Hotels in Halifax

Halifax is the largest city in Atlantic Canada and has one of the world's great natural harbours, which shaped everything about it. The star-shaped Citadel looks down over downtown, the boardwalk runs for several kilometres along the water, and the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic holds the most significant Titanic collection anywhere, since Halifax was the port that recovered the dead.

That maritime history has a darker chapter too: the 1917 Halifax Explosion, when a munitions ship detonated in the harbour, was the largest human-made explosion before the atomic age and flattened much of the north end. Pier 21, meanwhile, was Canada's Ellis Island, processing a million immigrants and now a national museum.

The city has a young, lively feel thanks to six universities, with a dense concentration of pubs and live music on Argyle Street. Nova Scotia's coast is the wider draw, with Peggy's Cove lighthouse 45 minutes away, the UNESCO-listed town of Lunenburg an hour, and the Bay of Fundy's extreme tides within a few hours.