For all things there is a beginning and an end. After the September 11 attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, we checked to see if this Grand Circle Trip had been cancelled. When we were told it was on, we went, and thirty-eight other intrepid tourists went, too. We went to see the autumn leaves and Canada's Maritime Provinces in that order. Our trip started in Boston, Saturday, September 29, a day before the tour group gathered. We spent the morning at the Boston Art Museum, impressed with the red on black ceramics of their fabulous Greek collection. They gave the stories of the figures depicted on each piece of who was doing what. We didn't have time to actually look at many of the paintings, but noted that they had a few Georgia O'Keefe canvasses and a terrific display of Edward Weston photographs. We were at the museum on a "free" Saturday and it was filled with students from the Boston Latin School. We met Mark, Stacy and our three grandsons at the Sheraton Towers and walked almost to the Commons to lunch at Maggiano's, Little Italy, Stacy's favorite restaurant for lunch in Boston. We had at least a two- hour lunch. It was so late that when we finished, there wasn't time to go to the Children's Museum. With three little boys, where else would you stop on the walk back to the Sheraton but at FAO Swartz Toys? What are grandparents for? That evening we went to a wine and cheese briefing from Grand Circle Travel, and Linda Szabo, our tour guide, declared that with 40 out of 42 people going on this trip that "IT WAS A MIRACLE." We packed carry-on bags for the ferry crossing from Portland, Maine to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia on Sunday.

Sunday, September 30. Our first activity on the tour was an hour and a half excursion through Boston and on the Charles River in amphibious "Ducks". We "waddled" around Boston, by Beacon Hill, Bunker Hill, the Constitution, Boston Commons, the State House, and more and confirmed earlier impressions that Boston is a very attractive city. The duck driver was sufficiently zany, loud enough, and informative. While on the Charles River, we went by the Boston Science Museum, and it was a shame we didn't get a chance to go inside. It was a little nippy and we were out in the air on he back of our duck, but we had unobstructed views of the city from the river as well as the streets. I think that the duck tour is a worthwhile thing to do in Boston.

From the duck station we were bussed to Quincy Market where we had lunch at Durgen Park with Jerry and Carol. The Durgen Park waiters weren't nearly as rude and entertaining as they were years ago.

As we headed out of Boston, I began to see occasional trees that had turned color. Mostly everything was quite green. It took less than half an hour to go from Massachusetts to Maine through New Hampshire. We drove thru Kennebunk and Kennebunkport. There were very pretty New England houses. Linda told us a romantic story about one of the houses involving a ship captain who built a house here for his bride. This area is the setting for a book called Arundel, which is a story about the Revolutionary War. "This area from the late 1600's to the Revolutionary War, was really an outpost," related Linda. We saw the President's vacation home on a point. As we rode along we saw occasional bursts of scarlet from a maple here and there and an indication that the trees were starting to turn, but still not much.

On our way to Portland, Maine, we stopped to see the oldest lighthouse in the United States, the Headland Lighthouse at Cape Elizabeth, Fort Williams. There are supposed to be 365 islands in the bay and they are called the Calendar Islands. Henry Longfellow often walked from Portland to visit this lighthouse; the keepers were his friends. This was the inspiration for his poem "The Lighthouse." "Sail on, sail on, ye stately ships, and with your floating bridge the ocean span. Be mine to guard this light from all eclipse. Be yours to bring man near unto man. Written on a rock was a message that said that the Annie MacGuire was sunk on Christmas Eve 1886. We had a nice dinner in Portland and then went to wait around to board the Scotia Prince. First we waited on the bus and then we waited in the terminal building for at least an hour. There weren't enough places to sit and a number of people ended up having to stand or sit on the concrete floor.

There was a dog that went around sniffing all the bags. Then there was a second dog (in training), which went around. Even after the dogs, we still were not allowed to board the ship. Our cabin had two lower bunks along one wall with a small, ship-type bathroom, a couple of hangers on a rod opposite the beds and a porthole. We stole blankets from the upper bunks, which were flush with the wall. The bunk was hard, and I can't say it was my best night's sleep, but I can't complain. Some people got seasick. Kurt didn't. He is generally the standard since he is easily affected. I didn't notice that we had all that much movement of the ship, but I don't get seasick.

Monday, October 1. Since the Scotia Prince was running late, the fact that we received no wake-up call at six was a non-event. We had plenty of time to dress, have breakfast, and then wait around at the designated meeting spot. We disembarked at Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, around 8:30 a.m. instead of 7:30 a.m. We drove to Digby, Nova Scotia and noted that the trees were not yet changing colors, but the ground shrubs were decked out in russet, scarlet and gold autumn foliage. It was at this point more than I expected, because I expected it to be over by now. The highway was essentially empty although there were a number of tour buses that were taking our same route. The road we were on was the Evangeline Trail, through the area where the Acadians lived before they were expelled by the British and to which many have returned. The first people who came to this part of Canada were French. They were fur trappers and traded with the native Americans. When England and France were at war, the English didn't know what to expect of the French inhabitants. So the British wanted everyone to swear allegiance to the British crown. Who was on top changed so often the Acadians didn't want to swear allegiance to anyone. So when the British were up, they evicted the French.

We stopped to visit and Acadian church, St. Mary's, at Church Point. It was constructed between 1903 and 1905 and the spire rises 185 feet. It is located on the campus of Université Sainte-Anne, a center of Acadian culture and Nova Scotia's only French language university. All along the way and in front of the church we saw Acadian flags flying, vertical red, white and blue bars with a gold star. At the front of the church was a large model of the church.

I talked to the lady who gave the orientation and asked her whether all the Acadians were expelled by the British. "Indeed, everyone of them was." She told me. "And they walked to get back to Nova Scotia." She further added. There are now about 10,000 Acadians living in Nova Scotia. The church was built about 40 years after the expulsion; it took them that long to make their way back. In the cemetery across the street from the church a large proportion of the the headstones had French names, i.e., LeBlanc, LeClerc. We had lunch at the Fundy Restaurant in Digby, and had excellent broiled scallops for which Digby is supposed to be known. Digby is home port to one of the largest scallop fleets in North America. From our table we were able to look out over the water. It was a beautiful, sunny day, albeit quite windy.

Leaving Digby, I started to notice quite a bit of color on the lower hills - various shades of orange and scarlet and apricot colors. Unlike New Mexico, I didn't see any real gold. There was also quite a bit of green all over without any indication of turning. We saw a bay they called the Digby gut, which opens out into the Bay of Fundy. Note that we did not stop to see the Anapolis Royal Tidal power plant, which we would have visited if we were driving ourselves. The project is the first of its kind in North America to generate hydroelectric power from the force of the Fundy tides.

We stopped at the Port Royal National Historic Site, which is a reconstruction of a French settlement established in 1605, based on the detailed drawings made by Samuel de Champlain. Costumed interpreters brought to life the hard daily existence of the early adventurers and trappers. The trappers were providing beaver to make the felt for top hats. The trade went down when the hat makers started using rabbit fur to make the felt. In order to get the rabbit hair to stick together they had to use a lot or mercury, which caused the felters to go crazy. Hence the origin of "Mad as a Hatter!"

"Here stands the forest primeval, the whispering pines and the hemlocks ..." So begins Longfellow's poem Evangeline. In the poem Evangeline and Gilbert first met in Grand Pre. Our next stop was the Grand Pre National Historic Site, and our guide told us about the Acadians. It followed the poem "Evangeline" by Longfellow so closely that it was difficult to tell if art followed fact or fact reflected art. We saw how they built their dikes to reclaim the land from the salt marshes. We went into a replica of a church. When the British were expelling the Acadians, they put all the men in the church and tried to force them to sign a loyalty oath. They wouldn't. People were deported and families were split up. Some were sent back to Europe and some to various parts of the United States on the Atlantic coast. Quite a few Acadians ended up in Louisiana and were the ancestors of the "Cajuns."

There were paintings on the walls of the church depicting this history. There was a bust of Longfellow on the grounds and a statute of Evangeline, which from one angle she is supposed to look like a young girl but from the other side, an older woman. For me, that was a little bit of a stretch. We were dropped off at our hotel, The Citadel, in Halifax. Immediately after getting our luggage, Kurt and I found the "pedway" and walked, escalatored, and elevatored down to the water front. We found Salty's restaurant almost immediately outside the Hilton. After having a glass of the local beer, we were shown to a table and had a fine meal of Nova Scotia lobster. Then we returned up the steep hill and over several multi-lane streets via the Pedway. It's a great way to get around.

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