One of our more frequent road trips was to the beach.I'm certain that proximity to the beach was a big selling point with my parents when they decided to settle in Moncton. Moncton was a bit inland,but it only took an hour,or maybe a bit less to get to the beach,even without a direct,multi-lane road like they have now.
My father loved the beach,almost to the point of obsession.That must have started when he was a teen living in Springhill. Springhill was the kind of place that people might like to escape in the summer months,but it was quite a bit farther from the beach than Moncton was.Once,while we were driving to our summer cottage,just as we were leaving Springhill,my father started telling me how they would all walk,or perhaps hitch to Heather's Beach,near the community of Port Phillip.I looked out at the land before us,at thickly wooded trees and I thought he must have loved the beach if he was willing to trek across that rough country.It must be about thirty miles.He said they would sometimes take two days to get there,they'd camp in the bush somewhere on the way,and kill some farmers's chicken for food.
The beach we used to go too was at Shediac,south and east of Moncton,maybe twenty five miles away in those days.A big part of that trip was through town,then out the old Shediac road,past a golf course until you got almost to the coast.The road wasn't all that good and you couldn't go very fast at all.
Once you got to the end of Old Shediac Road,there was a T intersection with a couple of gas stations and some seafood shacks.Beyond that you could see the town and the ocean beyond. Shediac is all about lobsters.My memory of the town is of a clean,white looking place.Modest white buildings,many of which would have a billboard with a lobster on it.They all had neat asphalt shingled roofs as well.Properties around the town seemed well kept,because,after all it was a tourist town,trying to look pretty for summer visitors.
Beyond the town,out in the water there were a lot of lobster boats,low at the back and high at the prow,and most often painted white,though I've seen them in all colors.The boats,and the little harbors that sheltered them were often scenes depicted on post cards from Atlantic Canada,scenes most typically used to identify the region in other parts of the world.
There were always stacks of lobster traps out on the wharf anywhere there were lobster boats.But most of the houses around would have lobster traps as well,sometimes large stacks of them,sometimes just one or two to decorate a lawn,cottage or small business.Once again,these are typical images of Canada's Atlantic coast.
When you got to the T intersection,you turned right to get to the beach.If you turned left instead,you would go up along the east side of New Brunswick,through all of the little villages,past where my father worked and where we used to live and beyond.But a right turn went to the beach.Once you were at that corner,you knew it wasn't far.
The first time we went to the beach we took plastic pails and shovels.My father had brought home two big bright colored beach balls,then gathered us all into the car for the trip.
I'd never seen the beach before.I don't know why we never went to the beach when we lived in Redmondville.It wasn't really that far off,but some of the beaches around are not that good for swimming.Some were rocky and others covered in thick,slimy mud.But the one at Shediac was ideal.Very sandy.In fact,there seemed to be miles and miles of sand along the coastline.We would go out in the water and swim.Or at least my father would.I didn't know how to swim.Still the beach was a new and wondrous place.All that sand and all that water.The place always had a sense of motion about it that I'd never seen anyplace else I'd been.The waves moving from far out in the water,then washing up along the sand.And seagulls overhead.Sometimes they would land nearby,Near enough that I thought I should be able to catch one.So I tried to,but they could move away so fast.Then they would circle and screech,and dive into the waves,sometimes coming away with small fish.And there were other creatures too.Clams and crabs.Crabs had a strange way of moving,something like crawling.You could see the little trails left behind by little creatures trying to get back into the water after having been left up on the land as the tide went out.Tides went in and out,farther away,then closer.The thing about this beach world was that it was always moving,and almost never moving like traffic in town,or like people when they are walking to get somewhere.And I would move too.One of my favorite ways of moving was to walk right out to the edge of the water,parallel to the surf,then try to stay away from the waves before they caught my feet.But it was wonderful to be caught too,to feel that cool ocean reaching around my feet.And then I'd watch how quickly the waves could take away the footprints I'd left behind.My father used to say that the waves were taking my footprints away to Africa,or maybe China,and would leave them there for someone else to find.Moving.The beach was always in motion.
Higher up,away from the beach the sand dried out.It dried out gradually as you got farther back from the water,and when I was tired of chasing waves I could go up a bit to where the sand was still damp.Here I could dig,fill up my plastic bucket and make sand castles.I wasn't very good at making castles at first,but I did like to dig.It amazed me that once I'd dug deep enough,there would be water in the hole.Farther back still,all the sand was dry,and hot to the touch,unpleasant to walk on.And there was crabgrass too,big clumps of tall grass.My mother always said you had to be careful,that crabgrass could cut your skin,but it never cut mine.I don't know of anyone who was ever cut by it.
There was a hut that sold food at the beach. Hot dogs,hamburgers and french fries,and maybe local fare too,like lobster rolls or fried clams.Sometimes we brought our own food for a picnic,but usually we had hot dogs and fries.The thing about fries was,the gulls would sometimes chase you for them.There were always gulls circling around the food shack.I'm amazed that the Health Department never shut them down because of the gulls.My father would take a french fry from the cardboard container and pitch it up in the air,where a gull would catch it,fly right over the outside of it sometimes,without even clamping down on it with it's beak.And my father would chuckle,then toss another one up.I'd never seen any kind of bird do that in the city.But the beach was a very different place.
My father loved the beach,almost to the point of obsession.That must have started when he was a teen living in Springhill. Springhill was the kind of place that people might like to escape in the summer months,but it was quite a bit farther from the beach than Moncton was.Once,while we were driving to our summer cottage,just as we were leaving Springhill,my father started telling me how they would all walk,or perhaps hitch to Heather's Beach,near the community of Port Phillip.I looked out at the land before us,at thickly wooded trees and I thought he must have loved the beach if he was willing to trek across that rough country.It must be about thirty miles.He said they would sometimes take two days to get there,they'd camp in the bush somewhere on the way,and kill some farmers's chicken for food.
The beach we used to go too was at Shediac,south and east of Moncton,maybe twenty five miles away in those days.A big part of that trip was through town,then out the old Shediac road,past a golf course until you got almost to the coast.The road wasn't all that good and you couldn't go very fast at all.
Once you got to the end of Old Shediac Road,there was a T intersection with a couple of gas stations and some seafood shacks.Beyond that you could see the town and the ocean beyond. Shediac is all about lobsters.My memory of the town is of a clean,white looking place.Modest white buildings,many of which would have a billboard with a lobster on it.They all had neat asphalt shingled roofs as well.Properties around the town seemed well kept,because,after all it was a tourist town,trying to look pretty for summer visitors.
Beyond the town,out in the water there were a lot of lobster boats,low at the back and high at the prow,and most often painted white,though I've seen them in all colors.The boats,and the little harbors that sheltered them were often scenes depicted on post cards from Atlantic Canada,scenes most typically used to identify the region in other parts of the world.
There were always stacks of lobster traps out on the wharf anywhere there were lobster boats.But most of the houses around would have lobster traps as well,sometimes large stacks of them,sometimes just one or two to decorate a lawn,cottage or small business.Once again,these are typical images of Canada's Atlantic coast.
When you got to the T intersection,you turned right to get to the beach.If you turned left instead,you would go up along the east side of New Brunswick,through all of the little villages,past where my father worked and where we used to live and beyond.But a right turn went to the beach.Once you were at that corner,you knew it wasn't far.
The first time we went to the beach we took plastic pails and shovels.My father had brought home two big bright colored beach balls,then gathered us all into the car for the trip.
I'd never seen the beach before.I don't know why we never went to the beach when we lived in Redmondville.It wasn't really that far off,but some of the beaches around are not that good for swimming.Some were rocky and others covered in thick,slimy mud.But the one at Shediac was ideal.Very sandy.In fact,there seemed to be miles and miles of sand along the coastline.We would go out in the water and swim.Or at least my father would.I didn't know how to swim.Still the beach was a new and wondrous place.All that sand and all that water.The place always had a sense of motion about it that I'd never seen anyplace else I'd been.The waves moving from far out in the water,then washing up along the sand.And seagulls overhead.Sometimes they would land nearby,Near enough that I thought I should be able to catch one.So I tried to,but they could move away so fast.Then they would circle and screech,and dive into the waves,sometimes coming away with small fish.And there were other creatures too.Clams and crabs.Crabs had a strange way of moving,something like crawling.You could see the little trails left behind by little creatures trying to get back into the water after having been left up on the land as the tide went out.Tides went in and out,farther away,then closer.The thing about this beach world was that it was always moving,and almost never moving like traffic in town,or like people when they are walking to get somewhere.And I would move too.One of my favorite ways of moving was to walk right out to the edge of the water,parallel to the surf,then try to stay away from the waves before they caught my feet.But it was wonderful to be caught too,to feel that cool ocean reaching around my feet.And then I'd watch how quickly the waves could take away the footprints I'd left behind.My father used to say that the waves were taking my footprints away to Africa,or maybe China,and would leave them there for someone else to find.Moving.The beach was always in motion.
Higher up,away from the beach the sand dried out.It dried out gradually as you got farther back from the water,and when I was tired of chasing waves I could go up a bit to where the sand was still damp.Here I could dig,fill up my plastic bucket and make sand castles.I wasn't very good at making castles at first,but I did like to dig.It amazed me that once I'd dug deep enough,there would be water in the hole.Farther back still,all the sand was dry,and hot to the touch,unpleasant to walk on.And there was crabgrass too,big clumps of tall grass.My mother always said you had to be careful,that crabgrass could cut your skin,but it never cut mine.I don't know of anyone who was ever cut by it.
There was a hut that sold food at the beach. Hot dogs,hamburgers and french fries,and maybe local fare too,like lobster rolls or fried clams.Sometimes we brought our own food for a picnic,but usually we had hot dogs and fries.The thing about fries was,the gulls would sometimes chase you for them.There were always gulls circling around the food shack.I'm amazed that the Health Department never shut them down because of the gulls.My father would take a french fry from the cardboard container and pitch it up in the air,where a gull would catch it,fly right over the outside of it sometimes,without even clamping down on it with it's beak.And my father would chuckle,then toss another one up.I'd never seen any kind of bird do that in the city.But the beach was a very different place.
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