on-site accommodation

www.gaeliccollege.edu
The Gaelic College, where most of the events of the Cabot Trail Writers Festival are held, offers modest but comfortable and attractive student-style (quad/single/double) accommodation for the budget-conscious or those who'd just like to sleep and eat a short walk from the festival events. To reserve a room, you can call Gail at 902.295.3411 or e-mail gail@gaeliccollege.edu to reserve a room directly.

Off-site accommodation

There are lots of places to stay in our community. However, it can be a little hard to find them. We’re not going to list all the places you can stay, because we’re not sure we know about all of them, and the last thing we want to do is leave someone off our list. Instead, we’re going to give you a few pointers for making sure you’re looking at a place that really is nearby, when you find one on the Internet or at your travel agent’s.

Here is a small selection of links that list local accommodation. If anyone knows of other useful, general links, do let us know! We won’t put up links that point directly to your accommodation, but a good listings site is welcome.

• homeaway.ca/cottage-rentals/nova-scotia/cape-breton-island/r5192

• capebretonisland.com/tripplanner

• www.bbcanada.com/nova_scotia/cape_breton_island/cabot_trail
  (Cape North will be too far, but the other places listed here are all within 45 minutes of our venue. We note that the location maps on this site are not reliable.)

• cabottrail.travel/stannsbay/accommodations.cfm
  (Note that the “Maven Gypsy” is the new name of the former “Goodwill House”; several other properties have duplicate entries in this list.)

• novascotia.com/en/home/placestostay/accommodationscampgrounds.aspx?mode=14&regid=20&isa=1
  (You can use the search tools at the left on this link to select the Cape Breton Island region, and then the individual community names we’ve shown here.)

PLACE NAMES

The first thing to know is that our community has lots of little communities strung out along the Cabot Trail. Most of those little places won’t be shown unless you really know how to look for them, in Internet searches and phone books and such (yes, it’s sometimes pretty confusing for us, too). However, all is not lost. The part of the Cabot Trail that is reasonably close to our festival site runs around St Ann’s Bay, and you will find the entire area referred to as St Ann’s Bay or just St Ann’s. So, that’s the first place you can try looking for.

Other community names that you might search as well, and that are within minutes to a half hour’s drive of the festival, include

• Englishtown

• Goose Cove

• Indian Brook

• Jersey Cove

• Little River

• North River/North River Bridge

• North Shore

• River Bennett

• St Ann’s/North Gut

• South Haven

• Tarbot/West Tarbot/Tarbotvale

Depending on how far you are willing to drive, you can add community names like

• Baddeck

• Birch Plain

• Breton Cove

• French River

• Nyanza

• Skir Dhu

• Wreck Cove

to your search. These places are within 45 minutes of the festival site in most driving conditions.

One last thing to check, if you’re wondering whether a place you’ve found is near enough, is the postal code. You can be reasonably sure you’ll be within that 45-minute range if you stick to B0C 1H0 and B0E 1B0.

A word of caution: lots of places around here rent by the week, so be sure there’s no misunderstanding when it comes time to reserve. Of course, if you round up a few friends…