This week, I was running errands in Middleton. First stop was the Library. I wanted to learn more about the English poet, Gerard Manley Hopkins (see post A Celebration at Meier Point). The staff put out an inter-library loan request.
I checked the new books and found the biography of Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson; a huge tome, 670 pages.
After the Library, next stop MacDonald Museum’s local art exhibition. Then the Summerland Nurseries for a planter and a shrub for Mothers Day (Stewartstonian, Evergreen Azalea).
Friday, we drove through the Rawdon Hills to New Glasgow. I started to read about Elon Musk. Page 47-48 has a reference to Peter Nicholson. He was in charge of strategic planning at ScotiaBank. Musk was at Queens University in Kingston 1990-1991.
This rings a bell. At COGS in Lawrencetown, there is a stone with Nicholson’s name on it, commemorating the new building.
Somehow, this discovery seems to bode well for the collaboration between Christian and myself (see Mapping the Geography of Places) Christian Gastmeier and Bob Maher.
Postscript
While no picture of the commemoration stone from the family could be located, a description of Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poetry was found, described in Frances Cafferata’s MA Thesis Dissertation from the University of British Columbia, “Gerard Manley Hopkins’ use of nature in his poetry“.
This weekend, I made contact with Christian Gastmeier. He is a student at COGS working under the supervision of David MacLean. He is working remotely from Sudbury, Ontario. It is a capstone project: developing an AI-driven NLP pipeline for Spatiotemporal extraction.
I have included two paragraphs from his proposal:
“ Background
Since 2013, Bob Maher has maintained an extensive digital record of geographic observations through his blog ‘The Ernest Blair Experiment’. This body of work contains over a decade of high-fidelity local knowledge regarding the Annapolis Valley. However this data is currently ‘unstructured’, existing as a narrative text rather than a spatial database. Transforming this narrative into a Geographic information System (GIS) requires Natural Language Processing (NLP) to bridge the gap between human story telling and provincial resource management.
Purpose
The purpose of this project is to develop a reproducible cloud-based AI pipeline using ArcGIS to extract geographic themes from unstructured text. Leveraging the full ArcGIS online (AGOL) suite this project will:
automate extraction
Geocode and Validate
Cloud- Native Visualization
Multi-media Integration
System Scalability
Where things stand today (Monday, May 4,2026) ?
Christian emailed his Capstone project proposal
We had telephone conversation
Bob agreed to provide hard copy ( 13 volumes of his ernestblairexperiment blog
Christian is working remotely from Sudbury, Ontario.
Deliverables:
Spatiotemporal Cloud Database
Automated Extraction Pipeline
The Ernest Blair Digital Atlas
This blog will be sent to a wide range of industry/academic partners.
If you are interested in the full project proposal, contact Christian at W0529818@nscc.ca Future blog posts will track our progress.
Edward is unavailable for a few days. He suggested that I post this blog, as is.
We arrived in Annapolis County in 1980. I had accepted a teaching position at the Nova Scotia Land Survey Institute (NSLSI). It was to teach applications of mapping software in an intensive one year program (48 weeks) in Scientific Computer Programming. Heather and I, with two young boys (Patrick and Andrew), moved from Ottawa (National Museum) to West Dalhousie. We rented what was known as the Ernest Buckler house from Bill O’Neill. He and I commuted down the Morse Road to Bridgetown, and on to NSLSI in Lawrencetown.
After a couple of years, we moved to Clarence East, neighbours to the Barteaux, Elliot and vanRoestel families. In 1988, we moved to Indonesia, California, Ontario (Peterborough) and BC (Victoria) before returning to accept the position of Senior Research Scientist with the Applied Geomatics Research Group (AGRG) at the NSCC in 2000. At that time we purchased a house in East Paradise on Highway #201. Now, in 2026, we have relocated to Middleton.
Throughout our time in Annapolis County, we explored the Bay of Fundy coast, the Annapolis Valley and, to a limited degree, North and South Mountain. Despite our familiarity with the local Geography, we had never been to East Dalhousie.
Given the forest fires last year (see Trial by Fire), I wanted to visit Lake George and Lake Paul. We started out, gassing up the car in Berwick. Moving up onto South Mountain, it is very evident why Berwick is considered the “Apple Capital” of the Valley. From Morristown, we passed through Lake George and Lake Paul reaching the Dalhousie Road, where we turned west to East Dalhousie at the Kings County/Annapolis County line. At East Dalhousie, we turned South on the Cherryfield Road. The Cherryfield community is on Highway #10. Afterwards, we headed North, back to Middleton.
Three significant observations were made on travelling the backroads of Annapolis County
Access to good maps is essential. We always have a copy of the Nova Scotia Atlas in the car. In this case, the seventh edition.
The forests of South Mountain are remote and relatively inaccessible. Given the nature of climate change, there is a high probability of forest fires by lightening strikes. This happened in 2025. The management of these forests is critical, not only for remote communities, but also the proximity to the communities along the mountain slopes — not a time to reduce the resources and capacity of NS Lands and Forests.
It is very evident from the signage on individual driveways that the public, individual land owners, are concerned about the mining of uranium. Without travelling these back roads, the average politician/ civil servant would not understand the public concern.
A final comment.
The county provides in the mail, “Explore Annapolis County: Your guide to discovery” an excellent publication – BUT NO MAPS ENCLOSED.
The drive through the back roads of Annapolis County was a revelation. And yet, we have known the geography since 1980 (approaching fifty years) on and off, and have been part of the history of the College of Geographic Sciences (COGS).
Edward visited the Annapolis County booth during the recent Saltscapes Exposition in Halifax. At the booth he did get a poster map, “Explore Annapolis County: This is where you wander”. The County marketer told him that the map promoted exploration “Choose your own adventure. Start anywhere. Go everywhere”. In essence it was thematic in nature.
A portion of the poster map is shown, above. A couple of QR codes on the back invite explorers to “Continue your journey with more itineraries and ways to wander”.
His previous books have covered lost roads and other treasures in the landscape (read previous posts Old Ways and Kings County).
On Tuesday, we stopped at ArtsPlace in Annapolis Royal. There were several displays on the theme : How trees influence Western Culture in the Modern Era; Wandering through Trees. Nature and Culture. And the response by local artists to the Long Lake Fire, Summer 2025.
How trees Influence Western Culture in the Modern Era, Information compiled by Doug Pope for the Robert Pope Foundation (Handout at the ArtsPlace Gallery).
Acknowledgements
Edward added the graphics and links. Much appreciated.
Postscript
Edward’s eleven-year old grandson, Tristan, from Saint Catharines, just celebrated his first anniversary with his YouTube Channel “United Mapping 01“, and has racked up about 370 YouTube shorts and almost 4,000 subscribers. As a reward, his mom updated his CapCut video editing software to Pro.
This Saturday found us at the ArtCan Cafe in Canning. Besides, the gallery and cafe, they often have a few books on sale by local authors (see also Canning Trip). This time, they included three books by Soren Bondrup-Nielsen, plus a recent publication on the Inner Bay of Fundy. The latter is a colouring and activity book. I picked up a copy for our grand-children. Indeed, I should have purchased three copies ( one per family)
The book is written by Sandra Eger, Darien Porter and Erica Porter
It fits well with the concept of books on local Geography. But it goes much further. It is written in both English and Mi’kmaw. It is an activity book with crosswords and colouring.
The geography is the Inner Bay of Fundy between Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. I can imagine extending it to the land geography that includes the watersheds flowing into the upper Bay of Fundy.
In response to my blog, Sandra Barry had referenced Mary Rose Donnelly’s ‘Great Village’. I am also aware that Sandra is a resident too of Middleton, and has written extensively on the life and times of Elizabeth Bishop (see Eccentrics in Paradise and One, Two, Three).
First and foremost, Tatamagouche and Lunenburg are very different communities. One is a university town; the other is a historic, sailing and tourism community.
Yesterday morning, we took Highway #10 across to the South Shore. The road was empty. The landscape is forested with evidence of fires and tree harvesting. Through New Germany to Bridgewater; on Highway #102 to Blockhouse and Lunenburg, our destination was Lunenburg Bound, the bookstore and the bakery/coffee shop next door.
The bookstore is excellent, both new and used books are well catalogued.
What did we find?
For Heather, Lorne Fitch ‘Conservation Confidential’. ‘A biologist investigates the clash between progress and nature’. Praise from Sid Marty(back cover)
We also took advantage of our geography — time spent in Antigonish. We had been recommended to stop at the Curious Cat Tea and Books in the mall. We found four books; three for Heather and one for me. Still looking to find the fourth for our luggage.
My knowledge of St Francis Xavier University goes back to awareness of the Coady Institute.
The book starts with an excellent quote from Rumi. “Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.“
As Anne and I prepare our palettes for the upcoming 2026 season, I find myself reflecting on the profound bond between geography and plein air art — painting on location.
Magic happens when we bridge the world of art and geography, as in capturing the highest tides in the Bay of Fundy.
I believe that plein air painting is much more than a hobby; it is a vital way of imprinting the landscape onto our soul. Because we immerse ourselves for a few hours into the landscape, we recall so much more. It’s not like snapping a tourist photo and moving on.
As plein air artists, we recall the July heat and wind at Long Point Lighthouse near Twillingate, Newfoundland …
the smell and sound of a violent downpour near Petit Saguenay, Quebec, or in Pakaskwa and Neys Parks, Ontario …
the brilliance of spring colours at Nova Scotia’s Lawrencetown Beach …
or the rise and fall of monster tides at Baxter’s Harbour.
Yes, plein air painting is far more than a simple outdoor hobby. It’s where we move from being passive observers to active participants. This intersection of art and geography links our creative expressions directly to our landscape.
Our interactive community map has already garnered 40,000 views, proving just how much we all crave that spatial link to our surroundings. The current 2026 map includes over 50 paint-out sites.
Close-up of our interactive Plein Air Map around Halifax-Dartmouth (click for more)
The map has become a digital bridge between traditional fine art and modern spatial exploration. Our map is viewed worldwide. Artists outside the region have contacted us to plan their visits to the region, based on the map.
I invite you to witness this connection firsthand starting May 7th at Granary Park, as the Plein Air Artists of HRM begin our weekly Thursday sessions. In the Annapolis Valley, the season begins at the Harriet Irving Botanical Gardens at Acadia University.
Plein Air artists under cover but in cold, drizzly weather (Chester, Nova Scotia)
We paint regardless of the weather—whether it is a “Nova Scotia sprinkle” or a foggy morning—because we believe there is immense beauty and a unique “mood” to be captured in a storm.
You will see incredible artists in action, translating the raw structure and light of the coastline into masterpieces.
Whether you join us for a session or just stop by for our friendly group critique around 1:30 pm, you will discover that there is no single “right” way to see the world.
Let’s celebrate “The Geography of Outdoor Art” together this season.
POSTSCRIPT
For anyone interested in exploring/developing Artificial Intelligence in creating a live interactive global plein air map please contact me.
At the Highland Mall in New Glasgow, I found a copy of Donald Savoie’s biography of John Bragg, The Rural Entrepreneur. It details his efforts with Oxford Frozen Foods and EastLink. Savoie provides an excellent description of the creative rural economy in Nova Scotia.
While in Pictou, we stopped at the deCoste Arts Centre and the accompanying library. I signed out Edward MacDonald’s, The Geography of Home: Poems for a Lost Time. A different example of the creative rural economy; in this case, the setting is rural PEI.
Today, I received online, the March newsletter of Atlantic Books entitled ‘Defend Nova Scotia Books’.
“One of the biggest clouds on the horizon this month has been the looming threat of planned cuts to Arts, Culture and Tourism funding by the government of Nova Scotia”.
Ernest Blair Experiment 