Overnight to Newfoundland

Meet Betty, a very helpful person and owner of the Bras d'or Lakes Campground where we stayed.  She and her husband are from Boston and bought this campground about 10 years ago.  The Campground is open from June 1 - September 30.  They spend the winter in Naples, Florida.

Before we left Baddeck we stopped by the Alexander Graham Bell National Historic Site in Baddeck.  Previous to today, I knew Bell as the inventor of the telephone, which he was.  But he was also a teacher, scientist and inventor with unusual success, to the benefit of humankind. He also produced important inventions and discoveries in medicine, aeronauts, marine engineering, genetics and electrical science, and greatly advanced the methods and practices of teaching the deaf to communicate.  Born in Scotland in1847, he became a citizen of the U.S. and longtime resident of Baddeck, Canada. 

Both he father and Grandfather were pioneers in phonetics and were well known teachers of speech. His father developed a written “speech” which was very helpful to deaf people. Bell began as a speech teacher in Boston and was able to develop the telephone from his knowledge of the way speech was transmitted using electric current. He was not quite 30 years old when he received the patent for the initial telephone (issued on March 7, 1876). On March 10, 1876, the famous, “Mr. Watson come here I want to see you,” was uttered and marked the “invention” of the telephone.  

In 1880 he was awarded the Volta Prize by France for his telephone achievement. He received $10,000 in prize money which he used to finance the Volta Laboratory in Washington DC. There he refined Edison’s phonograph and developed the graphophone. About this time he visited Baddeck for the first time with his wife, bought 50 acres of land to use as a summer home and a place where he could think and experiment in peace. 

In 1887 he met Helen Keller and he and Helen’s father became lifelong friends. Helen Keller credits Bell with expanding her horizons and changing her life for the better. In 1909, Bell was responsible for the development of the Silver Dart, which was the first successful powered flight in Canada. But perhaps he felt that his greatest development was the hydrofoil with which he set the water speed record of 70 mph when the normal mph on water was 17mph.  Anyway, he had many accomplishments in addition to the telephone and this museum did a fine job of conveying his many accomplishments. 

We left the museum by 2 pm to drive to North Sydney and the Newfoundland ferry.  It was a drive of only 35 miles but the scenery, of the Cabot Trail, was spectacular for the first 25 miles.  North Sydney, what we saw of it, is mostly about the Newfoundland ferry.  The ferry left at 5:30 pm, but we had to be checked in by 3:30 pm so we got here just before 3 pm.

Alexander Graham Bell Museum.

View of the small harbor our across from the Museum.

Frederick in the AGB Museum buying an annual pass for Canadian National Parks and Historic Sites.

Bell's office, as he left it.  The picture of the owl was done by his wife as a wedding present. She chose an owl because of Bell's penchant for working at night.  It always hung over his desk.

The hydrofoil that set the record for speed on water.

The Silver Dart, the first airplane that achieved flight in Canada.

Bridge to North Sydney.

Airstream waiting in line to board the ferry.

Our ferry, the Atlantic Vision, to Newfoundland.

We're next, into the maw!

Leaving port. the Atlantic Vision's sister ship in the background.

Another ferry waiting to dock at North Sydney when we leave.

Leaving the shelter of  land for the open water.

We are now on the ferry and decided to pass the evening by going to a very fine restaurant on board the ship and spending 2 hours eating and drinking one of the finest meals we have had in Canada.  We have a cute little cabin (berth) that is actually about the size of the Airstream bedroom and bath; maybe just a little bigger, so we feel very comfortable.  The passage will take about 14 - 15 hours and we are due to arrive in Argentia, Newfoundland, at 10:30  am Newfoundland time, which is 30 minutes earlier than Atlantic daylight saving time, which we are on now. 

This is Tamara, our server last night.

We are not surprised to learn that there is no internet access onboard ship.  So we are writing the text for this blog on Wednesday evening, July 9, but will only be able to transmit it tomorrow, on Thursday. Sorry for the delay.  

Update:  We are just arriving in Argentia and have restored wifi connection. I've uploaded the pictures and am ready to tap the send button.