The Maritimes, Canada

The Halifax Explosion Was the Largest Accidental Man-Made Explosion Before Hiroshima

A munitions ship and a supply ship collided in Halifax Harbour in December 1917. The resulting blast destroyed the north end of Halifax, killed around 2,000 people, injured 9,000 more, and was heard from 200 kilometres away. The rebuilt Hydrostone district, constructed in the years following, is still one of the more architecturally coherent post-disaster reconstructions in North America. Halifax is a city that contains more history than most visitors expect, and it is the right starting point for the Maritime provinces.

Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island occupy Canada’s eastern seaboard and are routinely overlooked by international visitors who stop in Montreal, Quebec City, and Toronto without continuing east. The lobster alone – the lobster suppers at PEI church halls, the harbour-fresh shellfish in Nova Scotia – justifies the detour.

Nova Scotia

Halifax (450,000 people) has Citadel Hill above the city, the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic with a serious Titanic collection (Halifax was the nearest major port and handled many victims and survivors), and a university town energy that keeps the food and bar scene genuinely occupied.

The Cabot Trail on Cape Breton Island is 300 kilometres around the northern tip through Cape Breton Highlands National Park. The western coast of the Trail offers cliff views over the Gulf of St Lawrence that rival anything in Atlantic Canada. Cape Breton has the highest concentration of living traditional Scottish Gaelic culture outside Scotland – fiddle and step-dancing in the Cape Breton style are heard in pubs and community halls, not staged for tourists.

Lunenburg on the South Shore is a UNESCO World Heritage site: an 18th-century German Protestant settlement with primary-coloured Victorian architecture. More interesting and considerably less photographed than Peggy’s Cove (the lighthouse photograph is famous; the experience involves a large car park and summer crowds).

New Brunswick

The Bay of Fundy has the highest tidal range on earth – up to 16 metres in the upper reaches. The Hopewell Rocks on the Fundy Shore are carved sandstone columns exposed at low tide that you walk around on the ocean floor, then watched from above as 10 or more metres of water cover the same ground six hours later. Check tide tables before going.

Prince Edward Island

PEI is connected to the mainland by the Confederation Bridge (13 kilometres, the longest bridge over ice-covered water in the world). The red sandstone cliffs, enormous north shore sand beaches, and flat red-soil farmland create a landscape unlike anywhere else in Canada.

The lobster suppers at rural church hall restaurants – chowder and rolls, a full fresh lobster, dessert, paper bibs, church basements – run approximately CAD 50 per person and are the correct meal on PEI. September through October brings fall foliage, quieter villages, and significantly lower accommodation prices.