Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Cape Enrage and Lobster Mania

We caught a one day break on the weather pattern we've been stuck in for quite a while now and took advantage of it by scooting over to Cape Enrage to see the lighthouse at the cliffs and the rappelling and zip lining school that is operated there by some local students. New Brunswick has been "hilly." Steep ups and steep downs and not too many areas of flat at all. I found it more of a challenge to drive the coach here than in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. The grades aren't near as long but they are even sharper inclines and declines over short stretches- the minute you get rolling along nicely, it's time to start braking again. Challenging, but interesting.


Cape Enrage is described by some of the brochures as "the most beautiful scenery in all of Canada." to my taste it wasn't quite that good- but very good none-the-less and just having a blue-bird clear day made it seem all the better.

The construction of the beach was quite unusual. Up higher on the beach where the water hits with less regularity, there was a bed made entirely of flat stones, the kind you like for "skipping" on the water and over the waves.

The portion of the beach exposed to the constant batter of the tide and wave action was composed of smaller and rounder rocks. It was an Alan Magee moment for me.


If there was any thought of riding the zip line, it ended when we saw how abrupt it came to the end of the run...and failure to end the run by design would have meant smashing feet first into the ledge at the end of the run. I had a hard time pretending that would be a fun thing to do. Think I'll wait for a tree top rain forest run some other place some other time.

The lighthouse itself was rather small, especially in comparison to the size of the rocks it warned of. In this case size DOESN'T matter. But hold that thought....


Slide Show Rappelling at Cape Enrage


So far, we had walked from the parking lot down to the keeper's house. Them up the stairs to the light. Back down the steps to the zip line station. Down those stairs to the "stairs to the beach." Then down those stairs to see the rappelling brave at heart drop down the face of the cliffs. Back up the stairs again to the gift shop. Up the stairs to the parking lot. All these ups and downs sure can make a guy hungry!


So we stopped at Butland's Seafood market on the way back to the coach. There we found the largest lobster in the world for sale. Well, maybe not THE largest one, but darn big regardless. The price was right! By Maine standards it was downright cheap. And by Maine standards it was also downright enormous. Way too much lobster NOT to think about the next SEVERAL meals. We took it home with us.

With several well chosen added ingredients, we set off to build a feast. (Hope that will be the topic for another time....

But before we could start, Abby needed to make sure she knew exactly what was going on. I'm sure she was thinking as we were, "haven't seen one like this before". 9 Pounders are few and far between.

Polite little creature that she is (Abby that is to say) she remembered to thank Marilyn for the informative session.

And then it was time to drop this monster into the biggest of all pots filled with boiling water and dulce (at least the biggest pot we had on board).

Now think back to earlier in this post. Remember when I asked you to keep in mind that "size doesn't matter?" Well, here is the lesson to state the obvious. Sometimes size does matter! Ooops! No further comment!

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