Page:Tourist's Maritime Provinces.djvu/277

A circle of 90 miles is made in driving from Baddeck to the Margaree Valley, Lake Ainslie and Whycocomagh, Baddeck being reached again on the third or fourth day. The drive from Baddeck to Whycocomagh direct may be taken as a day's outing, and discloses throughout its length of 25 miles characteristic highland scenery. The Baddeck River Valley is 8 miles from the New Bras d'Or, whose proprietor will give information about further expeditions for tourists and fishermen.

 

The drive of over a hundred miles from Baddeck to Bay St. Lawrence, at the top of the Island, is unrivalled throughout the Provinces for its panorama of stupendous bluffs and ranges towering over the sea. The route includes Englishtown on St. Ann's Bay (20 miles), Breton Cove, Cape Smoky, the Ingonish Bays, Neil's Harbour, Aspy Bay (Dingwall village), and passes below Cape North to the deep bight that scallops the coast between Cape North and Cape St. Lawrence. Small hotels and private houses give sufficiently good accommodation and in many cases afford insight into a life primitive in the extreme. At Baddeck a two-horse carriage can be secured at the rate of $5 a day for the trip, with an additional $2 a day added for the driver's board and feed for the horses. Forty miles a day may be averaged over a fair road, so that the entire distance of 200 miles is frequently covered in a week. At Englishtown, St. Ann's Bay, was born the "Nova Scotia Giant," Angus MacAskill, who toured the world with Tom Thumb. One of his shoes is preserved at the Whycocomagh hotel. His height was 7 feet, 9 inches, his chest measurement 80 inches, and his weight 425 pounds. His grave makes "a new promontory" on the gnarled coast of St. Ann's. The author of Baddeck has written no more humorous page than the one devoted to this Cape Breton phenomenon. The presence of tunny-fish has of late years