Seventy Flavours, Vanilla

Sheryl and I went to Read by the Sea earlier this month — nice, if far too short. Apple Maps took us on a route I'd never been on, and Sheryl hadn't seen since she was a kid. Read by the Sea was held in River John, a small place I'd never heard of. You can get there via Route 6, which follows the coast through some pleasantly narrow roads from the Caribou ferry.The actual highlight of the day was a visit to Pictou, a town I've driven past many times and always wondered about. There isn't much to see — an expensive leather goods shop, the usual tourist draws around old architecture, not unlike Charlottetown. What made the day was a stop at Thompson's Dairy Bar, which boasts around seventy soft serve flavours. Despite the selection, I had vanilla.It was a day more about ice cream than anything else. We'd had one in River John too — the usual oversized serving common at places like that in summer.The next time we take the ferry to Halifax, a short detour to Thompson’s Dairy Bar is on our…