… but more about that in a bit.

My overnight spot was excellent and was a wonderful place to pick, and so up and about at an early hour I went for a walk along the Dune de Bouctouche – all 11 kms of it (the dune, that is, I walked … errr … somewhat less than that).

The morning was the best morning yet on my adventures and a brisk walk by the seaside blew away all of the cobwebs, and quite right too because the wind was a little bit frisky to say the least. The wind turbines on Prince Edward Island way across the Nothumberland Strait were going round like the clappers

Here, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky as you can see, and the sky was almost as deep-blue as the water. It really was a pleasure to be out and about.

From here I went off along the coast looking to see how many of the old wooden truss bridges are still left standing, having noticed that a few that I counted when I was here in 2003 have been replaced by modern concrete bridges.

The one near the First Nation settlement at Rexton is still here as you can see, but it’s really only just about standing

It’s in a totally dreadful state of repair as you can see, thoroughly eaten away by rot and woodworm in several places. Some of the wooden trusses have been replaced and others have had some kind of Heath-Robinson repairs that have done little to fix the problem.

I don’t reckon that it will be much longer before this bridge ends up in the river underneath with a couple of car-loads of pasengers down there with it.

And there was another one equally as bad on the way out of St Louis de Kent and that’s on a main road with heavy traffic too.

Talking of St Louis de Kent, this town is said to be the birthplace of the Acadian flag and here flying on the bluff that overlooks the river and the valley below is probably the biggest Acadian Flag that the world has ever seen.

The guy that designed it, and did so much to foster the Acadian “identity” was Marcel-Francois Richard, a priest here round about the turn of the 20th Century and they celebrate his fame in something of a big way with statues and plaques and, of course, the flag. But not, so it seems, a chorus of Ave Stella Maris, the Acadian anthem (unless I’m going deaf).

Talking of priests and the like, and going back to Rexton, here is the parish church of the aforementioned and the priest of it 150 years ago is by no means as famous as his son ever was.

Andrew Bonar Law was the only British Prime Minister ever to be born outside the UK and if you read his biography it says that he was born in Kingston New Brunswick. However, if you go to Kingston they know nothing about it. This is because there were formerly two Kingstons in New Brunswick and it all became confusing and so 100 years ago one of them, this one, changed its name to Rexton

Bonar law’s dad was vicar of this church and it was in the manse next door that Junior was born.

So with more bridges and beaches and yacht harbours and the like I’m now on the campsite of the Kouchibouguac National Park for tonight. It’s nice and peaceful at the moment but now that I’ve arrived, you watch that all change.