The many islands scattered around Nova Scotia are both part of its natural beauty and mysterious history. A new documentary airing next week takes an in-depth look at what makes them so unique.
There are more than 3,800 islands that lie along nearly 5,000 miles of coastline. ‘Nova Scotia Islands,' a half hour documentary, will explore some of the most interesting islands in the province.
Lorna Kirk, director and co-writer of the documentary, said they had to use many different forms of transportation to get all of the footage they needed.
"We used a number of different type of boats and a plane for our shoot," Kirk said. "For McNab's Island we used Mike Tilley's McNabs Island ferry. For our shoot in Lunenburg we used Walter Flower's whale watching vessel 'Eastern Points,' a brand new 45-foot fiberglass-hulled boat, and we also used a small motor boat to get to Troop Island in St. Margaret's bay."
"We also used a plane to get aerial shots of our beautiful Nova Scotian coastline," she said. "It was important that the audience see the islands from two perspectives to get a real sense of what these places look like, and its extraordinary."
Aside from the beauty of the locales, Kirk said the history behind these places provided the most interesting parts of the feature.
"I don't think people are aware of the amazing history associated with the thousands of islands that ring Nova Scotia's beautiful shores," Kirk said. "You've got everything from pirates, to ship wrecks, to whimsical fairgrounds. In many ways the history of these islands reads like a good mystery novel."
From abandoned settlements, to contagious diseases and mass burials there's no shortage of intriguing things that happened off our shores, Kirk said.
"I thought I knew a lot about Nova Scotia, but this documentary revealed stories I had never heard before," she said. "Many of the stories we explore in this documentary are surprising."
‘Nova Scotia Islands' features three controversial islands. One that has assumed many roles including protecting the province's capital city, another that went through an intense tug-of-war between land developers and conservationists, and the last, a micro-nation, that found itself at the epicenter of an international dispute with the United Nations.
Nova Scotia Islands will have its world broadcast premiere on CBC Television's Land & Sea on Sunday, Feb. 17 at 12 noon. Following the broadcast, the documentary can be watched on the CBC TV website at: www.cbc.ca/landandsea.
colin.andrew.chisholm@gmail.com (Twitter: @ColinHFX)
