Just so everyone is clear, including the author, Brier Island is in SOUTHwestern Nova Scotia, not northwestern. Grew up in Digby, used to spend summers on Long Island. Been around the world, still find the Annapolis Valley the nicest place - my brother just returned from 40 years in BC in the Okanagan, a place where there are no roads for fun, just north/south and busy.
There are other roads paralleling the main highway almost all the way from Halifax to Annapolis Royal and thence to Digby. Some places there are a choice of three. Those roads are where you can drive at 90 to 100 klicks on real old country roads and revel in having a decent car under you. Curves, blind corners, steep little hills, almost no trafffic. On a nice day, bliss. On a wet day, concentration. In winter in a storm, well, well. Once did Wolfville to Digby, 90 miles in 8 hours back in the 1960s. Yes it was an adventure in a Beetle with no decent heat to demist that windshield in a snowstorm. But we were young.
Navigation? Hard to get lost, nowhere in Nova Scotia is more than 25 miles from the coast. Use a tourist map, who needs fancy electronic doo-dads for a trip down the Valley except namby-pambies?