Newfoundland - 2015

Day 1 September 15, 2015. Montreal - Trout River

We arrived at Pierre Elliot Trudeau airport pre-dawn and caught the first flight out to Halifax. There, we watched the passengers arriving from Deer Lake in their snappy plaid jackets; if we had been under-dressed in Montreal, we definitely would be over-dressed in Newfoundland. On arrival, we picked up our Toyota Corolla rental car on arrival (a good choice, light on gas, but plenty of room for a camping trip)) and headed straight into the sleepy community of Deer Lake. We picked up camping fuel at Home Hardware and groceries at both "Coleman's" and "Foodland". So far, we understood just about everything that we heard. At the time, the supermarkets looked somewhat limited, on a later visit, after time out in smaller communities, they looked pretty darn good.

We drove through some light showers, made a few view stops, had a quick look around the village of Trout River and then headed for the Gros Morne NP campground of Trout River. It was well protected from the wind. We organized ourselves, ate a salmon dinner, and retreated to the car & tent in the light drizzle. It was a successful day and sleep was most welcome.

Day 2 September 16, 2015. Trout River (Green Garden trail, Gros Morne NP)

We drove to the Green Garden trail head. The trail starts out in brown mantle rock then passes through a variety of vegetation (bog, dwarf trees) before reaching the volcanic coastline. The trail followed along the coast to the "Green Garden", inhabited by sheep. At one point, we waited out a downpour. We could have continued in a loop, but the balance of the walk was inland and the trail had some wash-outs, so,we wimped out and decided to return the same way we had come in and had double the coastline.

We had some afternoon time, so we visited the Discovery Centre (very good and informative) and wandered around the village of Trout River before heading back to the campground. It was interesting to listen to local people speaking, we understood about 80% of what was spoken in Trout River.

Day 3 September 17, 2015. Trout River - Green Point

(including Tablelands, Western Brook Pond)

We got off to an early start and stopped at Tablelands to do the short hike in the barren but somehow captivating mantle rock environment. The area warrants more time than the basic walk (we did return later in the trip), but we had to move on as we had made a booking on a boat later in the day.

We drove north to the Western Brook Pond parking lot, then walked to the edge of the "pond". It is a fjord, carved by glaciers, that has been cut off from the sea; it's now a 16km long lake surrounded by 600m high cliffs. We converged with plenty of conventional tourists and went on the two hour boat tour ($60 Cdn each). The incoming clouds made the trip dramatic. We both had most of the clothes on that we had brought to Newfoundland. I stood out on the bow for most of the trip like a real keener, but then went downstairs and discovered a nice heated lounge. Oh, that's why it seemed like there were so few people on the bow.

Later we had a look around Rocky Harbour (bought some fish at the harbour fishmonger shop) and poked around the nearby lighthouse at Lobster Cove Head. Fish is inexpensive in Newfoundland, so if you do see a fishmonger, stop and buy something. Over at the Green Point campground, we retreated from the black flies and some drizzle and cooked fish in the shelter and then went out to check out the actual Green Point.

Day 4 September 18, 2015. Green Point - St Anthony

The forecast was for continuing clouds, so we decided to head north rather than walking up Gros Morne Mountain. We had a look at Arches Provincial Park. The beach rocks are nice there, so there were a few people collecting stones. If you want to see the stone beach, you better hurry before it gets picked over, no, don't worry, there are a lot of stones. Over at Port aux Choix, the National Historic site museum was closing for the season the following day, so we were able to gain insight into some of the native peoples who have lived in the area. We drove out to the Pointe Riche lighthouse and had a look around the shoreline there. Then we drove a few miles to the northern trail head for the archaeological site. On the walk in, we encountered a caribou herd, then we went past the actual archaeological site to some interesting rock features. We tried to follow the caribou herd, but they simply disappeared, so I'm not sure if we actually saw them or not.

We drove up to St Anthony, passing through a number of seaside communities. We stayed at an RV park about 10km before town and didn't see town until the following morning. The "Triple Falls RV Park" was not one of our favourites, if we could have done it all over again, we would have stayed at the "Viking RV Park", even if it meant more driving. Perhaps we should have asked where the triple falls were and our opinion might have been different.

Day 5 September 19, 2015. St Anthony - L'Anse aux Meadows

(including Burnt Cape Ecological Reserve)

We were in town by 8:00am in low clouds. We took a look around the north shore of the inlet first including a walk. We stopped at a private dock and had a nice chat with some friendly, recreational fishermen who were cleaning their freshly caught cod ( they insisted that we take at least one fillet). There isn't a compact Main Street in St Anthony, so we settled on the local Foodland supermarket and adjoining small shopping mall for a re-supply. The Grenfell museum was closed on weekends. We did enjoy walking up to the cliffs that overlook Fishing Point and the lighthouse.

In the afternoon, we drove up to sleepy Raleigh and then onto a gravel road ( a few tricky spots, but OK for a sedan) out to bleak Burnt Cape Ecological Reserve. We didn't know much about it, but it turned out to be a real gem. The landscape and vegetation is sub Arctic with nice cliffs, all meant to be explored. Even on a Saturday, there was no one else there which was a little weird because it is an amazing place. We could have spent more time there.

We then headed towards L'Anse aux Meadows, and pulled into the Viking RV Park. There was a nice sheltered section for tents and pretty pink picnic tables. Clyde, the owner was the genuine article; a man of few words but still friendly, a salt of the earth type. After dinner (delicious fresh cod) we drove the short distance to the National Historic site, but heavy fog had set in, so there wasn't much to see. At least we didn't drive into a moose.

Day 6 September 20, 2015. L'Anse aux Meadows

We were up early and followed the road out to Quirpon a few kilometres to the east for a crazy sunrise ( a red ball). Then it was off to the National Historic site. We arrived to an empty car park, well before the 9:00am museum opening, so we wandered the site and circular path. Once the museum opened, one of the helpful staff advised to visit the re-created long house before a cruise ship group arrived. In the autumn, cruise ships drop by as often as every second day, landing at a wharf by lifeboats. The staff animator in the long house had a typical Newfie dry sense of humour. The intro film at the museum was well worth watching. The overall setting is beautiful. After a picnic lunch, we climbed up a knoll behind the Norstead museum, which was a real highlight (it could have been the warmth and blue skies) and then we visited the privately run Norstead museum. The small museum village is worth a visit to see the Norse style buildings and the Viking cargo ship that did make a voyage from Greenland to L'Anse aux Meadows. It is all a little ironic that the peninsula markets the Viking angle; the Norse were there for 10 summers, a thousand years ago and then never returned except as tourists.

Day 7 September 21, 2015. L'Anse aux Meadows - Green Point

This was primarily a drive day. We did pass a small caribou herd in the northern bog area. We stopped and one of them crossed the road just behind our vehicle. We had a look around Flower's Cove (small town) and then checked out the thrombolites. If you are passing by, this is a must. Thrombolites are only found here and in Western Australia. They are living (yes they are still alive, but don't bite) relics of life that existed 3.5 billion years ago! Our next significant stop was Cow Bay where you'd find a quiet seaside community, a nice walk out to Cow Head and the very beautiful Shallow Bay (a long beach with the Long Range mountains in the backdrop). We didn't see any cows and couldn't see a cow shape in the rocks.

We camped at the NP Green Point campground and took a marvelous sea-view site and later watched the sun disappear over the horizon from the point, but no green flash.

Day 8 September 22, 2015. Green Point - Gander (including Gros Morne Mountain)

We drove about half an hour to the Gros Morne Mountain trail head. The first hour of the walk is mostly through forest, then it emerges into open country and some pretty ponds. It's a quick climb up a gully to the top of the blob. After the mandatory summit photograph, we moved along to the northern edge of the plateau. If you drop off the trail you can get some nice views of Ten Mile Pond, though the black flies seemed surprisingly evident when we were enjoying the view. We returned via Ferry Gulch, which got a little tedious until Sheila almost walked into a bull moose. He wasn't aggressive but he wasn't in any hurry to move off the track into the dense bush, either. So, we went for a tough bushwack through thick bush to get around the intransigent fellow. In the end, the "tedious" return walk was eventful.

We were back at the car early afternoon and we decided to do a little driving, rather than waiting for the next day which was forecast to be as nice. We headed to the Trans Canada Highway, made a grocery stop in Grand Falls - Windsor. We considered an overnight halt at Bishop's Falls except the well run campground looked out over the TC Highway, so we continued onto Gander and stayed at a campground on the edge of town. We still had nearby traffic noise, oh well.

Day 9 September 23, 2015. Gander - Fogo Island

Once we had seen some of the interior towns, we wondering if we had perhaps gone through the Northern Peninsula a little quickly. However, Fogo Island turned out to be one of our favourite places. We drove from the Gander outskirts to Farewell Harbour and took the first ferry of the day to Fogo Island (reasonably priced). We methodically visited each community starting with Stag Harbour, Little Seldom and then Seldom Come By. I apologize to any Fogo island residents who might have noticed a woman taking photographs of their laundry lines, but she just couldn't resist. Another woman (I've forgotten her name, sorry) gave us a terrific little tour of at the Maritime Centre in Seldom which details the island's history, so by the time that we arrived in picturesque Fogo town, we figured that we had an inkling of what was going on there. The island people had resisted the provincial resettlement program after the cod moratorium and are finding alternative income sources and using larger off-shore fishing boats. It's a really cool place.

There is a terrific campground sandwiched in between Brimstone and Fogo Heads that is run by the local Lion's Club. It would ordinarily, be almost vacant that time of year, but there was a paving crew on the island (we had encountered them on the road in), so there were quite a few trailers in the park. We'll always remember Fogo as a place with warm, sunny weather (and some wind), so it was a lovely place to camp. After we had had a look around town, we followed a recommendation to hike the Lion's Den trail. It was much nicer than the name might indicate with ocean vistas, nice shoreline, small tarns, and so forth. It was just beautiful, and unlike most other trails in Newfoundland, we actually encountered another human being on it. After dinner at the campground, we went up to the top of nearby Brimstone Head for the sunset. Nice spot!

Day 10 September 24, 2015. Fogo Island

We climbed up Fogo Head for the sunrise and then had breakfast before setting out on another super day on Fogo. The idea was to visit the historic village of Tilting and have a look around on the way there. It took us most of the morning to reach Tilting, 25 km away, because there were all sorts of curiosities along the way. We walked to a couple of artist studios and to the Fogo Island Inn which seem somewhat incongruous compared to many of the heritage buildings on the island. The inn and studios are modern structures sticking out like sore thumbs. A room at the Inn goes for about $1,000 a night, and it's typically fully booked. Along the way, we visited the villages of Shoal Bay, Barr'd Islands and Joe Batt's Arm.

Tilting is an authentic heritage community with loads of traditional buildings and fishing sheds. We met Roy Dwyer, a local guide and bought one of his books. He showed us around his fishing stage (shed). Later, we talked to other residents who were all proudly engaged in traditional living. Everyone was so friendly and a-matter-of-fact; very refreshing. It's a lovely, fascinating place. I'm proud to say it is part of Canada.

We dragged ourselves away from Tilting, stopped by the fishing Co-op in Joe Batt's Arm, but it was closed. So, it was off to the Fogo fishing Co-op. We bought a bag of shrimp there and chatted with a few staff who were packaging sea cucumbers for export to Asia. None of them had ever tried eating them. After our prawn dinner, we were back up at Brimstone Head, this time with a bunch of local kids who just finished playing softball next to the campsite. The wind had kicked up that afternoon, so we moved our tent up onto the music stage (as suggested by the camp manager) for protection. I bet the August music festival in Fogo (there is another one in Joe Batt's Arm too) must be fun. But that night, we were on Centre Stage.

Day 11 September 25, 2015. Fogo - Twillingate (including Change Islands)

We had a little extra time in the morning before the ferry departure, so we drove out to the communities of Deep Bay and Island Harbour. It was showery and we got a good soaking on a walk to see the studio near Deep Bay. All was not lost, we saw a herd of caribou out there. On the drive out, we followed behind a truck with two guys dressed in camo, obviously looking for caribou (50 hunting permits issued each year on Fogo). We did not stop to tell them where Rudolph was.

When we got to the ferry ramp, there were already quite a few vehicles lined up. As we were going to the Change Islands (a stop along the way), we lined up separately and waited. An older fellow came by and we talked for a while. I understood about 20% of what he said, but I did figure out that he was going to Change Islands for a funeral. The ferry arrived, we loaded last, so that when we arrived at the Change Islands, we backed out of the ferry. Not all the cars got on the ferry and we realized that vehicle space for getting off Change Islands was quite limited for the multi-stop ferries. That kept us moving quite fast on Change Islands, because we didn't want to miss a ferry and wait 3 hours for the next one.

We had a couple of hours on the Change Islands. It is a pretty sleepy place. There was a shop & gas station open. There is an inn, which might have been open, but there wasn't much happening there. However, it is a picturesque place and if the campground was open, we might have stayed a night. We drove around to the end of all paved roads and got out here and there. We saw a few people and some vehicles on the road, and that was about it. So we didn't get a real dose of culture but it was worthwhile and we headed back to the ferry terminal an hour before departure time, which was a good thing because a lot of vehicles did not get on the first afternoon sailing.

The drive to Twillingate was routine, we crossed New World Island (great name, intimating a Shangri La, or simply reminding me of New World Supermarkets in New Zealand) and over the causeway to Twillingate. We found Peytons Woods RV Park out at Back Harbour. There was two really cool things about the RV park. Firstly, we did our first laundry in Newfoundland there, but also, this was a key location for the book "River Thieves", where one of the last " Red Indians" ( they painted themselves with ochre) lived in a tent (where site #1 is). The colourful camp owner tried to convince Glenn to skip the camping and rent a room, but I stuck to my guns and we toughed out two chilly nights in the tenting area.

Day 12 September 26, 2015. Twillingate

We took a liking to the heated seats in our rental car that morning. We stopped in at Crow Head, had a peak at the lighthouse area and opted for a walk that goes below the lighthouse. It was cloudy, windy, sometimes showery, but mostly it was atmospheric. We worked our way around the bay area and made our way over to the French Head (eastern side of the bay) and went on a terrific and sometimes terrifying cliff walk that wasWOW . Along the way, we decided that the wild Twillingate blue berries were even better than those on Fogo Island.

Back at the campground, we ended up with beer in hand in a little kitchen party with the camp owner and his mates. Then, with the cooler weather, we opted for dinner inside at a restaurant. By late September, most seasonal businesses were closed including restaurants, but there was still one or two open to serve the community of 3,000 people. It's often interesting to peak at the local notice boards and the board at the R & J Restaurant fit the bill. There was an advert for a furnished apartment that included among other features "WIFE". That's because someone had taken a pen and modified "WIFI". Newfie humour sometimes sneaks up,on you.

Day 13 September 27, 2015. Twillingate - Lomond, Gros Morne

I don't think many people were out of bed yet, other than fishermen, when we left Twillingate. It was the last day of a recreational cod fishing window, so there were a few keen fishermen out on the water. We opted to walk the Lower Little Harbour trail. As it is deeper into Notre Dame Bay, we weren't expecting too much, but the description included an arch, which peaked our interest. Like many Newfoundland coastal tracks it exceeded expectations with all kinds of cliffs and foaming seas below (of course we didn't encounter anyone else on the trail).

Over at Boyd's Cove, the Beothuk Interpretation Centre had not closed for the season, so we dashed in to learn about a people who no longer exist. These were the "Red Indians" referred to in "River Thieves" and the centre was near the location of a settlement where a people once thrived. The centre has a spirit garden where you can create and hang up your own talisman; a moving experience.

Thereafter, we rattled down the roads reaching our old haunt of Grand Falls - Windsor for a grocery run at Sobeys (much better than the lackluster Dominion), and then along the TC Highway towards Deer Lake. We had read that the Badger Diner serves up a mighty fine fish & chips so we stopped in and ordered three pieces of cod and chips and split the order. It was really good. We did some back-tracking and head north a ways to the NP campground of Lomond on the Bonne inlet. The wind had moderated, so we pitched our tent by the water.

Day 14 September 28, 2015. Lomond - Marble Mountain (including Tablelands traverse)

We had seen the base of the Tablelands in the first part of our trip and figured it warranted more time, so we returned. Sheila was feeling the early effects of a cold, so she did her own thing, while I sauntered over rocks, going back and forth across a creek up a cool looking valley. There's no trail. There were a few cairns here and there, but the way forward is simple enough. Once I reached the top of the plateau, clouds blowing in from the sea impaired visibility. The landscape was stark but there were small clumps of nutrient starved, wind blown vegetation all over. It was slightly disorienting and at one point, I spotted a huge cairn that had no significance other than to pull me off-course. As I reached the edge of the Tablelands ( I was doing a loop), I peered over the edge and realized that I wasn't where I wanted to be. I was about 1km away from where I could descend. No problem. I worked my way over to an area where the slope eased and made my way down back to the valley bottom and back to the car.

That afternoon, we made a tactical error. We should have stayed at the Lomond campground, but we pressed on to the Corner Brook area. Actually, for the amount of driving that we did, we would have been better to have visited the Bonavista (Trinity) area earlier when we were in Gander, instead of Corner Brook. In late September, all the provincial campgrounds are closed, so we stayed at the Marble Mountain ski area. What we hadn't realized was that the fine ski resort is right on the Trans Canada Highway, which is very convenient but not really conducive to camping or sleeping. We could see and hear big rigs idling in front of Tim Hortons right from our tent. Late afternoon, a truck and trailer pulled into the park. Thereafter a steady stream of vehicles came in and out of the campground. The drivers were mostly older, so we ruled out the possibility of a mobile crack house. We went over to see what was going on. It was the family of a commercial fisherman selling bags of fresh cod (they had called their customers ahead to let them know they were coming).

Day 15 September 29, 2015. Marble Mountain - Lomond (Bottle Cove)

We knew that there was a rain front coming in, so we got off to another early start and drove through Corner Brook and then another 45 minutes further west to the Bay of Islands and Bottle Cove (Lark Harbour). The wind was blowing hard and we had to be careful when we opened the car doors or they might be torn off. We did a few nice walks (Little Port Head, Cedar Cove and around Bottle Cove). The blue skies made way for showers, so we didn't complete the South Head lighthouse trail, which I suspect would have been a highlight.

We had a quick look around Corner Brook and then we drove out to Lomond and stayed at the campground there (rather than anywhere near the TCH!). Rain was coming in and we knew the Lomond campground had a nice, large open shelter.

Day 16 September 30, 2015. Lomond - Deer Lake

It rained all day on our last day. After a leisurely breakfast and we yakked with a few other campers, we drove towards Deer Lake. It was Sheila's birthday, so what better way to spend a part of the day at the Newfoundland Insectarium. Say what? Insectarium? It was brilliant. The owner is passionate about insects and passionate about ensuring that visitors enjoy and learn something on their visits there. It gets great reviews on Trip Advisor for good reason. It's a wonderful place to go on a rainy day and if you can spare the time on a sunny day too!

We checked into a flash hotel for our last night (Holiday Inn Express) and played in the pool & water slide. It took a while to organize our bags again for the return flight. We had a surprisingly good dinner down the road at the Deer Lake Inn.

Epilogue October 1, 2015.

We caught a 5:30 am flight out of Deer Lake onto Toronto and then Vancouver. We were back on Vancouver Island before noon (the wonders of flight and a 4.5 hour time difference). We'll be back to Newfoundland; perhaps a spring trip to the eastern part.....