Tatamagouche Train Station Inn

For our tenth anniversary year my wife and I decided to do something a little different, so we packed up the kids and headed to Tatamagouche to spend a night at the Train Station Inn. 

A collection of assorted rail cars sit on the rails outside the restored Tatamagouche Railway Station.

The station building itself closed in 1973, and was scheduled for demolition, before being saved and purchased in 1974 by current owner James LeFresne. He was only 18 at the time. The last train passed through in 1986, and the line was abandoned. Restoration of the train station began in 1987, and it was opened as an inn in 1989. Railway cars began arriving in 1994 in the form of two wooden cabooses, and they have since been joined by a number of other cabooses, a passenger car, boxcars, the 1905 Vice Royal Railway Car Alexandra, and sundry other artifacts. 

The interior of the passenger car has been converted to a restaurant.

We had our dinner in the dining car that evening - my steak was good, and my wife's Coquille St. Jacques was excellent. We discovered to our pride and dismay that our 5 year old likes scallops, especially when wrapped in bacon, which could get expensive and means we will have to share in the future. 

The interior of the Vice Royal car, now a lounge for guests of the Inn.

Exterior of the passenger car.

Most of the cars are located along the old main line, with two cabooses and a boxcar sitting on rails on the other side of the parking lot.

The Jitney Cafe sits at one end of the restored train station.

The next morning, we had our breakfast in the Jitney Cafe, which was much more crowded than shown here.

Caboose #9, #79575, was our accommodation for the night.

Though comfortable, our bedroom was shoehorned into one end of the caboose.

Original equipment remaining in Caboose #9 includes two conductor seats, still installed in the cupola, providing a view in both directions along the "train" and to the sides. The fore and aft windows are still fitted with window wipers, two manual, and two with motors fitted. 

The children had a great time climbing up and down from the cupola and sitting in the conductor's seats. 

Caboose #9 can accommodate a family of four, with the two kids in single beds at the opposite end of the car from the main bedroom. Two sliding pocket doors isolate the middle section of the car, where the cupola and washroom are situated, from the bedrooms.

Though not as comfortable as a modern hotel room, the caboose was certainly unique, and the entire family enjoyed themselves. 

House on Mount Nuttby

Whilst driving to Tatamagouche on Saturday, I passed by the former location of the abandoned house on Mount Nuttby. I was aware that the house had been torn down, but it was still a bit weird to stop at the gate and look out, thinking that there should have been a decaying house in the now-empty field. 

The now empty site of the former house on Mount Nuttby.

In years past, the house was a magnet for photographers, and I was no exception, starting in at least 2005 (I suspect I have some film images as well, but can't find them at the moment).

The back of the house was propped up to prevent it from collapsing.

This dormer bore some of the most obvious signs of collapse on the front of the house.

During one visit, we were lucky enough to have some fog gracing the background.

The house in April 2005.

The house continued to deteriorate, and depending on how long one went between visits, it became obvious that the house wouldn't remain standing forever. Contrast the photos above and below, in particular around the dormer.

The house in April 2006.

On one occasion, in June 2005, a number of us visited the house at night, and played with light painting. 

This image best shows the posts propping up the back wing of the building.

Our nighttime visit coincided with a full moon. This particular visit was somewhat creepy, as a herd of cows stood just out of our lights behind us in the field, and watched our activities. We could feel the eyes boring into the back of our heads.

We placed a flashlight inside the house to light up some of the ground floor windows.

We shone a light on the front of the house so this wasn't a simple silhouette from the full moon behind.

At the time these photos were taken, I was using a 6 megapixel Konica-Minolta Maxxum 7D - the first digital SLR released by Minolta (& ancestor to modern Sony A-mount DSLRs), and based upon one of its last film SLRs - the Maxxum 7. While the 7D was a decent first effort, and the camera body was quite wonderful to use, the sensor itself was behind the standard of competing Canon and Nikon digital SLRs which at the time were being fitted with 8 megapixel sensors capable of better dynamic range and higher ISOs. As a result, these images are not terribly sharp, and the night images in particular contain many hot pixels due to the long exposures. There is also lens flare present (probably the result of older lenses with less advanced coatings), and they suffer from another issue unique to the early Minolta DSLRs - these cameras were the first to have sensor-stabilization within the camera body, and the mechanism put off heat that tended to appear as a purple haze in the top left corner of any long exposure image. These are no exception, and I had to crop it out. Digital cameras have matured considerably in the years since these images were taken, and I often look at older photos I have taken and wish I could put modern camera gear into the hands of my younger self.

In summary, you often can't go back again - either because they tore the house down, or because modern camera gear has improved to the point that you don't want to.

Heerema's Hermod going for scrap

In 1999 and 2003, Halifax was visited by two large semi-submersible crane platforms in support of the Sable Offshore project, Saipem 7000 and Heerema's Hermod respectively. The former is the younger of the two (completed in 1987), has the heavier lift cranes (two 7,100 tonne models), and is still in service. Hermod, completed in 1979, has recently been sent for scrap.

Hermod, with her two cranes of 5,000 and 4,000 short ton capacities, was in port around April 12, 2003. She transported and installed the jacket(s) (support legs) for the Alma platform, in 67 metres of water depth. At the time, the daily rate to hire Hermod was reported to be in excess of $150,000 per day.

Hermod with McNab's Island in the background.

Hermod is the younger sister of Balder (completed 1978), which is still in service with Heerema.

Hermod, with two offshore supply vessels alongside.

Hermod surrounded by vessels in Halifax.

Hermod ready to be towed out. That's Fenwick Tower in the background under the two cranes.

To replace Hermod, Heerema is building the world's largest semi-submersible crane platform, the Sleipnir, with two 10,000 tonne cranes for a total capacity of 20,000 tonnes. 

As an aside, these four images were scanned from film negatives, and they aren't cleaned up as well as they could be. In addition, there was a spot of dust in the scanner that caused an overexposed line to appear in the center of each photo - best visible in the first image.

Recent Harbour Shipping

I will dispense with much commentary, and merely show some shipping photos from the last week or so.

Yang Ming Essence.

Yang Ming Essence.

Yang Ming Essence.

Yang Ming Essence.

Sarah Desgagnes.

AIDAdiva.

Serenade of the Seas.

Serenade of the Seas.

Itea.

Crown Princess.

Guangzhou Highway.

Nova Pilot.

Serenade of the Seas.

Hapag-Lloyd's Palena.

Hapag-Lloyd's Palena.

Sailing in Hebridee II

When done well, museums bring history to life for visitors. Working museums, such as the various working farm museums, sawmills, and blacksmith shops around the province, add live action and interactive elements, where action replace the words on an information plaque. My interests in boats and boat building aside, the opportunity to not only see a traditional Nova Scotian boat being built (or in this case rebuilt), but to actually see the end product sailing around the harbour - and if you're really lucky, to be able to join the boat for a sail - is a real privilege.

Hebridee II heading out into Halifax Harbour under sail.

I'm been following the progress of reconstructing the schooner Hebridee II at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic on the Halifax waterfront for some time, and she has been the subject of this blog before:

Reconstruction of schooner Hebridee II

Revisiting Hebridee II

Rigging Hebridee II

Hebridee II - Back in the Water

Hebridee II Rechristening and Relaunching

In addition, all of these photos, and more, can be found in my Hebridee II gallery on Smugmug.

After the rechristening and relaunching, I was told by builder Eamonn Doorly that I should invite myself out for a sail at some point. It took me a while to find the time, but with the hurricane and boat hauling seasons upon us, I decided to take him up on the offer. I was instructed to meet up on the waterfront next to her berth at noon on Friday. We left the wharf in calm conditions under the power of Hebridee's electric motor, and went looking for some wind, which we found beyond George's Island. 

It was a four cruise ship day in Halifax. 

After raising the sails, the electric motor was shut down, and off we sailed. The wind started out light, but gained strength throughout the afternoon, and of course gave us some of our most exciting moments just before we were due to lower the sails. 

Soon after we put up the sails, we crossed wakes with the auto carrier Guangzhou Highway - and what a wake it was!

Approaching Guangzhou Highway.

The auto carrier had just pulled out of the Autoport in Eastern Passage, and was making a hard turn to port in order to round McNab's Island and head out to sea again. 

A rare view of an auto carrier (for me, anyway) taken low to the water and with nothing but the ocean's horizon beyond.

Guangzhou Highway's hard turn to port left significant turbulence in her wake.

Hebridee II crossing the boundary of Guangzhou Highway's wake and the tail eddies left by her propeller wash.

At this point, we temporarily lost steerage in all the turbulence, and marveled at the effects of the prop wash on the surface of the harbour. Small whirlpools passed along our port site.

A small whirlpool from the ship's prop wash.

Eamonn made his crew work for our passage, and our participation made the sail that much more enjoyable. Under his watchful eye, we took turns on the helm, raising and lowering sails, and trimming sheets. I managed two turns on the helm myself, and probably had a stupid grin on my face the entire time.

Looking up a schooner's vast mainsail - the boom often overhangs the transom, and requires running backstays to keep the rig from falling forward when going downwind. Unlike the single backstay that I am used to on my boat, running backstays need to be reset after each tack or gybe. The "BJ" at the top of the sail stands for "Bluenose Junior", the name bestowed to Hebridee's class by her designer, William J. Roué. Sailboats usually carry letters or a symbol indicating their class on the mainsail.

Schooners are known for being reluctant to tack (some more than others), and Hebridee is no exception (though this may have been exacerbated by her inexperienced crew). I am used to a smaller sloop rigged boat that is fitted with a tiller and a fin keel, and she turns on the proverbial dime. Hebridee, on the other hand, has a full keel and her rudder is turned with a wheel - the former kills more momentum when she turns, and the latter takes longer to shift the rudder hard over. One trick is to allow the jib to backwind during every tack before hauling in the jib sheet on the new tack, to allow the wind to bring the boat onto the new course quicker - but we were not always effective in doing so, and sometimes Hebridee's bow would take a while to fall off onto her new course. The light winds probably didn't help in this respect.

Eamonn Doorly adjusts the foresail sheet. Sheets are the ropes that pull sails in and out, and they often (as seen here) use blocks to gain a mechanical advantage to make it easier to pull the sail in against the force of the wind. In Hebridee's case, the blocks are from the original schooner and were refurbished for use on the new.

Speaking of the helm, the helmsman (or helmswoman) sits on a seat on top of the worm gear that the wheel is attached to. The wheel itself turns in the opposite direction of where you want the boat to go, which takes some getting used to for anyone who is used to driving a car or, for that matter, boats where the wheel operates normally. I eventually got used to it to a certain extent, but continued to second guess myself everytime I turned the wheel, and made a few mistakes. I did not offer to bring Hebridee alongside the floats at the end of the sail.

The view from the helm, with two of my fellow crew, Aaron and Ray.

When not under sail, Hebridee is powered by an electric motor and a battery. This makes her very quiet under power, and simplifies a number of aspects in her operation and design. No longer does she carry flammable diesel fuel, and the blower normally required to remove explosive fumes from the bilge of vessels powered by internal combustion engines isn't present. The "throttle" for the motor is a simple dial located by the helmsman's right ankle, and one turns it forward to go forward, back to go aft, and it is merely turned to the neutral position when under sail. Power is instantly available when needed by turning the dial in the desired direction. The endurance of Hebridee's batteries isn't known at this point, but Eamonn says he has run the engine for 5 hours and only run down the battery by 10% (although he suspects when the batteries do drop off, they will do it quickly).

Mainsail and boom.

On our way back downwind, we managed to get the fore and main sails "wing on wing" - the foresail was on the port side, and the main was on the starboard. I didn't even know this had a name until that moment.

Sailing "wing on wing". 

A good view of the cockpit from dead aft, with the helmsman at the bottom of the image. We were still "wing on wing" at this point.

I spent some of my time lying flat on my back up at the bow, under the jib, to get some shots of the rig set against the sky. I find this often makes for good photo composition, and I love the curve of the while sails set against the blue sky.

Halifax, and George's Island, make an appearance in the bottom of this image taken as we headed out the harbour. One of the halyards is tied off on the port shroud.

The sails on my boat feed into a track in the aluminum mast. On Hebridee, a rope spirals up the foremast to attach the luff of the sail to the mast. 

The curve of the jib mirrors that of the foresail.

As with the leech of the sail to the mast, the foot of the foresail is attached to the boom with a spiraled rope. The leech and foot of the mainsail, on the other hand, are attached to clips that run in tracks in the mast and boom respectively.

Another shot showing the different attachment methods used for the different sails.

Hebridee II's restoration isn't quite finished, and Eamonn expects to work on her this winter. The turnbuckles that connect the shrouds to the chain plates, for instance, are from the original schooner and grey paint is covering up their true age. She also requires some modern electronics to allow her to sail farther afield than just afternoon sails in Halifax Harbour, and Eamonn hopes to sail her down the South Shore for Chester Race Week and schooner races in 2018.

Hebridee employs polypropylene rope that has been treated to look like traditional hemp rope.

All in all, it was a very enjoyable sail. As Friday afternoons go, I've had much worse.