Crossing the Hartland Covered Bridge
The world's longest surviving covered bridge.
Recorded .
Published in Canadian Son: Roots, Stars, and Everything in Between.
Whenever I go somewhere, I do want to see all the popular things, but I try to avoid the tourist traps. I prefer to taste the local flavor, so to speak.
I'd found that the town of Hartland, New Brunswick has the world's longest surviving covered bridge. At 1,282 feet long (measured before Canada's metrication in the early 1960s), the Hartland Covered Bridge carries a single lane of traffic across the mighty Saint John River.
It's paved and still an important thoroughfare for the town so I joined the regular traffic and drove eastbound across it. There is no traffic light; rather, people wait and take turns, because this is Canada and everyone I met on this trip was polite. I'm not even making fun of stereotypes. Everyone was nice.