Saturday 22 June 2024 200 miles
Today I am heading to a campsite at Meat Cove, an interesting name, I hope it lives up to my expectations!
The ride to the campsite takes us to the Cabot Trail, the road signs along the way announce how important the trail is to tourism in the area. It was a really good ride with some fantastic views particularly when we reached to Cabot trail itself. Parts of the Cabot trail have some really good twisting bends as it rises over the mountains, really good fun to ride if you are prepared to risk exceeding the 50kph speed limit.
You can’t book the campsite, it is on a first come first served basis, they recommend calling ahead. I called around lunchtime, they said I should ring later when I was at town of Cape North. This is the point you leave the Cabot Trail, taking the dead end road that leads to Meat Cove, I called as they suggested and was told there are 8 pitches left so I should be ok.
The campsite is at the top Cape Breton Island Highlands National Park, it is very isolated, the last few miles are a mixture of very poor tarmac and gravel. The gravel is much more predictable than the undulating and broken tarmac.
A food shack on the campsite sold food on a very limited menu up until 6.00pm, I settle for very good pot of chowder made from local fish and shellfish. I asked the lady who ran the shack if they had beer, I was told it’s in the cold box over there, it’s free but you are welcome to leave a tip. They obviously don’t have a license to sell alcohol and that’s their way of getting around it.
As I was walking back from the beach one of the camp site staff stopped his truck, passed me a can of beer out of the window and said “here’s a cold one for you”, my tip was to large, obviously!
View from Meat Cove campsite in the evening light
View from Meat Cove campsite in the morning light
Meat Cove beach
