Day 2: Nova Scotia! Cape Split, brewery lunch and more

Thursday, October 9

After a good night’s sleep, I woke up, showered and got ready for our day’s adventures, while Elisabeth shuttled kids out the door and off to school.

We had a light breakfast (leftover homemade biscuit and peanut butter and tea for me) and Elisabeth took care of a few things on her computer before we headed out.

I had to capture this pic of her at her dining room table, which is where much of her “blogging magic” happens! So fun to see behind the curtain. 🙂

We headed out to drive to Cape Split, our main destination for the day. I had seen this in photos on other posts, and I knew it was high on my list of places I wanted to get to. Of course, Elisabeth was happy to oblige. 🙂

The drive was great- just beautiful, perfect, crisp fall weather, no clouds, gorgeous leaves.. a dream.

We stopped off at this most stunning lookout along the way. WOW!!!

We made it to Cape Split after… I honestly can’t remember how many minutes!! Haha. Maybe 45? We were just so engrossed in talking and enjoying the ride that I completely spaced out on any sense of time.

Friend selfie!

It was a bit chilly at the start but after a few minutes we were both almost warm and felt like we had worn the perfect garments. (I am very partial to “the vest” in the fall. 😆 It’s the perfect mix of keeping you warm without overheating you… highly recommend. ;))

The hike would be about 8 miles round trip. The parking lot was beautifully nearly empty, only a handful of other cars. We only saw a couple other people the whole time! Amazing.

It was an ideal fall hike. Gorgeous views, plentiful colored leaves, sunshine, views of water interspersed, and a heavenly scent of evergreen trees along the way.

Elisabeth’s classic “shoe shot” 🙂

I was lucky to have a personal photographer along. Hahaha. She’s so great with photos and also like me, equally loves to go crazy taking pictures! We are two peas in a pod like that. I secretly am always relieved when other people don’t mind or even embrace plentiful photos. It can make me feel a little self conscious otherwise! As her daughter Belle says, we are “momtographers”. 😅😅

Beautiful ocean view lookout:

We talked the entire way, not surprisingly. 😉 Finally made it to the main attraction, Cape Split!

It was windy up there but just stunning. Water as far as your eye could see, and the rugged cliffs were so cool looking.

Elisabeth took this pic of me from the opposite side- it really shows the drop off!!! Eek. We stayed plenty far back from the edge.

This picture of Elisabeth below cracks me up. Not sure why, but she just looks so funny among that super tall grass, like this random little person just hanging out on the edge of this cliff… lol. (I think she looks closer to the edge than she really was!)

This below is the actual “split”:

The water was so pretty and so peaceful. I was just like “ahhhh this is the life”. After a very busy, hectic stretch at home, this was much needed.

We had a little snack break- some water, Elisabeth’s amazing homemade energy balls, and some chips.

Then, to hike back! The time flew by as we chatted, and we even started diving into what is now a blogger’s tradition of answering “36 Questions”. We made it to I think Question 4 before we completely went off on a ~2 hour long tangent/deep discussion on one of the answers and didn’t get any further! (To be continued…haha.)

We took breaks in our conversation randomly to take pictures! (Some of these may be photo credit to Elisabeth- they’re all mixed together now so I don’t know whose are whose!)

I LOVED everything about this hike. We did clock in at right about 7.75 miles I think.

Next up we drove back to Wolfville for a late lunch. Elisabeth so kindly rearranged Indy’s after school plans to go home with a friend so we’d have time to go out for lunch.

We went to The Church Brewing Company, which was so my vibe. You all know my family loves to hit up breweries on trips so this was super fun. I loved too that Elisabeth knew this about me and planned it in!

It’s such a cute place, too- an old church converted into a brewery!

We each got a light lunch of seafood chowder and a pretzel. The ideal cozy, warm lunch after our pretty long hike. I was not cold, but felt a bit chilled and the chowder hit the spot for me.

Loved the vibe. We sat right by the window and it was an excellent choice.

Before heading back to the car, we did a swing by the waterfront Wolfville sign. I’ve seen it in other posts but now it was finally my turn to pose there!

Such a quaint little area in the center of Wolfville!

We went back to Elisabeth’s and had a little time to kill before Elisabeth needed to do a kid shuttle run. We relaxed in the living room and I packed up my things- tonight I’d be switching over to the Tattingstone Inn I’d be staying at for the next 4 nights. (Originally I had planned to come for 4 nights total but then added an extra night and stayed at Elisabeth’s! She was more than happy to host us the whole time but Sarah and I had decided that with 2 of us, we’d stay out of their hair a little bit and get a hotel!)

She dropped me off to get checked in while she ran to pick up Belle.

I immediately fell in love with the inn!!! It is straight out of Gilmore Girls or a Hallmark movie. Soooo cute and quaint and beautiful with charming grounds and fall decor.

My room:

Outside fire pit and sitting area /happy hour site!

Front porch is adorable:

I only spent 20 min or so and then Elisabeth swung back by for me to head back to her house for dinner.

She put on music and I (sort of) helped her make a fabulous seafood risotto for dinner! I loved all of this. It was so fun to just be in her house and chat and sip a sparkling water and cook together. 🙂

Ready for dinner:

Delicious!!

We ended the evening with this to die for “lava cake” (ok the gooey lava part was sort of missing but even slightly over baked it was still a 10!).

The final hour or so of the night was spent leisurely chatting in her living room, just me, Elisabeth and Belle. LOVED this. It was so relaxing and I sipped tea (Elisabeth has now learned that I apparently must always be drinking something at all times.. ha) while we talked about all different things, blogging and more.

Finally, she had to run me back to the Inn since Friday was still a school day, etc… and later in the afternoon we’d head to the airport for SHU!!

I unwound a little longer at the hotel, sipping one more cup of tea (love the electric kettle in my room) and puttered posting some pics on my phone while half watching Thursday Night Football with the fireplace on. 🙂 Soooo relaxing!!

In closure, I’ll say that this was pretty much my idea of a perfect day. (One of the “36 Questions” we were doing was “What is your idea of a perfect day?” My answer included something active in the morning, like a pretty hike, followed by a cozy lunch out, ending with a relaxed afternoon/evening lounging around.) We definitely checked several of those boxes here!

Cape Split was absolutely everything I’d hoped and thank you thank you thank you to the weather gods for our most gorgeous, perfect weather (all weekend!!).

Stay tuned for Friday, when Sarah arrives!! 🎉