous number of pictures for over an hour, we left for a leisurely lunch, returning later just past high tide.
The beach was gone. Several flights of the metal stairs were submerged. Where we had been walking & taking pictures just a few hours before was now the ocean floor beneath nearly 50 feet of water. Many rock formations had totally disappeared. The tallest, the "flower pot" rocks, now looked simply like rocky off-shore islands.
Nowhere in the world can you see such dramatic changes in the tide.
.......
An aside: Readers of last year's blog may remember my encounter with the Banditos motorcycle gang.
Well, one evening while strolling the 3 blocks of Alma, who do we spot but a group of motorcyclists...with matching leather jackets, all covered with identifying patches. I couldn't resist.
"Hi! Are you guys a group?" "Yes. We are the Chariots of Light"
"What's that?" I asked, already thinking this sounded much less intimidating than the Banditos."We are a faith-based group, Christian bikers."
After proceeding to share my Banditos encounter (they knew all about them!), they offered to do a group photo to prove to folks back home that not every biker is a bad guy!! (See photo.)
.........
In my previous post, I commented on the price of lobster. Now, seeing the many boats and the piles of traps on every dock, I had a zillion questions about the whole process, the traps, the business, the life of a lobsterman.
We were fortunate to strike up conversations with a bartender in Alma and a young woman in Cape Breton from a four generation lobstering family. They patiently answered many questions, sometimes laughing when my eyebrows shot up in surprise at their answers.
The lobster season at the northern tip of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, lasts only 2 months: mid-May to mid-July.
Each boat sets 265 traps that must be checked every single day! A trap can hold up to five lobsters that must meet a minimum size when measured from eyeball to tail.
The lobstermen in a "district"....a small stretch of coastline...meet each Spring and can choose to set their own limitations. For example, the district near our hotel had chosen to limit traps to 250 per license.
Most lobstermen belong to the co-op (the area's largest employer) that not only purchases all the haul, but also off loads it at the dock, stores the wooden traps during the winter, operates a processing plant and runs the area's grocery store ....all 3 isles of it!! (Fresh produce on Tuesdays...be sure to get there early!)
If the lobster season is only 2 months, what happens during the other 10 months??
Most lobstermen on Cape Breton also fish for snow crab. These traps are much, MUCH, larger than the lobster traps and hold ALOT of crab. And all those nice big snow crab legs you crack and eat? They are all male! The females are too small to bother eating ... and don't meet size restrictions anyway.
And in winter? "We just enjoy the snow. Ski. Snowshoe. Play hockey."
On the bay when it freezes over? "No. It doesn't freeze hard enough anymore. So we play hockey on an ice mat," she said enthusiastically. "Of course, we can't use skates...just rubber boots and a stick. Everybody plays: little kids, people in their 60s. "
"Of course, my dad spends the winter getting ready for the next lobster season. "
This young woman, who has worked both on her family's boat hauling lobster, as well as working in the processing plant, proceeded to describe all that must be done to prepare for the short two month season.
New traps must be built. There's no reason why some traps are rectangles and some have the dome top; just personal preference
Obviously, lobstermen are pretty capable. As the bartender we chatted with said, many don't finish high school, but they know everything about hydraulics and how to fix an engine.
"Heads" must be knitted. "Heads" is what they call the twine interior of the trap which must be replaced every Spring and often throughout the year.
The "head" is the mechanism that actually traps the lobster. The lobster goes through the opening to get the bait (mackerel). The space where the bait is is called "the kitchen". As the lobster reaches for the bait, it slides down into the bottom of the trap called "the parlor". That's where it sits until the trap is hauled in.
Heads can be purchased ready-made but the woman had fond memories of watching her grandfather knitting two or three heads a night, into his 80s, while he watched TV. She recalled how he'd tie one end of the twine to a kitchen chair and how his hands would fly as he knitted.
Conversely, she says, her father hates knitting heads.
And do they eat much lobster and crab at home? "Nope."
When you do, do you eat the green stuff? "NO!"
Really? I'd heard it was a delicacy. "Maybe. But NO. No one in my family eats it. Some people do, I guess. " She looked at me like I'd suggested eating live grasshoppers.
Having thoroughly enjoyed the time and the conversation, I was grateful for their patience and willingness to share a small peek into the life of lobstermen.
And the lobster I ate that evening tasted so sweet. Was it the lobster....or perhaps my new appreciation of how it got onto my plate?
