Canada - Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia and Quebec

Arriving in Canada after cold and windy Greenland and Iceland was like a reward. 

It sound like a paradox, because nobody ever think about Canada as sunny and warm place but it all depends on perspective - if you were stuck on windy volcanic rock in the middle of North Atlantic the whole summer, the warm climate of Canadian Atlantic coast feels like a comforting embrace. Visiting this part of the world is quite an experience because I always imagined Canada completely different - in my mind this was some wast, permanently frozen tundra where people like Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen write their intellectual poetry with icicles shining outside their windows while wolves howl outside. Well, I guess there are some places like that somewhere in Canada - after all it is a huge country - but what my eyes have seen right now is cute beyond the words, in fact I could easily move here right now this moment without thinking twice.

First of all, this whole part of Canadian Atlantic coast has a very warm climate - even the northernmost point of our journey (St.John's in Newfoundland and Labrador) welcomed me with glowing, sunny day that felt like a God's gift after being whipped by wind and the rain previously the whole summer. One thing I noticed immediately is that local people are really very friendly and nice, much more than almost anywhere I had roamed trough years and this comes apparent specially in times of needs, charities or any disasters. Whatever happens, you can be sure that Canadians will help you - not just with advice with direction but they would actually put you in a car and drive you there. Very first place on my itinerary is cute, little Charlottetown situated on Prince Edward Island: it is a quaint little historical town with lots of wooden and brick houses, very easy to walk around (basically there are two main streets), lots of local art & craft shops, restaurants with lobsters and surprisingly large number of bookshops. It feels like time stands still here - there is something dreamy and almost unreal about this place - maybe because as you walk around, there is nothing modern, no steel and glass monstrosities you encounter elsewhere, this is just a charming little historical town with nice people everywhere. Charlottetown is world famous for being a place associated with fictional character of Anne of Green Gables and she is a local heroine, her dolls, all sorts of gifts and even musical in local theatre, everything here is about Anne. Which intrigued me enough to actually check out the book (very belatedly) myself and to my surprise, at the age of 47 experience the delight of this wonderful children's novel.

Our next stop is part of Canada called Nova Scotia and here we have capitol Halifax.

Halifax is not some immensely huge city - in fact, it feels exactly right, because the city is built very nicely and is spread symmetrically so its very easy to walk around - but the population of this town actually eclipses total population of Iceland (!). Where Charlottetown was historical, Halifax has best of both worlds, combination of both old and new. As you walk trough pretty streets, you can admire old architecture, beautiful waterfront area or newest shopping mall areas - it has absolutely everything and once, after enjoying particularly nice walk trough Spring Garden street and magical park Public Garden, me and my colleagues excitedly decided we could live here. Halifax is also a place where victims from Titanic were buried, so I went to visit that cemetery - I don't know what came over me to walk there, because it is really very far and completely different part of town, but it was a beautiful sunny day so probably I got carried away with enthusiasm and it took me solid five hours to get there and back. The cemetery was really interesting, because lot of these people were never identified and gravestones have simple numbers and year of death. Walking back I enjoyed discovering completely different part of town that I would not know otherwise and I took some nice photos to remember this moment. Halifax was also a place of terrible accident in 1917 when two ships collided (one was full of explosives) and detonation wiped the whole town away, killing some 2 000 innocent people who didn't even know what happened - I have bought a book about this and its really shocking, because the tragedy of this explosion erased lives of so many people who were that morning simply minding their own business and never expected the life will be over for them. Because Boston helped first with trains full of medical staff, food, furniture and such, Halifax sends them Christmas tree every year ever since.

Finally, there is a prettiest place of them all, wonderful Quebec City that must be one of the most magical cities I have ever seen, and I have seen a lot so far. I seriously consider Quebec City to be in my top three most beautiful spots ever, along with Prague and Dubrovnik. It is an ancient French Canadian town with cobblestoned streets, chic restaurants, art galleries and zillion of churches, palaces and wonders everywhere. Magnificent hotel Château Frontenac proudly towers over the city from the hill above, but amazing as it is, I actually fell in love with cute little hotel just behind it (I think its called something like Château de la terrace) that has only two floors and it just looks so comfortable and cozy that I could imagine living there permanently. Everywhere I walked trough city, people seems to be very much enjoying themselves, there are naturally lots of tourists but they are all herded in certain central areas so if you just avoid big groups, you will be fine on your own and countless little streets are perfectly quiet once you step away from tourist attractions. I have even visited local history museum and learned about beginnings of Quebec, which grew out of fur trading post into this present beauty, really stunning place, full of culture, sophistication and art. Every single time we visit Quebec, I talk so proudly about it that my passengers assume I must be local, for me this is really a highlight of the whole trip.