On to Cape Brenton Island

Cape Brenton Island is at the northeast end of Nova Scotia.   Cape Breton Island is part of the province of Nova Scotia, Canada. Although physically separated from the Nova Scotia peninsula by the Strait of Canso, it is artificially connected to mainland Nova Scotia by the long rock-fill Canso Causeway. The island is located east-northeast of the mainland with its northern and western coasts fronting on the Gulf of Saint Lawrence; its western coast also forming the eastern limits of the Northumberland Strait. The eastern and southern coasts front the Atlantic Ocean; its eastern coast also forming the western limits of the Cabot Strait. Its landmass slopes upward from south to north, culminating in the highlands of its northern cape. One of the world's larger salt water lakes, Bras d'Or ("Arm of Gold" in French), dominates the centre of the island.

 

  We are staying at a campground near Baddeck, close to the Cabot Trail.  Baddeck Cabot Trail Campground is one of the better we have been to on the trip.  Easy access, true big rig sites, and a very helpful staff.  A view of the surrounding mountains and a sand beach at the river.

John Cabot discovered the island in 1497. During the Anglo-French War (1627–1629) , under Charles 1, by 1629 the Kirkes took Quebec City, Sir James Stewart of Killeith, Lord Ochiltree planted a colony on Cape Breton Island at Baleine, Nova Scotia and Alexander’s son, William Alexander, 1st Earl of Stirling established the first incarnation of “New Scotland” at Port Royal, Nova Scotia. This set of British triumphs which left only Cape Sable as the only major French holding in North America was not destined to last. Charles 1’s hast to make peace with France on the terms most beneficial to him meant that the new North American gains would be bargained away in the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1632).

 

The turn of the 20th century saw Cape Breton Island at the forefront of scientific achievement with the now-famous activities launched by inventors Alexander Graham Bell and Guglielmo Marconi.

Following his successful invention of the telephone and being relatively wealthy, Bell acquired land near Baddeck in 1885, largely due to surroundings reminiscent of his early years in Scotland. He established a summer estate complete with research laboratories, working with deaf people—including Helen Keller—and continued to invent. Baddeck would be the site of his experiments with hydrofoil technologies as well as the Aerial Experiment Association, financed by his wife, which saw the first powered flight in the British Empire when the AEA Silver Dart took off from the ice-covered waters of Bras d'Or Lake. Bell also built the forerunner to the iron lung and he experimented with breeding sheep.

Marconi's contributions to Cape Breton Island were also quite significant as he used the island's geography to his advantage in transmitting the first North American trans-Atlantic radio message from a station constructed at Table Head in Glace Bay to a receiving station at Poldhu in Cornwall, England. Marconi's pioneering work in Cape Breton marked the beginning of modern radio technology. Marconi's station at Marconi Towers, on the outskirts of Glace Bay, became the chief communication center for the Royal Canadian Navy in World War I and up to the early years of Word War II.

Promotions for tourism beginning in the 1950s recognized the importance of the Scottish culture to the province, and the provincial government started encouraging the use of Gaelic once again. The establishment of funding for the Gaelic College of Celtic Arts and Crafts and formal Gaelic language courses in public schools are intended to address the near-loss of this culture to English.

The Scottish and Irish influences can be seen everywhere.  What draws many tourists to the island is the Cabot Trail and the many music venues around the island.

Cape Breton Island is a magical world filled with traditional music. The astounding number and quality of musicians is matched by the knowledgeable enthusiasm of their audiences. As Alasdair Fraser put it, the locals not only know a vast repertoire themselves, they know the differences in how various musicians have played each of these tunes, going back 30 or more years! This intense, exciting music is attracting fans of celtic music from around the world. After you have listened to some Cape Breton music, everything else seems tame.

Cape Breton music is compelling dance music, and as such it is; and dance the Cape Bretoners do, with their low-to-the-floor, intricate step-dancing, a style that disappeared from Scotland decades ago. If Cape Bretoners between 10 an 75 years old hears that one of the better fiddlers is playing for a dance, without hesitation they gather friends and drive for hours if necessary to one of the intimate parish halls, such as those at Glencoe Mills, West Mabou, Southwest Margaree. For next 4-5 hours, these little halls shake with the percussive steps of entire villages in lengthy sets that test the endurance of even the most fit dancers, and demand of the fiddlers repertoires of hundreds of tunes. These events are referred to as " a ceilidh"

A Ceilidh (pronounced "Kay-lay" is many things. It derives from the Gaelic word meaning a house party, a concert or more usually an evening of informal Scottish traditional dancing to informal music. Ceilidhs in the Lowlands tend to be dances, in the Highlands they tend to be concerts.

Tomorrow we will drive the trail and find the music.