This Maritime province, where French, Loyalist, and Scottish cultures predominate, has a rich seafaring past. Its rugged coast and sheltered inlets were home to pirates and shipbuilders alike.

The name of Nova Scotia brings to mind a vision of craggy highlands, echoing with the sound of bagpipes. But before Highlanders fled to New Scotland, there were Mi’kmaq, French, British, and Loyalists from the American colonies. All have left a stamp on this province. Today 77 per cent of Nova Scotians are if British descent and 10 per cent of French extraction. Nova Scotia also has the largest indigenous black population in Canada.

Nova Scotians are as close to the sea as they are to the past – inextricably bound to it by their nature, by economics, and by geography. Part of the province, Cape Breton, is an island: and the mainland is attached to Canada by the Isthmus of Chignecto. Appropriately, the shape of the province resembles a lobster, with no point more than 56 kilometres from the sea.

People are drawn to Nova Scotia for its overwhelming friendliness, exemplified by the traditional Gaelic greeting Ciad mile failte – 100,000 welcomes.