Sun sends Nova Scotians to parks

Sunday saw a perfect storm — or rather, a lack thereof — for Nova Scotians to get out and enjoy their local parks after the ban on visiting them was lifted by the province on Friday.

After a gloomy Saturday, the blue skies, sunshine and 15-degree temperature on Sunday drew many to places like Point Pleasant Park and Long Lake Provincial Park, under the provisions of social distancing with household groups no larger than five persons and keeping at least two metres apart. Beaches and playgrounds remain off limits, but sports fields, trails and community gardens are now available to users, provided they observe official health guidelines.

It was no mean feat, especially in a popular spot like Point Pleasant Park where families, joggers, cyclists and dog owners were all jockeying for position on its many trails along the harbour and through the woods.

But the mood and behaviour of park visitors felt very different from days in the park leading up to the declaration of a state of emergency across the province on March 22.

Sandra Kirkpatrick and her teenage daughters Bryn and Shea have been looking forward to Sunday's walk in Point Pleasant Park since they heard the news on Friday, and weren't sure what to expect when they got there. But after walking the trails and feeding peanuts to squirrels for an hour-and-a-half, they were pleased to see other park users respecting each other's space.

“Everybody has been walking very far apart, they're on each side of the trail, they're not coming up and talking to each other,” said Bryn, “and even if they are, they're staying six feet apart.”

“We ran into someone that we knew, while we were walking,” added Shea, “but we had our conversation from opposite sides of the trail, and then we went our own ways.”

Their mother, Sandra Kirkpatrick, is hopeful that restrictions won't have to be tightened up again due to people ignoring the rules about park overcrowding and social distancing, and it seemed to her on Sunday that other park users were feeling the same way and sticking to health authority rules.

“We haven't seen big groups of people congregating anywhere. Everybody's walking, stopping and looking, and staying within their own groups.”

The Kirkpatricks' reasons for coming to the park were twofold since they also came to visit its Halifax Memorial to mark the 75th anniversary of the end of the Battle of the Atlantic, as Bryn and Shea are Nelson Royal Canadian Sea Cadets.

Traditionally there would be a large ceremony to mark the occasion, but this year the Royal Canadian Navy held a virtual ceremony with memorials happening onboard many of its vessels, including HMCS Ville de Quebec, sitting just offshore in Halifax Harbour.

“We thought we'd come down today and bring poppies to leave at the monument. We figured we could do it on our own,” said

Sandra.

Closer to the water, westend Halifax parents Andrew and Laurie Hilchey watched their young sons Gavin and Colin explore on the rocks and observed HMCS Ville de Quebec and the offshore supply vessel Atlantic Osprey moving in the harbour.

“It's such a relief, especially for the kids,” said Andrew who, like many parents had been waiting for this moment for more than a month. “For the last few weeks we've just stuck to our own block, doing our bike rides and stuff, so it's nice for the kids to have the freedom to get outside.

“Today they've been exploring the brooks and the paths and seeing all the animals. They even had the chickadees landing on their fingers . ... There's just so many different things they can do here, it's even been fun being able to get down to the water to look for crabs and sea glass.”

Just off the Halifax peninsula, at Long Lake Provincial Park on St. Margarets Bay Road, the small parking lot is full, and a few additional cars are parked along the shoulder. But with a five kilometre trail and over 2,000 hectares of woods in which to wander, it wasn't hard to observe the rules of social distancing.

On Sunday afternoon, Armdale resident Barry Craigmyle was walking his “Woodle” Roxy (part Wheaten terrier/part poodle), although he'd already visited Long Lake on Friday, within 15 minutes of hearing the announcement that the parks would reopen.

“It was the most important thing for me, especially being a dog owner,” he said, standing next to the lively brook running alongside the trail towards the lake. “When I got here on Friday, there were probably 10 or 15 cars here already. It was overcast, and when I got on the trail I never saw anybody else in here.

“It was spectacular. That's the hardest thing about being a dog owner, just walking around in circles on your street, it was getting really hard to keep doing the same circuit every day.”

Even on Sunday, with gorgeous weather and a full parking lot, Craigmyle said he found park users were well spread out throughout the area, and the ones he did encounter remained mindful of the rules.

“I passed some people two minutes ago on the trail, but before that I didn't see anyone where I was back in the woods,” he said as he was wrapping up his latest excursion with Roxy. “And I thought I'd be bumping into 10 or 15 people back there.

“But I saw no one, it felt like we had the area to ourselves. Then when we got to the lakeshore, it seemed people were spreading themselves out pretty decently.”

Craigmyle also found there was another side benefit to being out in the park immediately after the ban was lifted, one that he wouldn't have immediately expected to encounter.

“The amazing thing after the park's been closed for over a month, there's no dog feces all over the place,” he said with a grin.

“Sometimes there is, but it was crystal clear when we've been down here this weekend, so that's been good.”