[Electric CO]

Some pictures for you from a little Insight trip my girlfriend and I took last week in the maritime provinces of Canada. We left from Montreal two Fridays ago after work and drove up to Rivière-du-Loup for our first stop. The next day we drove pretty much non-stop through New Brunswick spending the last 70 kilometres of our first tank of gas hoping for a gas station to appear with the gauge showing empty all the while. That was a bit tense. We saw a couple of cars stranded on that new section of highway between Fredericton and Moncton, no doubt out of gas. Somebody needs to put a warning sign up at the entrance of that long deserted section! Anyway, that first tank of gas took us 1021 kilometres. At the gas pump, we put 39 litres of fuel in the car. Good thing we had drafted that truck for over an hour the night before! Anyway, from there on in we gassed up the next two times slightly ahead of schedule.

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NB1.jpg

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NB2.jpg

We proceeded to the Confederation bridge (almost 13 kilometers long) leading us to beautiful Prince Edward Island, where we stayed two nights in the Cavendish area. PEI was the highlight of our trip.

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NB3.jpg

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NB4.jpg

We then took the ferry over to Nova Scotia and drove to a little town called Baddeck (in Cape Breton) where we stayed two nights. On the first morning there, we took off to do the Cabot Trail, a nice long scenic road going around Cape Breton. It was not exactly as grandiose as I was hoping, but the Insight was brilliant as always, with the IMA seeing full charge for the first time in months!

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NS1.jpg

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NS2.jpg

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NS3.jpg

The next day, we took off again and went to Halifax. Toured the city a bit then hopped in the Insight again for a stop in Peggy's Cove to see the picturesque lighthouse and the Flight 111 memorial. We didn't stay long there and left for Yarmouth where we spent the night. Some pics from the Yarmouth lighthouse and surrounding area:

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NS4.jpg

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NS5.jpg

We took the high speed ferry to Bar Harbor, Maine the next day and rode through Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont to make it back home. Picture of the Insight inside the Cat Ferry:

http://216.95.165.34/Pics/CO/Insight/NS6.jpg

The Insight never missed a beat in our 3000 km trip and proved a very good way to go touring for a week. We had pondered taking our Accord Wagon instead, but with well chosen luggage, all was fine and the car fit my 6'8" frame fine, even during extended periods behind the wheel. Everywhere we went in the maritime provinces, it was like we had landed in a spaceship. That was very amusing. Hybrid-wise, we saw one first generation Prius in Yarmouth and that was it. In Maine, the scene was different, as we saw two Priuses, two silver Insights and one HCH in the first hour we were there!

 

[Electric CO]

That's a "Powered by Honda" sticker, no doubt put on by the dealer. I bought the car second-hand last year with the sticker already on. The "Powered by Honda" thing was originally what was on the Williams, Lotus and McLaren Honda powered F1 cars of the late eighties and early nineties.

http://www.prostfan.com/photos/imola1.jpg

 

[Electric CO]

Bonjour Yves,

All info on the Yarmouth/Bar Harbor ferry can be found at http://www.catferry.com.

The crossing took 3 hours. I monitored the speed with my GPS and we never exceeded 75 km/h. It was quite foggy and we couldn't see 20 metres away. Also, consider you have to be there an hour before and waste more time at the border on the other side. And the Bar Harbor area isn't exactly devoid of traffic. The one road leading out of there was bumper to bumper all the way to Bangor.

Considering that Halifax is 3-4 hours away from Yarmouth, the ferry isn't that great a solution to come back from (or go to) Halifax. Like flying versus driving to Toronto in my book.

Cost-wise, the ferry ended up costing $300 cdn I think. A bit expensive, considering the $59 it cost on the more enjoyable crossing from PEI to Nova Scotia.

If I had to do it again, I would drive back to New Brunswick and catch I-95 in Maine for a while then go across to the Beauce region then back to Montréal.

Interesting experience though. Nice boat!