Cruising Through New England and Canada: Part 1 (Boston & Canada)
This cruise brought a lot of firsts for us. We had never been out of the port of Boston. We had never cruised on the Serenade of the Seas. And, we had never cruised up to Maine and Canada. We had actually never even been to Canada before. So, we began our New England cruise adventure with open minds, thirsty (pun intended) for whatever would be coming our way.
In Boston, as this was the first time visiting there as adults, we knew that we needed to pay homage to Samuel Adams and hopefully taste some other great beverages while there. So, after checking in to our hotel that was near the cruise port, we walked over (in the rain) to a brewery nearby called Trillium Brewing Co. There we were able to taste some great craft beers and witness our football team unfortunately lose to, ironically, Boston College. Then, we got an Uber over to Samuel Adams brewery where I had arranged for us to go on the Beyond the Brewhouse experience. I recommend this tour and definitely think that if you are planning on going to Samuel Adams that you make a reservation ahead of time for whichever tour you are planning on taking. After the tour, we found dinner near the hotel, which was delish, and headed back to the hotel to get some sleep before our cruise.
On embarkation day, we had some time in the morning so we went on a brisk but dry (it had been raining the whole day before) walk around this area called Fan Pier Park, which was nice and we could see the skyline of Boston from there. We then grabbed our things at the hotel and went to the Boston cruise terminal. The terminal was pretty basic and not at all like the fancy Royal Caribbean terminal in Miami. Because this was a smaller ship, they didn’t really pay much attention to check-in times so we were just seated with everyone else who was waiting. We did have to fill out customs forms as we were headed to Canada so we could turn them in to guest services once on the ship, which was a different experience for us. Once on the ship we looked around and settled in to what would be a fun week of firsts.
After a rather rough day and night at sea, we made it up to Nova Scotia and our first stop was Sydney. We had signed up ahead of time to do a pub crawl throughout the city. As Sydney, known for having the largest fiddle in the world, was a smaller city and very walkable, we realized that in hindsight we could have done our own tour and not paid for a Royal Caribbean excursion. But, if we had done that, we would have missed out on the best/strangest tour guide experience that we have ever come across. Our tour guide told us at the start that he is a part-time pilot and does tours on the side. On our first stop at the local cider house, Island Folk Cider House, where we met the sweetest, most bubbly owner, in between pours our tour guide treated us to the gift of song. Apparently, he was also a part-time singer, so while we tasted some really excellent cider, we also listened to his singing, which was weird in a can’t look away way. At the next pub, after we were served a beer from one of the local breweries, he sang some more and informed us that sadly he wouldn’t be able to sing at the third place because it was too loud, but that he would be able to come around to each table and do a magic trick. This is because he is also, apparently, a part-time magician/mentalist. Could we have done our own tour of Sydney, yes, but would we have missed out on this borderline bizarre experience, also yes.
The next day, we stopped in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where we were prepared to go on our own tour. Our goals for the day included beer, trying a donair, more beer, having some poutine, and even more beer. We accomplished all of our goals and we even met a fellow cruiser, Doug, with identical goals at our second beer stop. We spent the rest of the day together and we really had so much fun. Our first stop was at Garrison brewing where we tried 10 of their beers. It turns out Halifax breweries are really serious about their flight and the prices seemed too good to be true to us Americans. After Garrison, we went to an Alexander Keith Bar, which is where we met Doug. Then, on our way to Propeller Brewing, we stopped so I could get a tasty donair, which is similar to a gyro with a somewhat sweeter sauce, and some poutine, which was exactly how I thought it would be. At Propeller, we tried 12 of their 13 beers all of which were very tasty and helped to boost Chris’ Untappd numbers. Our last stop was at 2 Crows Brewing where we had another smaller flight. It was a great day of drinking, eating and making new friends.
Once back on the ship, we prepared for another day at sea and for us to head back to the United States. We definitely enjoyed our time in Canada and could have spent more time discovering what Halifax had to offer.
