New Brunswick Canada

Back in September we took an extended vacation to the Atlantic Provinces of Canada and ended up in Bar Harbor, Maine.

This post will focus on New Brunswick, Canada. A couple of revelations up front. New Brunswick is big and it is a long drive from Bangor where we flew in to Riverside Albert where we were staying for a couple of days. Also, the time is in the Atlantic Time Zone. It's an hour later than you think.

We stayed at The Maplegrove Inn. A cute, bright yellow building which includes an adequate cooked breakfast. 

This place was selected because it was close to Hopewell Rocks Park, situated on the Bay of Fundy. The park includes some incredible landscape. I highly recommend visiting. How the tides carve out the rocks is fascinating. The seaweed covering the boulders reminds me of giant mop-dogs sleeping in the sun.

This area of Canada is dotted with small towns and communities. Along the way, one discovers covered bridges. New Brunswick contains over 60 covered bridges.

Restaurants can be hard to come by, even with local recommendations. In the Bay of Fundy area we had lunch at the park - a lobster roll.

Before dinner we visited Waterside Farms Cottage Winery and tasted their famous blueberry wine - both sweet and dry versions. Surprisingly tasty. Unfortunately, they do no ship to the States.

For dinner we landed at the Tides in Alma, New Brunswick. It reminded me of the traditional seafood restaurants that I visited with my parents as a child, only this one featured lobster instead of shrimp and crab. 

We shared a Lobster Dip with crispy pita. Hubby decided on the scallops, a feature of the Tides. Decent, but not extraordinary. I went with an unconventional choice for me - Lobster-stuffed Chicken. Once again, decent.  Both were accompanied by a baked potato and veggies.

What was interesting about this place was the view. We could see the tide coming in and it came in fast. I was able to get a before and after photo.

On our drive back through New Brunswick we stopped at Fred's Restaurant in Cap Pele. Once again, a traditional place, but since Cap Pele is in the heart of Acadia country, all of the staff spoke French. Hubby enjoyed fried shrimp and I had an open-faced turkey sandwich. The turkey was real roasted turkey; none of the processed, sliced stuff here.

Before we left Canada, we spent the night in Saint John. This is the largest city in New Brunswick and cruise ships stop in for the day. A quaint place with some interesting church spires and architecture.

  A lot of the shops are only open when the cruise tourists roam, thus, we covered the heart of the town fairly quickly. We did visit Barbour's General Store and came upon a Canadian candy called Chicken Bones.

Saint John also features a market including a booth with fresh Dulse, a type of seaweed.

I think we did hit upon the best restaurant in town, Opera Bistro. When we crossed the threshold the place looked more like a take-out place with a counter displaying desserts and implements for coffee and espresso. However, when we perused the menu, we knew we had landed at a little gem.

The wine list was a bit challenging, but it seemed that the Province of New Brunswick had issues with supplying their Canadian residents with affordable and tasty wine. We ended up with a Cabernet Franc/Cabernet Sauvignon from Niagara's Jackson Triggs. Not bad.

To start, we had a warm lobster potato salad. Absolutely awesome! Hubby enjoyed baked salmon with a blueberry salsa. Right up his taste bud alley. I had the duck confit sandwich. Yummy! If you find yourself in Saint John, go here to eat.

New Brunswick is definitely the place to explore the Bay of Fundy and the varied and awe-inspiring geological formations. Great culinary places are few and far between, but little gems can be discovered.