A Day at Keji Seaside

The Port Joli trail in Kejimkujik Seaside Adjunct has been on my list of trails to do for a while now. This summer seemed like the perfect opportunity to finally do it as I am now living only 20 minutes away. This latest attempt of the trail was actually the second of the summer. Earlier in the summer, my mom had come down to do the trail with me. We had only made it two or so kilometers in when my mom told me to stop walking. I never got to see it but my mom told me she had spotted a bear on the trail. We decided to turn around and agreed to try the trail another day. 

Flash forward to our most recent visit to the park, we opted to bring reinforcements. My mom and I plus six other family members went on the hike this time around. We thought it would be safer this way. With bigger groups we would make more noise and hopefully prevent a bear from approaching and also make enough noise to alert any bears in the area that there are people approaching. Plus, you know what they say, “you don’t need to outrun the bear, you just need to outrun your friend”, and we brought a lot of friends. 

A few days before the expected day of the hike, we worried it might rain. Luckily the rain held off. It was a bit foggy at times, but the trail still had some beautiful views. Sometimes fog allows for some eerily beautiful photos. 

The beginning of the trail is nothing overly noteworthy. Just some trees and a few unique looking flowers and plants. This went on for one kilometer before reaching a fork in the road. We selected the right path in order to save the best for last. "Best" meaning the coastal section of the trail.

The non coastal trail was still quite beautiful. We traversed a combination of well groomed gravel paths and boardwalk. The shrubbery was a very nice colour green and we saw a great variety of plants and flowers. Some of my family even picked a few raspberries along the way to snack on. A kilometer or so from the fork in the trail, we came across a nice area of a wooden look-off. Which offered a nice preview of the soon to come coastal views. 

15-20 minutes after the look-off and just as we were approaching the start of the coastal section of the trail we noticed a deer off in the distance grazing on the grass. After stopping to take a few pictures we continued on, thankful that the wildlife we saw was a peaceful herbivore and not the omnivore that could be territorial at times. 

The coast was as expected, the highlight of the hike. This is why you go to the Kejimkujik Seaside, to breathe in the fresh salt air, the cool coastal breeze, and the sounds of waves against the shore. A true Nova Scotian experience. 

Our timing could have been better. The high tide was in, so no sandy beaches to walk along, only the rocky shore. We decided to rest here, have a snack break and enjoy the views. A rock large enough to be seen above the water line had a great number of birds on it. None of us were experts on birds so we did not know what species they were. They could have been seagulls for all we knew. It is exciting either way to see any kind of wildlife along a hike… with the exception of bears.

Between the shoreline and the forest, the last four or five kilometers were very scenic. The ocean was within view to our right for the majority of the last half of the hike. The “finale” to our hike was the little beach off on a little side trail. At this point you could continue on past the beach and hike the Harbour Rocks trail, but we opted to head back to the trail head. A bit much for one day for some of the party members who don’t normally hike. That was fine with me, just meant I had something to look forward to for next time.

The hike in total was about eight kilometers and took my family and I, two and a half hours. We did stop to take pictures along the way and stopped for a few snack breaks. If you just want a nice easy walk without stopping for long periods of time, this trail could be done quite easily in under two hours. I know the map on Parks Canada describes the Port Joli trail as “difficult”, but I did not find it overly challenging. The trail is fairly flat, the most challenging part would be walking along the rocky shoreline and perhaps the length. An experienced or even casual hiker should have no issues with this trail.