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Nick Churton of Mayfair International Realty looks at a wonderful house in a beautiful Nova Scotian coastal town made for sailing.

The north east coast of North America has a long and celebrated relationship with the sea. The fishing communities of Maine and Connecticut in the US and Nova Scotia and Newfoundland in Canada have made hard and sometimes heartbreaking livings off the Grand Banks in the cruel but bountiful North Atlantic.

Nowadays the sea may be the same but the living is not so harsh. Indeed many of the once hard-pressed but charming seaside harbour towns have now become important holiday and second home destinations.  One of the finest is Chester in Nova Scotia, about 50 miles south of Halifax the province’s thriving capital. Chester is a charming and neighbourly town hugging a rugged coastline which provides a playground of inlets, islands and protected sailing waters.  The Chester Sailing Club established in 1900, is at the heart of this activity.  They sail the classic Bluenose sloop here. I have raced one in the harbour at Chester with the excellent Tim Harris, founder and owner of Tradewinds Realty.

So I was thrilled to see that Tim and Tradewinds had been chosen to market a very distinguished waterfront house in Chester called The Jib House. Actually it looks more like a mansion – and a Governor’s mansion to boot. The well-sheltered Georgian influenced home with its distinctive and stylish double-height pedimented storm porch faces south and looks directly over Chester’s Back Harbour and the islands of Mahone Bay. The former boathouse is now a fully equipped guesthouse and there is about 400 ft of shoreline with dock.

Because it is so imposing The Jib House can’t fail to catch the eye. It caught the eye of film location scouts seeking the perfect house to set the 1995 film, Dolores Claiborne, starring Kathy Bates and Jennifer Jason Leigh and based on the Stephen King book.

So if you are fishing for a perfect storm of a house on the Nova Scotia coast – one where all the elements align to create a magnificent home in a stunning position then you will like the cut of this jib.