By Deborah Poole

VISION? “A mental image produced by the imagination.”

This is what Warden Robert Sanford, Joan Batemean and Annapolis County Council had; a vision to provide public access to the Bay of Fundy coastline and all its beauty.

Today, traveling west on the Bay of Fundy Scenic Drive and passing through our shoreline communities, as you near the western end of the drive the pavement narrows until it is hardly more than one lane wide. Just before driving down the hill to the Delap’s Cove wharf (and the end of the road) there is a dirt road that turns off to the left and descends into a steep gully. This rough road – suitable for four-wheel drive vehicles with high clearance, mountain bikes and boot clad feet – will lead you back a mile or so through the woods to the Delaps Cove Hiking Trail, the largest public park on the Bay of Fundy in Annapolis County.

In 1985 the County of Annapolis leased and eventually purchased land here from the Mersey Paper Company Ltd. and the vision became a reality - 140 acres of woodland and shore frontage was made available for public access. This land was originally called the Delap’s Cove Wilderness Trail, but having been a community for many generations it is not a true wilderness area and is now more accurately known as the Delap’s Cove Hiking Trail.

In early June, the press release read “We are pleased to report that 100% of EastLink’s Rural Broadband Network is complete, making EastLink High Speed internet available to all residents and businesses in Annapolis county ... all of our towers, related equipment and connections that provide high speed internet service availability to Nova Scotians ... are ready to service residents… As is the case with any network, wired or wireless, we do expect to have a relatively small number of challenging installations due to unique topography and very remote locations.”

If you were to hear about a new law enacted by the federal government and entitled the “Heritage Lighthouse Protection Act”, you might think that the law was intended to preserve and protect classic lighthouses along the coastlines of Canada. Think again.

The Act became law at the end of May this year, and Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO), the federal agency charged with responsibility for lighthouses, states that this new law is “a means to protect federally-owned heritage lighthouses by allowing them to be used for other purposes, as long as they are maintained in a manner consistent with established conservation practices.” What? What does this mean?

The name of this new law and the governmental description of it are prime examples of political doublespeak. What has happened - in plain English - is that the federal government has decided that there are cheaper ways to provide navigational assistance to mariners and that the upkeep of aging lighthouses should not cut into funds required for the expense accounts of our elected officials, or the generous pension plans of our well paid bureaucrats.

Finding a way to keep the tax and utility bills paid and the roof in good repair is a challenge faced by every homeowner. For our community halls the reality is no different, and for many years the money needed for maintenance and repairs was raised through community suppers. As the years rolled along, the ranks of hard working volunteers got older and a bit weary - and so the fund raising suppers became less frequent. In search of a more reliable and less labor intensive funding stream, for the past few years the community hall in Young’s Cove has hosted musical jam sessions one or two nights each week.