Our B&B, Innisfree B&B in Hopewell, New Brunswick, has set the bar rather high for both accommodations and breakfast. The owners and operators, a relatively young couple from Montreal, have done an outstanding job of providing clean, spacious, and more than adequate accommodations; the landscaping is relaxing, simple, and natural with a wonderful walking path beginning with a collection of lobster trap buoys.

And the breakfast was to die for! The multi-course breakfast consisted of juice and a simple, but tasty homemade blueberry scone, accompanied by butter and several jams; an oversized martini glass filled with fresh fruit, all locally grown, including sweet wild blueberries, topped with yogurt and homemade granola; and lastly, huge Belgian waffles with locally made maple syrup. Allen, who with his wife, own the place, was alone during our stay while his wife was on holiday, but successfully managed to see to our every need, including preparing this sumptuous breakfast.

Driving a large, almost circuitous route, we returned to Nova Scotia, traveling through largely uninhabited country. At Truro, we turned south, and were awed by the sparse, but neat farms on Nova Scotia’s upper west coast. In the largely pastoral countryside, we saw beautiful villages with their white churches and colorful houses. Further down the coast, on the Evangeline Trail, we toured the Grand-Pré National Historical Site. Grand-Pré National Historic Site of Canada commemorates Grand-Pré area as a center of Acadian settlement from 1682 to 1755 and the deportation of the Acadians, which began in 1755 and continued until 1762. Grand-Pré was the basis of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s Evangeline. Though not positive, we believe my mother’s paternal side of the family, the Malotts (Maillet), included members expelled from this area to Maryland in the 1755 to 1762 period, then to Indiana, and finally to Arkansas.

After the day’s long drive, we arrived in historic Annapolis Royal for our overnight accommodations at the Garrison Inn. After a long wait, we were "acknowledged" by a young, inattentive innkeeper, who did little to make us feel welcome. Our room was quite small, and unadorned. After checking in we drove south to Digby, the scallop capital of the world, where we had an outstanding dinner of grilled scallops, baked potato, and fresh vegetables. And their lemon meringue pie was almost as good as my mom used to make. This was a great way to end the day!

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