Day 10 - 2025 East Coast Adventure - Into Canada!

July 27 - Acadia National Park, ME to New River Provincial Park, NB

We had another rough night of sleep initially as we continued to try the idea of sleeping in the hammocks.  While it took us a while to get to sleep, once we were all in the camper, it was a good night of sleep.  Still, we got a later start to the day than we had planned.

We had a breakfast of pancakes and eggs on the skillet for breakfast then packed up and, after a quick farewell to Snax and Lola, we were on the road. 

We headed east on highway 9 and there was a stretch where we went 20 miles without seeing a building. Fortunately, the building we found was Airline Lodge, a campground and store/restaurant.  While they offered a lot (when you're the only building for 20 miles, you sell a lot of different things), we tried their DELICIOUS pastries and blueberry muffin. 

We stopped again one last time in the US to fill up on gas before crossing the border and we entered New Brunswick, Canada!  

We learned that we switched to Atlantic Time (1 hour ahead of Eastern). My phone/watch had some issues figuring this out, but it got there eventually. 

Once we crossed the border, we only had 40 minutes to get to camp.  However, because we approached the ocean as we travelled, the car temp dropped from 84 to 68!  I guess the North Atlantic can influence the air temp!

Anyways, we arrived at the new river beach provincial park - our home for the day. We set up camp and then went to explore the beach. It was almost exactly high tide and while the bay was VERY cold, there was a shallow inlet that was bearable. The boys really wanted to stay so we agreed to let them hang out for a couple hours before we went to St John to get more groceries and see the river. So, back to camp we went to change. 

After getting back to the beach, we found that the tide had already started going out and so the inlet had shrunk. Apparently that didn't matter to the boys because they just wanted to, you guessed it, dig in the sand. 

I, however, was fascinated by the water, especially when I realized that it was FULL of plankton. I literally couldn't put my hands in and strain water through my fingers without catching some. I knew this is what brings the whales into the bay of Fundy, but to see it in life is unbelievable!  If you watch the video, hopefully you can get a sense for just how many small critters are moving in the water.

After watching the tide go out and the inlet shrink further, we dragged the boys off the beach and back to camp. We got some warmer clothes (wind off the bay is seriously chilly) and headed to St John. We made a quick stop at the river before heading to the grocery store. It looked pretty calm as it would between low and high tide. 

Shopping in a foreign place is always interesting and we ended up buying a lot of new and novel treats. I'm sure they will all be delicious. 

After the store, we headed back to the river and boy had it changed!  What had previously been a calm looking body of water was now a class 6 series of rapids!  It was truly amazing how the tidal change has influenced the river. 

While observing the river, it was fascinating to see the water birds work the river. They would fly to the upstream beginning of the rapids, land in the rapids, then disappear into the current only to come out substantially downstream. And then they would fly back upstream only to repeat the process. Either there's a lot of fish or cormorants are daredevils of the first degree!  Hopefully you can see the birds in the video.

While I had rushed my dinner because I wanted to get out to observe, the rest of the family had opted for a more relaxed meal. Eventually they came out and joined me and we toured the rapids together. I was in a different area when they called me over because they had spotted a seal!  Sure enough, it seemed to be posing for the picture!  As we watched, another one showed up!  How fun to see nature like this. 

As the sun began to set, our rough night of sleep from the day before was beginning to catch up with us. So we headed back to camp.  I started a load of laundry ($2.75 Canadian for a wash AND dry!) and then went back toward the beach to get a look at it at low tide.  Below is the same general area with three pictures - when we arrived near high tide, an hour or so later, and then at low tide.

After the laundry finished, we all climbed into bed for an evening cooled off by the Bay of Fundy.

Trip mileage - 1,658

# states - 12

# provinces - 1