Halifax, the Titanic and the Steinbrechers

Dateline Halifax, Nova Scotia and at Sea
October 23, 2210 hours in the North Atlantic

Another riotous ride in the North Atlantic tonight. Not quite as bad as the previous two, but we have been encountering gale force winds, either cross-wind to the ship or right down our length. The mirror in our stateroom right in front of the computer is rolling from side to side, as well as up and down. Gee, what fun!’

Arrived in Halifax, Nova Scotia at 0800 this morning. We were up at 0700 and off the boat by 8:45 after hitting Jimmy (Buffet) for a large breakfast.

As you may or may not know, Halifax has quite an amazing history as a sea faring town (it is actually a city of some 300,000 these days) that has played some major roles in North American history. The city has been a strategic asset to both the Brits and the French since the early 1600’s. We had an opportunity to visit a Citadelle that the British used for almost 300 years to protect their assets in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, once they threw the Frogs out.

When the Titanic went down off the Grand Banks in 1912, Haligonian (that’s what the natives are called) fishermen picked up debris from the liner, as well as some 245 bodies off the North Atlantic, and brought them into Halifax. We toured the Maritime Museum of the North Atlantic this morning, and they had a ton of items on display that the local fishermen brought in off the ship. There are some 150 bodies of those who drowned in the disaster buried in local cemeteries here. They also came up with an ingenious methodology (by 1912 standards anyway) to identify the bodies and make sure the proper folks were notified. Body number 124 turned out to the none other than John Jacob Astor.

During World War II, all of the American and Canadian convoys ferrying supplies for the Great Britain, Murmansk and Archangel runs to Russia formed here, including the infamous Convoy 237, which lost 18 of its 29 ships to Nazi U-Boats.

We spent the day walking all over the city, and of course, Carol found two Starbuck’s here, so she is back on track. We visited the Victorian Gardens in the center of the city, and went through some churches that have been here since the late 1700’s. A very historical, but modern city and we continue to meet the nicest people as we walk through the cities. As always, Steve took some wonderful photos and you can find them on our Google Picasa Photo Album, we have also added some fall color photo, check them out at the Fall Colors Photo Album.

We had an unusual thing happen tonight when we left. There is another liner in town for the first time on this trip (a Norwegian Cruise Lines ship), and as we were preparing to depart the harbor, as the pilot came along to take us out, so did three Canadian navy guided missile frigates. They sort of cruised slowly around the large and very deep inner harbor here until we began making headway. They then blew right by us, with one taking station about 1500 yards in front of us, with a trailer in the same position behind us. Made us feel like we were sailing in 1942 with one of the convoys. Hopefully, no U-boats are lurking out there tonight, as the seas are rough and the wind is howling. Good news is that as we were coming back to the ship, we noticed the crews of both crews of the liners having life boat lowering and release drills in the harbor, so at least we know the damned thing works!

Also heard for the first time today that it is the Red Sox and the Rockies in the series. Last time we had heard Cleveland had them on the ropes ala the Yanks a few years ago. We have also been following the fires in Southern California via CNN, which the ship carries when we are in satellite range. It looks REALLY bad from the news so we are hoping that every one is alright. They stated on the news that 500,000 people had been ordered to evacuate?? Hopefully that was a screw-up.

Well, that’s it until he hit port at St. Johns, New Brunswick and find an internet port.