by Ann Major

Created on: April 18, 2008   Last Updated: July 24, 2011

Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia (Canada) is cottage country.  Like most cottage country locales, it brims with activity during summer.  When the season comes to an end, cottagers disappear, one by one, leaving local residents to contend with the quiet, the calm, the serenity and the vicious elements of winter.

The harbor of Tatamagouche boasts the warmest waters north of North Caroline; the sweetest oysters to be gathered from our own backyard; the largest lobsters this side of the Atlantic. This village is an artist's enclave: from painter to writer, to sculptor to potter. They all gather here to show their talents.

Tatamagouche is also a food lover's heaven, boasting free-range poultry; organic farming; vineyards where no sulfates are used in the processing of wine; homemade rustic breads. We are near the blueberry capital of Oxford; a famous maple bush and restaurant; organic lavender farm; all just minutes away.

The unrivaled beauty of Tatamagouche never changes.  Only the constant ebbing and rising of the tides signal one day to the next. Beautiful days, I would sit on my deck, bathed in sunshine, infused with warmth, gazing out the inlet to the vast ocean beyond.  On a clear day, I can see Amet's Island, where the seals hang out.  In even clearer weather, Prince Edward Island would come into view; at times a cruise ship can be spotted, strikingly stark and white against the horizon of blue.

On sunny days, sailboats come out to frolic in the harbor.  I watch for my favorite, a boat with brown-colored sails, quite reminiscent of a Chinese sampan, standing out from the rest of the lily-white sails.  They dot the horizon for a day, forming a seascape much like yellow sitting ducks at a carnival/fair, weaving in and out of traffic.  Sometimes visible, sometimes hidden from view.

Sometimes, the stillness of the air is interrupted by a soft breeze blowing through leafy, swaying poplar trees.  Often, the quiet lapping of water against the shore is accompanied by periodic thumps of a hammer at a nearby construction site.  Yet another house being built, disrupting the harmony of country life.

In Tatamagouche, we are one with nature; or is it the other way around? Families of deer, rabbits, ducks, pheasants, and even raccoons leave their daily calling cards. The raccoon competes with birds and squirrels for a meal from the bird feeder. Rabbits come to nibble the needles off the spruce tree, under the guest bedroom. An

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