Au Canada - Day 1 - Campobello Island, NB

Friday, June 19 - Calais, ME
Today is the first recorded day of our travels with Charlie and Kathy Burch. We traveled out to Campobello Island, the summer home of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. This is truly a beautiful place! It was easy to understand why FDR referred to Campobello as "my beloved island". His parents, John and Sarah Delano Roosevelt, first came to the island in 1880, and loved it so much that they purchased 4 acres of land and built their "cottage" on it. FDR first traveled out to Campobello at the age of 1, in 1883. As a boy growing up, he spent his summers here, watching the local fishermen and learning to sail with his father. As he grew older and married, he continued summering on the island with his family, eventually purchasing a cottage next door to his parents. This became known as the Roosevelt Cottage. As you will see in the pictures, they did not live ostentatiously. There was no electricity and no telephone service on the island. Water was stored in tanks in the attics of the cottages and gravity-fed to the bathrooms. The climate here in the summertime is very mild, and was a great way to escape the heat of Boston and New York, which is where the first American businessmen came from who bought and built up most of the land here in the mid-1880's.

FDR contracted "infantile paralysis" (polio) here in 1921, at the age of 39. After five weeks, he was transported on a stretcher, across the bay to Eastport, ME, and was transported to New York for treatment. He only returned to the island three more times after that, in 1933, 1936 and 1939.

From the cottage, we traveled out to the tip of the island to East Quoddy point, where there is a lighthouse. We took several pictures of this spot, since it was another great sight. We did not venture all the way out to the lighthouse, as the tide was rising, and, at the rate of 5 feet per hour, we did not want to get stranded out there until low tide.

Tomorrow, we will travel into New Brunswick at St. Stephen, then proceed along the south coast to Hopewell Cape. This is where the highest tides in North America are recorded. Be sure to check back for pictures tomorrow night, or Sunday morning.

That's it for today's adventures.

Here's the link to the photo album:

http://picasaweb.google.com/cbenoitiii/AuCanadaDay1CampobelloIsland?authkey=Gv1sRgCIyd9JeHy-GmAg&feat=directlink