Day 22 - Canadian Maritimes 2026 - Beach Morning at Cheticamp, Casino Boondocking in Moncton NB

While pouring our coffee early in the morning at the beach by Cheticamp, we pulled open our mini blinds to look out at the ocean. 

And what did we see???

Oh my goodness! This beautiful golden eagle was standing on the shore, looking around in the morning light. I ever so carefully grabbed my large camera with the zoom lens...

What a magnificent bird! He stood there for a while looking around. After I snapped a few more photos, I switched over to video mode. And I kept the camera aimed right at him.

We stayed as quiet as we could within the motor home, with me just pointing the camera out of the open window. If you look at the video at the end of this blog post, you can see him eventually flex his wings wide apart and push himself up into the air, ever so gently and gracefully. Watch as he moved forward to fly up over the roof of the motorhome!

We watched him land further down the beach to look around again. I don't know if he smelled our breakfast cooking or not, but he sure seemed curious about what we were doing inside of the RV. 

I'm so grateful that we are able to get these glimpses up close of such beautiful wildlife. We surely wouldn't be getting that if we were staying in a crowded campground. But because we were out here on this remote beach in a peaceful quiet setting, we were able to get this little moment with such a magnificent bird.

Now we opened up the rest of the window blinds and looked around. The sun was coming up over the mountains to the background and a long narrow band of mist was rising from the land. Oh my, such a beautiful spot...

These are the type of mornings that we want to remember. To preserve forever in our minds. To look around and gaze upon such beauty. This is different than what we see in Wisconsin. It's also different than what we see out in the desert, or up in Alaska, or when we were in Oklahoma and Texas. The beauty of being able to travel in our rv, allows us to wake up in different places all around the country and see different things.

The peacefulness all around--- of total quiet and tranquility, only broken by the sound of the waves on the shore. As the gentle waves would hit the shore, little bits of gravel would push ahead and then recede. It made almost a rattling sound. 

There's some really nice beach and wave action footage on the YouTube video link at the end of this blog. Watching those waves lapping on the shore is almost mesmerizing.

We walked along the beach after breakfast and enjoyed the soft breezes blowing on our faces. We could look backwards over the route that we had come as it wound it's way down amongst the craggy rocks and hills to get down to this level. It had been quite an awful day of driving the day before, and we were glad to be done with that part of the Cabot Trail. If the weather had been nicer, or less windy and rainy, we might have enjoyed that section more. But we did endure a lot of construction and muddiness and just waiting for pilot cars.

We had only put on 79 miles yesterday, but they were rugged and long and slow. It was not one of our best travel days. I think that made us relax and enjoy the morning even more so. We felt kind of "battered" from the day before. 

As we walked along the shoreline, Steve found this little yellow agate. These are the kind of rocks that we were looking for up in Alaska. This one is not shaped perfectly, there is a gouge out of one side. But it still was pretty cool. We didn't see any Sea Glass in this area. But (hint hint) that would come at our next stop!

We wandered among the clumps of seaweed here and there on the rocky shore. The seaweed has a distinct odor to it. Not really stinky, but salty and kind of vegetation-ish. Definitely not the smell of dried autumn leaves that we have in Wisconsin as they decay. The seaweed has a odor of rotting wood in my mind. We looked among the clumps to see if there were any interesting creatures. But I think that the tide had been out for so long that anything interesting would have scuttled away by now. Or eaten by the eagle?

As we walked back towards the motorhome, I snapped what I think is one of our absolute best photos I have ever taken of it. I know I take a lot of pictures of our rig, we are kind of proud of it. But this one to me looks almost like it should be in a magazine ad!

Yep, that's what traveling is all about. Having our comforts at hand to stay at places out in the rugged wilderness. Long gone are days of ever wanting to be backpacking or in a tent or sleeping on the ground. By having our own soft bed, our own bathroom, and our own cooking facilities and safe transport of food.

We had downsized 3 years ago from a 40 ft luxury diesel pusher. We had only purchased that one because we thought we would be living in it full time in our later years. But as things change, and we bought a home base, back closer to the children. Then it was decided to sell that larger motorhome. By downsizing to the smaller 25 ft motorhome, we are able to get into littler places, maneuver around easier, and just maintain it easier in our old age. It is much easier than the larger motorhome. It was a wise choice. 

Pulling the little cargo trailer behind has added a lot of comfort to taking the possessions along that we need. Because the 25 ft Winnebago View has such a limited cargo carrying capacity, having the little cargo trailer really helps us. Now we can bring along extra gear and our bikes and additional supplies as needed.

But when we traveled to Alaska, we did it all just within the motorhome. And that was a little tighter and restrictive on what we could take along.

Adjusting and adapting is necessary when we travel in an RV. But I think we are extremely grateful for what we do have. We don't take it for granted.  Sometimes, when walking back towards the motorhome, we just smile and enjoy the fact that we are able to travel around in such a beautiful RV. Not bragging, just appreciating it.

Steve grabbed my camera, and swung around and snapped one of Nicholas and myself. I don't often get photos of myself, because I'm the one always taking the pictures! I'm glad Steve took this picture, cuz I will always remember where it was and what we saw and what a great morning we had at Petite Etang Beach.

The weather reports did not look good for the next three, four or five days. It was going to rain rain and more rain in this area of Cape Breton. So we looked at the maps and decided we would get off the cape, cross that Port Hastings, and work our way back into New Brunswick. Time was running out and this was our return trip now that we were no longer heading East. As we head West, we are thinking ahead to getting home, seeing our children and grandchildren, and getting out of here before the weather turns too cold.  This is the approximate route that we are going to want to travel today...

But before we could leave this little village of Cheticamp, we had to stop at the bakery on our way out of town. We had passed it on the way to the beach, so we knew exactly where it was. 

Remember, this is Steve's new hobby. Visiting bakeries! He is searching for an elusive cinnamon roll that equals the one we had at Tetsa River Lodge on our way to Alaska while we were driving through the Yukon. I don't think he's ever going to find that, but he is sure going to have fun trying.

We wandered in, making our selections. 

The segment of inside the bakery is on our video link down below.

We chose a variety of things to restock our cabinets before heading on out. The day was going to be intermittent sunshine and clouds. I was hoping to maybe get some nice pictures while we were traveling. The trees are becoming more deciduous so we are getting a little more color. Further out on the cape it has been mostly pines and cedars, so we weren't getting quite as much color. 

We were totally enjoying the rolling landscape and the cute little neat houses spaced here and there throughout this area of Nova Scotia.

We see a lot of houses with gingerbread type trims, the cute little bric-a-brac features. Our little farmhouse back at home in Wisconsin has some bric-a-brac on the screen doors that we put on all three entrances. We have been inspired now by looking at the passing homes, and we think we are going to add some gingerbreading to the front porch on our own home once we get back to Wisconsin.

Again, I reiterate that everything seems so neat and well taken care of as we cruise on through the countryside. All of the houses are pretty and proper. Pride of ownership is evident and you don't see clutter or junk or dumpiness. I think people are appreciative of what they have, and take care of it to the best of their ability. 

Even public spaces, like this little harbor and pier. Everything is neat and trimmed and you don't see anything junky or weedy laying around. In the morning light, this bright blue boat struck my eye.  I think everybody else went out fishing, but this guy decided to stay moored up to the dock. Just in time for me to snap a pretty photo...

As we meandered along, I just happened to have the camera in my hand as we saw this beautiful yellow home and outbuildings across the water. The reflection was absolutely perfect! 

There's no filter or alteration whatsoever on my photos, and this is exactly what we saw and it's exactly what the camera captured. Wow!

As we roll along through the countryside, every curve and every twist and turn reveals a new scene. Being a horse nut ever since I was a little girl, I always have my eye out for horses in pastures or paddocks. Whenever I snap a picture of one, I also send it to my friend Vicky back in Wisconsin. Fellow horse nut.

Even though the skies were clouding over, some of the colors were still presenting themselves along the roadsides.  It's hard to get the true effect of autumn colors on a cloudy day. But it's also hard in bright midday sun as well. Late afternoon evening Golden Glow is probably the best time. Well, this was the middle of the day, and this is the best you're going to get from me.

I'm also attracted to Old Barns. Their sturdiness and utilitarian structure also has a certain amount of grace and peaceful blending with the countryside around them. I think of the days they were first built and how farmers were so proud of their newest barn. Seeing them maintained and taken care of over the years shows the appreciation and need of maintaining their structures as part of their livelihood.

This one appears to have cedar siding that is slowly battered by the salty sea air over the years. It still is in good condition, and I see the newer addition on the right. I think about the family who said to themselves: "now that we added three more dairy cows to the herd, we better have a milk house to store our milk in before we sell it to the creamery". I have a silly imagination like that. But that's exactly what it looks like, somebody increased their dairy herd and needed a place to store the newest equipment for chilling and pasteurization before the milk truck comes to take it away.

We wound our way down along the shoreline and then worked our way back up into the hills again. When we dipped down near the ocean, things were foggy and cloudy. The mists were not rising very high off of the surface of the water. At times we were literally driving through the clouds!

This is really beautiful countryside, and I wish we had a little bit more sunshine while we were driving through. But that was not to be. 

As we got closer to Port Hastings, the clouds increased as well as the fog when we got down to sea level. We crossed over the causeway to get back onto the mainland of Nova Scotia, it almost felt like night time. But it was only 11:00 a.m.

We drove on in a northwesterly direction, heading towards New Brunswick. Most everything now was rural farmland and agricultural as we moved away from the seaside. We were now done with our magnificent ocean views. 

We fueled up and got propane as well at a Walmart stop at New Glasgow. 

The diesel fuel prices are coming down a little bit as we get more inland. After the exchange rate and calculating from liters to gallons, we are paying about $6.94 a gallon. We are averaging about 13.2 miles per gallon even with all the hilly twisty turns. That's not too bad. Sometimes we get up in the 14 mpg range, but not with this many hills.

Our Park4Night guide app mentioned a gas station that also had a dump station and free water fill on the back corner. It was quite hidden, and you would have to look for it. It was specifically not marked with signs or arrows, I think reserving it just for their own customers. There isn't even a knob on the faucet spigot, and you are told to bring your own pliers!  So of course we patronized them by filling up with diesel fuel, and then swung around the back side of the building to find this elusive Debert dump station:

Mission accomplished, our tanks were now emptied and we were able to refill with fresh city water. Although we filter our drinking water, and for Nick's water dish, we do appreciate city water in our tanks that has been filtered and processed, rather than questionable well water from rural parks or wells at campgrounds. 

Actually, after getting our fuel, we took a little break at Walmart and took a nap. We were putting on more miles than we normally do in a day. But we figured with such gloomy dark rainy weather, we might as well get some miles underneath the tires.

We entered New Brunswick at 6:16 p.m. Goodbye Nova Scotia.

We had to pay a toll on the Trans-Canada Highway because we were not New Brunswick residents. For the motorhome and trailer we had to pay $10. That was surprising. We had never encountered that type of toll before.

We were putting on quite a few miles in one day. We tried to only do 200 miles or less. As we were reaching the 300 mile mark, Nicholas was telling us he thinks he had just about enough traveling for the day. He grabbed his little reindeer and said it's time to go to bed!

We ignored him for a little while, but he kept pushing his little reindeer at us and insisting it was time to stop driving and do something else. His little doggy brain was getting a little bored after 300 miles. So it was time to look for a place to spend the night.

It was getting darker, and we are still in the Atlantic time zone so night time hits an hour earlier than what our bodies are used to.  Through the waning daylight, we could still see the pretty trees, is the colors were flinging by us on our way towards Moncton, New Brunswick.

We have decided to try something different for the night. We were going to overnight boondock at a casino! We have never ever done this before, so we can call ourselves "Casino Virgins"?  

We don't gamble or buy scratch offs, so we really don't ever have the need to hang out at a casino. But we do know that they have facilities available for RVs. We looked up online and this is the photo of the building that we were looking for in the almost darkness:

According to their website, we needed to follow the signs and park in their RV area. Then we needed to go inside to register. Okay. That sounds good to us.

It was just getting dark and we found our way to the front of the casino, then we followed signs around to the back. There were plenty of street lights to illuminate our way around the building. Even then we really couldn't find the designated parking spot and didn't see any other RVs. So I went on Google maps and did an aerial view to see where the RVs are parked. Found them!

Once we got settled into a spot and got ourselves level, we set Nick up in the motorhome with his food and water. Then we locked the doors and walked all the way around the building to the front entrance to be able to enter to register. 

It was a long day and we certainly didn't want to walk all the way around but we had to. We got inside and spoke to the security guard. Go figure! He said that during the off-season we don't need to register and just pull in and enjoy and that was it. Ugh! All we wanted to do was get back to our rig and make some dinner and go to bed.

Which is exactly what we did...

Here is the video that goes along with today's blog: 

Join us tomorrow when we work our way over to St John to see an amazing natural phenomenon of a reversing waterfall! Then we end the night at Sea Glass Beach by Blacks Harbor.

307 miles traveled today

2,882 miles traveled so far

Day 21 - Canadian Maritimes 2026 - TURNAROUND DAY - Cape Breton - Cabot Trail - Cheticamp Beach

 TODAY MARKS OUR "TURNAROUND DAY" ... AFTER 2,500 MILES, 

WE ARE AS FAR EAST AS WE CAN GET. 

TIME TO TURN AROUND NOW AND 

START HEADING BACK HOME!

It rained all night long in the snug little harbor of Hawley's Cove. Sound of the rain on the roof of the RV is soothing and helps us sleep comfortably. We are cozy warm in our RV even when it's cold and damp. We put Reflectix insulation sheets on the windows and we have the propane furnace running. We also have an electric mattress pad heater that keeps us snuggly and comfortable.  Now that we've upgraded our battery to a big Vatrer lithium, also we use our Bluetti power station as a plug-in power source, we can run those things all night long and not have to worry about draining our power.

We peered out the windows and saw both fishing boats still moored tight in the harbor. Guess we didn't have to worry about being parked in anybody else's way. Nobody was going fishing on this foggy wet rainy icky morning.

There were mud puddles all around us, but we were on firm ground, I am sure after many many decades of trucks coming and going from this little harbor.  We brewed up our coffee and decided to get a start on the day and hit the road. We weren't sure how far we were going to drive with this type of fog. Looking ahead on the weather reports, it looked like the next three or four days we're going to be rainy wet and windy in this area of Cape Breton.

The heavy fog was starting to lift, even though we could not yet see the tops of the hills surrounding us. It was almost eerie to watch the wisps of moisture work their way upwards into the sky, over the tops of the hills. That's something we don't see in Wisconsin.

Driving along the oceanfront, the waves were rolling in with big white caps.  The gusty winds as we were clinging to the little road along the shore were battering us around a little bit in the motorhome.  It was another "Two Hands on the Wheel" kind of day. 

We pulled over a couple times along the route to view the Atlantic Ocean in all its fury.  With the waves crashing on the rocks, we didn't see any sea wildlife along the shorelines. It was so blustery, we didn't even see any birds.

We worked our way around the northernmost route that the highway could travel. There were some teeny tiny roads that went north of the town of Cape North. But we opted to not take those. We wanted to stay on the main highway. When I say highway, we're only talking about just a smooth two lane road, no wide shoulders, and it's not any type of interstate. lol!

We are seeing a change in the terrain, it's almost all rocks and scrubby pine trees in this area. Very similar to what Door County is in Wisconsin, or up around Lake Superior.

Being in the most rugged land facing the North and the East, I think that these trees need to be pretty hardy to be able to exist and grow on the rock.  

It's amazing how much the road construction crews many many years ago chiseled through the rock to make this nice smooth road. This route was a lot easier driving than the one on the day before.

Once we looped around the top edge and started coming down the northwestern shore, tree species got a little more varied and we saw some deciduous ones again here and there. But the colors are not as vibrant as they were further south.  It seems their color change here is just at the very beginning for the Autumn weather. 

On some of the highest ridges we could look over these beautiful serene valleys. Could you imagine having a home with big picture windows facing out to look at this view everyday? Oh my goodness...

We worked our way along with this winding road, with the chiseled rock borders guiding our way. There were very narrow shoulders, there wasn't a lot of room to pull off anywhere, unless it was a designated pull-off spot for picture taking.

I was snap snap snapping pictures as we were cruising along.

This is what I meant about the trees growing in rugged hardy conditions. It doesn't even seem that there is any dirt. The roots are just clinging to the rocks and the whole terrain for them to grow on is nothing but a big huge rock! 

We were enjoying the nice smooth ride. The road really seemed to be in great shape. But of course, this time of year means there's a chance of road construction to get things nice before the snow flies. So everything we were driving on appeared to be pretty new. Of course, up ahead, we could see an orange sign. Yep.

Now it was time to wait. Yes, it gives us a chance to look around at the scenery and hope for some wildlife. We didn't see any. Finally the pilot car came and we could get around this first section. We were hoping it was just an isolated spot of a washout that they were repairing.

But no, no such luck. We ambled our way through stops and starts, weights and delays, and then crawling ahead of the slow pace. 

Have you ever seen a caution sign like this?

I'm not sure where the stones were flying from. If it was off the trucks ahead of us or from the cliffs alongside of us. Either way, we were fortunate not to have any hit us.  

We started seeing a few more towns. Things were getting a little more commercialized and geared towards the tourists. Things were not quite as rugged and rough anymore. We were seeing art galleries and coffee shops and gift boutiques as well as interesting bed and breakfast accommodations. Geodesic Tent Dome Glamping anyone??

The fog was finally lifting but it was still going to be cloudy and gloomy. I didn't have any high hopes for spectacular photography or anything visually enticing for today. Nor for the next 3 or 4 days either. But that's okay, we saw a lot of beautiful things on the day before to hold in our memories.

It seems like we were winding our way down down into the valleys, and then before we knew it we were climbing up up on another high ridge line. The scenes were unfolding before us, and changing with every turn.

The type of rock seems to be changing. It's more of a lighter gray and seems to be running in diagonal slabs. Can you imagine chiseling through this stuff just to create a road?  There were plenty of caution signs about falling rocks. In this photo below you can see why...

We are now about halfway down the western shore of Cape Breton. This is on the side that faces the Gulf of St Lawrence.  The winds seem to have died down and the waves were calming on the surface of the water. The rain was intermittently splattering on and off. But the road construction just never seems to end.

In this stretch, it appears to have large portions of the bank that had washed away. I think they were trying to get everything restored before winter hits. It must be a real challenge trying to get work done--- when the only route around the entire Cape is also your construction zone? 

Coming around a curve, it was amazing to see this huge rock with its diagonal striations. Just imagine the force and strength of the Earth as it was creating these rocks with glacial movements and pressure. Frozen water did that! 

The drops of rain on the windshield kind of messed up the photography. But the rain on the muddy surfaces made things slick and slippery. It almost felt like ice in some sections. We were going very slow and being extremely cautious. The motorhome and cargo trailer were also getting very, very muddy! Steve started to talk about trying to find an RV wash somewhere. Good luck with that.

We did reach one stretch of interesting rock that was more red again, like the iron ore that we are familiar with in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Most of the rock that we have been seeing today was gray. When this red rock was wet, it was even brighter than I think if it was dusty and dry.

We were skirting along the last edge of shoreline before reaching the town of Cheticamp. You can see up ahead the type of roads we were on, because it finally cleared up enough to give us a view of the terrain.  Lots of ups and downs along the rocky shoreline.

We followed along our concrete ribbon, safely avoiding the worst of the road construction and finding our way down towards sea level again.  We have sure run into the variety of altitudes and weather changes, and crazy road conditions today varying from smooth and new to ongoing rough and rugged repairs. 

We were finally down to sea level and just a few turns left to get to the small beach that we were intending to spend the night. We were breathing a sigh of relief that it was time to exit this driving experience and relax for the evening.

See that little strip of sandy land over there in that cove? Yep, that is Petit Etang meaning "Little Pond" in French.  We could see it while we were still driving higher on the hill...

But as we got closer, the fog moved in! We were really glad to be getting off the road, but we were worried about finding our turnoff to get to the beach.  Are running lights / fog lights really didn't do much to cut through the haze.

We found the two signs that we needed to find r turn, and drove past a bakery that was closed right now. But no fear, it would be open in the morning and Steve would be able to try out their delicacies. We drove on further to the north and found the final turn to Petit Etang.  It was too wet to even get outside and take a picture. You'll have to wait till tomorrow's blog to see our walk on the beach when it wasn't raining.

The rain was pouring down, and it was a relief to be off the road and relaxing now for the evening.  I had a pile of fresh veggies and some chicken to cut up. It was a perfect afternoon to simmer up a pot of soup. Homemade chicken vegetable noodle soup. The process is on the video link included down below. All I can say is that it was absolutely wonderful and the inside of the motorhome smelled marvelous.  

Soup is one of Steve's favorite meals...

The rain kept coming down for the rest of the day. I'm glad that we were off the road, and safe and sound. At least the temperatures were warm enough that it wasn't going to freeze. We were only going to be down in the 40s overnight. I cannot imagine it hitting down into the low 30s and trying to manage with ice everywhere and all of those hills??? 

Instead, we hunkered down and relaxed for the evening. Steve was watching some YouTubes and I was editing the next video on my laptop. This is really a pretty picturesque view for my little mini office from the cockpit of the motorhome.  I'm glad I don't have to deal with this type of rainy wet weather all of the time. But for a day or two, or three, I guess we can handle it. There's a beauty and a rugged rawness in this land that is appealing. But I really honestly don't think I would want to live here.

I guess that is all I have for this blog today. We are sad to be turning around and heading back, but also we know we still have another 2,000 miles or so ahead of us with more adventures.

Here's the YouTube that goes along with today's blog post: 

79 miles traveled 

2,578 miles traveled so far