I still haven’t hung any artwork on our walls in Halifax, but I have a semblance of my sense of direction. I’ve found bookstores and bars and new favorite restaurants. I’ve swum in lakes, ponds, beaches, tidal pools. I’ve walked through fog, rain, and bright sunny days. The dog has discovered the beach and ice cream and seaweed. When it rains, she likes to be wrapped up in a blanket like a burrito. The fog is like nowhere I’ve been before. The tides in the Bay of Fundy sweep in and out, water churning brown from the red mud as it goes. The water is colder on the Atlantic side. The Labrador current flows south from the Arctic Ocean, past Labrador and Newfoundland, then wrapping around the Nova Scotia coastline.
I have favorite hikes like Taylor’s Head, Duncan’s Cove. And favorite swims at Crystal Crescent, Martinique, Purcell’s Pond and Rainbow Haven.
After the leaves fell the winter was stormy. Every other weekend the winds came, knocked the power out of a different corner of Halifax, dropped buckets of snow, then the temps climbed, turning to rain, melting the snow, flooding basements all over town.
I tried for swims in a hundred different places, but fell short of course, netting only a quarter before my time on the coast was up. But such good swims they were.
all photographs by me, Becca Grady, 2021-2022.
