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very impressed with Halifax! It was very quaint and it reminded me of my home country, England. There was plenty of parking, very interesting architecture and an ample amount of touristy type shops. There was a wide variety of restaurants and English style Pubs.

Unfortunately, we had not expected Halifax to be so nice. We would have spent more time there, but we had made plans previously and we had to push on elsewhere. We could have walked around that town a lot longer.

Our destination was Cape Breton Island, this was to be a very Celtic experience for us.

We entered Antigonish, which is the last major town before Cape Breton. We soon discovered the correct the way to pronounce Antig-onish (say it fast), as the locals were very proud of that name and didn't want anyone saying it incorrectly.

Antig-onish was settled by Scottish migrants, about five hundred years ago. In fact the Scottish, today, visit Antigonish frequently because of it's ancestral records. The records are concise, because such a large majority of the Scottish ancestry migrated there to start with. Some say that there are more true Scots in Nova Scotia than in Scotland itself.

We were very fortunate to arrive in Antigonish in time for the Highland games. Watching the 'hammer throwing', the 'Shot put' and the Caber toss' was very entertaining and again, kept us right in the Celtic Spirit.

Eventually, we pulled ourselves away and crossed over into Cape Breton and it got even better. Everywhere we turned, there were Scottish names on the left and French names to the right of us. Basically, Cape Breton is made of two migrating countries, France and Scotland. The French descendants live in their communities along the coast and they have some very interesting history to share with you.

Cape Breton was very magical. We stayed in a few little towns in the north of the Island. we were also fortunate to find that some of these little towns held Ceilidhs, pronounced Kay-lays.

A Ceilidh is a traditional Scottish musical event. In this instance, the events were held at the local town hall. Everyone was invited for a very small fee. The local people performed a variety of Scottish songs, some ancestral. The main musical instruments were organs, violins and accordions.

These Ceilidhs' put extra spice on the whole trip and had us reeling, so to speak. Even our Daughters felt that they had discovered something new.

We stayed in some very comfortable and very reasonably priced, self catering apartments. It never got too hot and it never got too cold.

There was so much to see, so many places to go and so much hospitality throughout Nova Scotia. We never had time to visit Prince Edward Island, which from what I understand is a must visit place as well.

We were very sad to leave Nova Scotia, especially Cape Breton!

Another good part about this whole trip, is that we were able to drive the whole thing in our own vehicle. We didn't have to get on a plane, we were in another Country of the same speaking language and, in an entirely different culture.

Learn more about this author, Jon Coe.
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