After I wrote a paean to the Not Since Moses race the other day, Nova Scotia 2023's weird weather forced the organizers to cancel it.
It turned out that the actual time of the race it was low overcast and a bit windy, but probably not terrible. However, areas to the south had epic thunder and lightning, and many parts of the province experienced torrential rains. All of this could very easily have shown up in the middle of the race, and there is no cover and no escape running on the ocean floor next to steep cliffs, so it was a good call to cancel it.
Hopefully they'll be able to find another conjunction of weekend schedule and phases of the moon when we can do it again, and hopefully I'll be able to make it.
The trip up to the Minas Basin area certainly wasn't a waste, though. We went to the Fundy Geological Museum, walked around Parrsboro a bit, and had a very Nova Scotian dinner of fried scallops and moon mist ice cream at the Harbour View restaurant.
Driving home on Sunday was a bit of an adventure though: all the way along the coastal road we saw ominous clouds looming to the east, and as we neared Truro we got caught in torrential rains. Visibility was cut to nearly zero and we had to pull off and wait things out for a while. We decided it would be less hazardous to take the smaller highway 2 rather than the faster and larger 102. Getting there turned out to be a challenge as many main roads in Truro were already blocked off due to flooding.
We braved the main highway for a little bit and exited by the giant Glooscap statue near Millbrook. Roads here weren't completely flooded but they were still recovering from the extreme amounts of rain. Lots of giant puddles. Gravel driveways had left small deltas on the side of the road, like little stone Niles and Mississippis. We even saw storm drains turned into fountains as the drainage pipes had become completely overloaded and water was being forced back out again.
It turns out that some parts of the province had gotten a month worth of rain in less than a day. This is the second time that's happened in just the last few weeks. On the other hand, at least we won't have to worry about wildfires again for a while.
It's been a weird year for weather in Nova Scotia. A dry May caused some of the worst wildfires in our history, and then massive rainfall caused widespread flooding, sweeping people away in their cars.
Anyhow, after an apocalyptic morning and afternoon, the rest of Saturday was quite lovely. Sunday continued the trend of blue skies and pleasant temperatures. So I put on the official Not Since Moses shirt and went out and did a 10K around Halifax to replace the one I missed the day before.
I managed to find some low-tide shoreline to stand in, at Black Rock Beach in Point Pleasant.
It might not be quite as spectacular as Five Islands, but it certainly isn't boring!
I even found some mud in the Common to complete the Not Since Moses experience.
It's not quite the same but we do what we can these days.