Canada: Halifax

After flying to Toronto, my first actual train part of my Canada150 train trip was to go to Halifax. Halifax is on literally the other side of the country and without this youth train pass, I would have never decided to go to Nova Scotia just for fun.

Since I got my golden ticket alone, I went to meet up with my train group at the Toronto train station. I met the members of my train group through the Via Rail Canada 150 Facebook group and we became a group because our dates aligned and we wanted to travel to the same places. Essentially, I was meeting a group of strangers.

All of them were younger than me (I guess I just made the cut for the youth pass) and live in Toronto. I was the only one from Vancouver, and this trend kind of continues as we traveled together as a group. Our first mini trip was to the maritimes and then later on in July we would be doing the 4-day trip across the interior to my hometown, Vancouver.

After a 3-hour stop in Montreal, we finally arrived in Halifax after 1 full day of train travel. For those who are wondering what economy class is like on Via Rail, think of your old style Lazboy chair with a big more recline than an airplane seat. You can get up and walk around as you wish and there are cafeteria carts (expensive food) and lounge carts where you can just sit on a sofa and chill. We made friends with a lot of other youth150 passengers. I’d say 90% of the economy carts were youth150 pass holders.

When we arrived in Halifax, it was evening so after we settled down in our airbnb, we strolled around Halifax’s Harbour Waterfront to watch the sunset and then went to a restaurant called The Bicycle Thief to eat some quality cheap lobster. Halifax is known for lobster!

The next morning, we were able to get a ride to Peggy’s Cove thanks to a new friend we made on the train ride to Halifax. He was 25 and thus had a discount for car rental.

Everyone in my train group liked to take photos so it was nice to take our time and help each other set up for good shots. One of us slipped on a rock and the rest of us watched in horror as his DSLR went plop into the water. I think we all screamed internally (and maybe externally too) because we were holding onto our own DSLRs and we knew how devastating it would feel to drop that.

Sadly our friend’s camera was out of commission for the rest of the trip, but luckily he had just purchased it for the trip so he was able to fish it out of the ocean and get a new one.

After Peggy’s Cove, we drove to the Ovens campground & park to go cave exploring.

For our very first trip together (with a bunch of strangers, no less) I think it went very well. And through our bar and alcohol bonding time in Halifax’s “most bumping” clubs and our airbnb, we were able to build inside jokes and learn about each other’s experiences.

I think that’s what was so special about Halifax – none of us would have gone if it wasn’t for our train pass. None of us would have even met, but somehow we did and we all enjoyed each other’s company and sometimes you can just be happy for the universe aligning together correctly for once.

How many people can say you traveled coast to coast together with?

Sincerely, Loewe