On a slightly overcast Sunday morning we made our way into Sydney harbour the home of the World’s biggest fiddle.
The town itself was a little quiet today with most of the shops being closed but with three cruise ships in port there were plenty of visitors looking to spend their money. The Main Street reminded Sylvia and I of a Wild West town with the horses being replaced by motor vehicles.
Some of the buildings were adorned with huge street art such as this.
Sydney was a base in WW2 for the North Atlantic merchant fleet with 177 convoys containing coal, steel and other essentials leaving this port. Each convoy was made up of an average of 14 ships and in total 48 of these convoys were successfully attacked by German U-Boats with the loss of some 226 ships. Many of the ships were old merchant vessels that weren’t really designed to cross the Atlantic and therefore they proceeded at a slower pace making them more vulnerable to attack. A monument on the sea front commemorates these brave merchant seamen.
Nova Scotia, as its name suggests was originally populated mainly by people from Scotland and in fact more people speak Gaelic in Nova Scotia than they do in Scotland. This influence can still be heard by the various buskers that serenaded us as we walked along the boardwalk this morning. Whether this be by guitar…
…mandolin…
….or indeed the traditional pipes and drums.
Sylvia requested that the piper play “Scots Wha Hae” and he thought for a minute before launching into it, instructing the drummer to play a slow 2/4 beat. He explained afterwards that it was the first tune that he had learnt on the pipes but hadn’t played it for ages, so had to think about it before starting. He did a very good job.
Near the cruise port was a large craft fair with local people selling knitwear, Christmas decorations and other such arts and crafts.
And of course no description of a day in Sydney would be complete without a picture of the giant fiddle.
A pleasant little town even if most of it was closed. Tonight we sail to our last Canadian city of this leg Halifax.