Alexander Graham Belly

I'll bet you didn't know that Alexander Graham Bell had a bell-y button.

Or that he was born in Scotland.  Or that he had a summer home on Bras D'Or Lake in Baddeck, Nova Scotia.  Or that he organized a group - the Aerial Experiment Association - which engaged in the first controlled powered air flight in Canada in 1909.

Well, neither did we.

We learned all this when we visited the Alexander Graham Bell National Historic Site today in Baddeck, Nova Scotia.  The visitor center is an appealing modern structure which is much bigger than it looks from your approach:

If truth be told, our primary motive for visiting was to track down Kathy's fabled Red Chairs, which, while located in many Canada National Parks, are also in some of the National Historic Sites.  We found THREE sets of Red Chairs here, and each of them were positioned to allow their occupants to gaze at the Kidston Island Lighthouse, which is perched on an island in Bras D'Or Lake opposite the tourist town of Baddeck:

The light itself is quite pictureque, perched as it is on a scenic point of the island:

We liked it so much, we tracked down the other Red Chair pairs in order to record our visit:

But the visitor center and museum was our unexpected reward for the visit.  There was much more to absorb than we could do in a short visit and -- frankly -- the exhibit was not very well curated to help a visitor understand the context of its subject.  We had to ask for an overview video and then track it down at the far end of the visitor center in order to get a proper overview of why Alexander Graham Bell lived here, or why he conducted his experiments here.  But, once we got our bearings, we were mightily impressed.

We only wished we had been here in Baddeck when the Bells' summer home, Beinn Breagh, is open for public tours:

The mansion is perched on a peninsula known to the Mikmak as "Megwatpatek", roughly translated to "Red Head" due to the reddish sandstone rocks at the tip of the peninsula. The name "Beinn Bhreagh"—meaning "Beautiful Mountain" in Scottish Gaelic -- is thought to have been given to the peninsula by Dr. Bell, who purchased approximately 600 acres to form the estate in the late 1880s.

We only have two days here before we board the ferry to Newfoundland, and tomorrow is forecast to be stormy and rainy -- so we decided that this afternoon was our only chance to get to these outdoor destinations.  Stay tuned tomorrow for some "rainy day" activities.