There is an art to travelling in the Maritimes in the off season.
Stormy seas reach up to stormy skies, tourist attractions board up and,
instead of being one of thousands, you will often find yourself the only
stranger in town.

Last year, I went to P.E.I. in October and, after a week of driving from
closed miniatures of the great buildings of the world to closed recreations
of King Tut's tomb, I was surprised to find that the bridge to New Brunswick
had not been pulled up. Standing alone in Anne of Green Gables' house with
the full attention of the skeleton staff was an unnerving experience.

This year, it was the Ovens, a glorious bit of coastline down the road
from Lunenburg. By early September, the Ovens are clearly cooling down.
A rustic cabin overlooking the water offered the sad scene of failing
family relations. Mother, father and two kids busied themselves setting up
one of those giant tents with small apartments and picnic areas (and
possibly somewhere to park the car), and were within a peg of finishing it,
when something went seriously wrong: minutes later, and in perfect silence,
the tent was back in the bag, the bag was in the van, and the family was
gone.

A highlight of any trip to the Ovens is a Zodiac ride into the
sea caves - or so I've been told. The curse of the off season struck: the
boatman left suddenly that morning to return to university, leaving a
campsitefull of tourists high and dry.

This seemed like a disaster, especially as I was banking on a wild ride
into the mouth of death to write this column. In its steed, I walked along
the path, up and down into the caves, several times (it's a surprisingly
short walk). Here is what I discovered: the longer you linger in Cannon
Cave, the weirder it gets.

It's a low cave that narrows into a boulder-sized hole on the land end,
beyond which something fierce is going on. As the water thumps around in
there, churning like a washing machine on the agitation cycle, a startling
noise rumbles out. It sounds like a nasty sea monster is giving some poor
pirate a beating. I half expected the see Captain Jack Sparrow come flying
out.

Next up was the petting zoo. There is a goat, and a few bunnies. You
can't pet them. The nice young man in the office warned they might be
skittish, as the week before, a kid had thrown one against the wall.

Standing in a spacious campsite today, it is hard to believe that at the
height of a gold rush in 1861, the Ovens supported a town of more than 1,000
miners, complete with bank, stores and hotels. You can rent a pan to try
your luck on the gold veins for about $5, but I figured it would be more
profitable to just buy $5 worth of gold.

I planned to end the night taking in the live music at the Hodge Podge
Lodge. The Chapin family who owns the campsite did produce Harry Chapin,
writer of Cat's in the Cradle. I tumbled down the dark road to find an even darker lodge. No live music, just a blue little man and the moon. Still, what a moon, lighting a silver
path across the dark waters. And this is the essence of the art of off-season travel: no one is going to make your vacation memorable; it's just you, and nature.

And this weekend, that was plenty.

First published in the Halifax Daily News Sept 15 2007