Travel by Ancestry -- to the Grand-Pré 2017 Celebration of Peace and Reconciliation -- August 10 - 13, 2017

The following slide shows, videos and shares offer a personal insight into the events and meetings that took place throughout all the days of celebration and learning that comprised the Grand-Pré 2017 Celebration of Peace and Reconciliation:

During this first-ever, four-day reunion of the Acadian and Mi'kmaq people, held at the Grand-Pré World UNESCO site in Nova Scotia, festival participants had an opportunity to take part in an historic renewal of friendship, exchanging of gifts, song, dance, and culture among Mi'kmaq and Acadian peoples, and the acknowledgement of a 400 year-old shared history, tradition and legacy in Nova Scotia.

The historical timeline of Nova Scotia, and specifically, "Acadia," reflects two cataclysms: first, the coming together of two distinct peoples from two separate continents, Europe and North America, that occurred in the early 1600s, when Europeans (largely from France) first settled lands held by the Mi'kmaq and intermarriage took place, and second, the involuntary  expulsion of the Acadian peoples out of Nova Scotia in 1755 who then carried Native and European blood lines borne of these first historic unions to their new homes and settlements. Now, in 2017, we may add to this same timeline a third milestone: the Celebration of Peace and Reconciliation that took place at Grand Pré.