14 June

Cat mountain, very dog; but try telling that to the slow funny cows or the hot yellow butterflies.

It’s like something out of Ghostpool, ear to bug, etc.

And yes, I ran up corn mad … never easy under town candy, a baby cloud farmhand birthday – your round.

All of these random thoughts make up the first half hour of my day, rearranging magnetic words on a fridge just to amuse myself, smiling and occasionally chortling while I eat my microwave porridge and later make a slice of dry toast disappear.

Shortly afterwards I’m waking up to this in the clear morning outside on the wood-stained decking. Party Girl next door is not impressed.

To ground myself, I escape the crow’s nest in my getaway car, parking up for air in a layby around the headland just to take a photo of a lighthouse and some wispy clouds, which somehow illuminate the roadside landmark.

Double yellow lines spiral their way around the bay to a town called Digby. Where fishing boats and holiday yachts co-exist in a grudging acceptance of one another, sitting alongside vibrant artworks which will ship worldwide.

I take my scallops wrapped in bacon and drowned in a maple syrup sauce, overlooking the harbour and the sibling rivalry. It’s a shore thing. And those scallops are good … so damn good.

There’s Captain Haddock loitering with intent over by the boats. He’ll sink a few before the sun sets, while I’m just searching for UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

I find one in Lunenburg on the other side of the province, and it’s a multi-coloured assault on the senses.

I check in at the Mariner King, a frankly ridiculous 1830s brightly-painted stately inn, feeling the need to invent a scholarly profession I have trained in … surgery, pharmacology, theology, the bar.

Ha, yes – the bar!

Sir, I was very well schooled at the courtroom saloon.

My host makes a great play of showing no impression either way, proceeding to take me on an informative tour of the Georgian building and outbuildings. I nod along, thinking … highly likely I’ll remember little of this.

I’m left to take stock in the Cranberry addition, the lurid pink abode over the road, with a view from the afternoon over the salty streets down below.

After thinking some thoughts, I head back out to wander around the grid-formation streets, looking out for the Lunenburg Bumps.

It’s quickly apparent there’s skullduggery around here, in amongst the the tall ships and sail boats and fin whale skulls and fish restaurants and lines and lines of smartphone tourists.

On my inevitable stroll to the pub, I fall into an open-house brewery, a tap room, going port side in Shipwright for a Rye t’Aweigh (twice). I’m not the only one.

I arrived here from earlier today, whereas the barkeep arrived here from the 1950s, via a well-stocked cosmetics counter, and I want to say … wow, you look way cool. But I don’t.

Perched at the bar next to me, Steve here is one year into his Lunenburg experience, primarily funded by his partner who he never knew was properly loaded. Hmm, I ponder.

Now spends his time spending his partner’s inheritance fixing up an old 1800s homestead in the middle of a World Heritage Site. Things could be worse, he speculates.

I nod, while smirking into my drink.

Everyone follows each other to the Grand Banker, the busy harbour tavern next door, for more salty tales and local craft ales.

Except for Steve, who goes home to renovate a staircase, or something.

I squeeze in at the congested bar next to the baby boomer couple from Down Under, the chatty wife regaling me with stories of their trip-of-a-lifetime travels around Nova Scotia; the mute husband occasionally nodding affirmatively, drinking not drowning, seemingly with two expressions – not here; might be here.

Obviously, the barstaff are all littered with tattoos of anchors and scallops and sailing boats and maritime paraphernalia and such.

When I climb down from my barstool, I find myself in the Saltbox, next to an actual bearded grizzled seadog. We both order pizza and a craft ale, and he tells me of the shit life it is on the high seas.

I try to persuade him that I don’t think it’s a whole lot better on dry land; for one, we have to pay for our fish (what a life!), but he’s not listening, he’s not interested … I think he’s at the wrong end of an all-day session, wobbling away on his stool.

I retire to my top-floor loft room at the Mariner King, drinking in the star-speckled sky outside my dormer window with a nightcap in hand.

The moon is watching over us all tonight.