jaunt to the airport

The ocean cold is gripping us here and even temperatures above draw the bitter damp right through you. But that's November.

On the first of the month we set off to the airport to gather up our honoured guest and old friend, Connie, who came for a week's visit. It was a gorgeous afternoon, not the rainy forecast we'd been expecting.  But that's becoming normal, these false alarms.

It wasn't always easy to get a good exposure in the contrasting sunlight but I thought this fine old house was worth sharing with its 2 chimneys and 3 dormer windows, the middle one larger than those flanking it. Three is the magic number, used again in the covered porch with its 3 groups of 3 windows.

a modern cattle farm

closer to the cattle

more cows in the afternoon sun

another large operation near Hantsport

along the Gaspereau River as it begins to widen into a huge "S" before it spills into the Minas Basin

Silos with supportive equipment

just beyond the Freddie Wilson overpass, colour still glowing

looking Southeast over the mountains

Falmouth, built on lowland, with the mountains rising in the distance

Birch and White Pine

outcrop of gypsum

another gypsum outcrop

gypsum cliffs

FYI: Gypsum is a soft mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate, that is 2nd only to coal as a mineral resource in Nova Scotia, whose mines are the largest in Canada. Quarrying began in Nova Scotia in the 1770s, when farmers in Hants County first found gypsum deposits on their land and started exporting to the United States. By 1818 the industry employed over 150 men locally and 50,000 tons were being shipped annually. These early quarries were chiefly around Windsor, Falmouth and Hantsport. Subsequently, even larger mines were opened around the province.  In 1953 the huge open-pit quarrying began at East Milford, Halifax County began and is the world's most productive mine of Gypsum to date. Originally used as a fertilizer and paint filler, Gypsum, is the main constituent in many forms of plaster, blackboard chalk and wallboard,  the latter commonly known as Gyproc.

As we begin to climb the rising Mt. Uniak, spruce on the rocks

Despite a late getaway, we got to the airport in time to meet Connie.

First stop: Pier 21, landing place, gateway to Canada for one million immigrants between 1928 and 1971, of whom Connie was one at the age of 4 years old. 

More to come of our jaunts over the week that she was here, the only time Wally and I seem to get out of our fix-the-house rut.

Til then....

peace dear ones