20020604

June 4, 2002

Day 26

Start: Gros Morne RV Park, Rocky Harbor, NF 
End: Triple Falls RV Park, St. Anthony, NF
Miles: 214

The low last night was 40f and the high today was 51f in western Newfoundland. The skies were mostly cloudy all day, but there was no rain.

One propane tank ran out as we were getting up, so I switched to the other. After breakfast, we unhooked and got underway. We stopped at the Irving station where the owner has a daughter in Virginia (Fredericksburg) and got the propane.

We drove up the Viking Trail (Route 430), sticking with the plan. Just north of Rocky Harbor, Dolores spotted two snowshoe hares next to the road. A feature called “The Arches” popped up, so we pulled in to check on it. It’s a large rock, maybe 30 feet high by a hundred or more feet long. Much of the base has been eroded and now has waves splashing underneath it. We found the army guy and his wife whom we met two days ago and chatted some more with them. They say they’ll see us here tomorrow.

We continued north, not going very quickly because the road is not in great shape. It’s not terrible, but it’s not good, either. Around 50mph seemed best. After Pt Barbe, Dolores spotted a moose just off the road on her side. We stopped for diesel fuel out in the middle of nowhere because I don’t like getting too far below half full. We stopped again, at Anchor Point, for a quick lunch, a stop at the liquor store for wine, and a visit to the grocery store for perishables (all these stores were clumped together).

At this point in the trip, we could see water on the left and a strip of land across the water, which turned out to be Labrador across the Belle Isle straits. The straits are only nine miles across at the narrowest point. A couple of conversations and the bleak look of the place caused us to change our plans. We had thought we would take the car ferry across to Blanc Sablon, Quebec and then drive into Labrador and see a few places. We’re convinced now that it won’t be worthwhile, so we’ll take more time somewhere on Newfoundland.

We diverged from the shoreline and went overland across the northern point of Newfoundland. It’s a strange place. Dolores says it looks like Iceland with more vegetation. It’s very rocky, but with bogs like peat-bogs all over. The telephone and electrical poles are stuck into the ground (bog), then there are cradles built around the base of the pole that are filled with large stones to brace the pole and keep it vertical. 

There are stacks of firewood at the roadside. People come out in the winter and cut wood. Then the use sleds and snowmobiles to drag it to the road. They can buy a permit to leave it there at the road. They then bring in what they need when they need it. No one disturbs another person’s wood.

In the middle of this passage, we saw two white deer-type animals. Shortly afterward, we came up to a road gang painting lines. We stopped and asked if those were caribou. They said, yes, those were caribou in their winter coats and they need those coats today (the wind was blowing hard here). 

We went on to the campground and set up the trailer. It’s located between St Anthony and the main attraction we want to see, the remains of the Viking settlement of the year 1000 in L’anse aux Meadows. The campground is rustic, but it has what we need and there’s a fast-flowing, noisy, small river about 50 feet away to put us to sleep.

We went into St Anthony to look around. After driving through the main business section, we followed the road out to the lighthouse point. With the binoculars, we could identify four small icebergs. We went back in to town and then out on route 430 to Goose Cove. There’s nothing there to mention, but that’s where the route ends, so we can say we traveled the entire Viking Trail.

Back in to St Anthony then, to a stop at a building formerly belonging to a Dr Grenfell, a missionary doctor who brought medicine to this corner of Canada. It (and other buildings in town) are all part of a museum now, and we’ll see more of it tomorrow.

A stop at the mall (very small, but there is one) provided us with the newspaper and a book.

We brought our goodies back to the little house by the river and dropped them off. We kept going then to L’anse aux Meadows, for dinner. I’d spotted a mention of the Norseman restaurant there in several Canadian web sites and wanted to try it. On the way, we found another moose feeding next to the road.

We were the Norseman's only customers early this evening. We were given a front window table, with a view over a rocky bay, a rocky island off shore, and a slice of Labrador on the horizon. After being seated, the waitress poured ice water and noted that the ice came from Greenland icebergs and showed us which one (there were several in the bay). She then asked if either of us thought we’d like lobster. Dolores said yes (of course), and an employee walked across the street to a shed where a lobsterman keeps the ones he caught that day and picked out one for her. She could have picked her own, but it was still blowing and she didn’t want to put her coat back on.

She had a seafood chowder that contained no shellfish and the lobster. I had a great spinach salad and baked cod with Dijon sauce. We shared a Chardonnay from Australia. Everything was very good. Then, we had coffee from Puerto Rico and I had cheesecake with bakeapple berries and partridgeberries separately so I could try each taste. Dolores had the same berries on a scone. Dolores preferred the 
bakeapple berries, I preferred the partridgeberries, which are a form of the lingonberry. I keep lingonberry jam from Sweden at home, so that may be the reason I liked it. The bakeapple has nothing to do with an apple – it’s a contortion of a french phrase ending in “q’appel” which means “what is the name (of this thing)?”. It’s also called a cloudberry.

We chatted with the waitress, who lives with her family in St John’s, NF, in winter and is getting her master’s in Environmental Science studying Greenland. She answered question after question for us. There is a little gallery in the back of the restaurant, so we took our second cup of coffee and strolled around in it. Dolores bought a gift and we both picked up tee-shirts, and we took a book. Finally, we grabbed our goodies and returned to the little house by the river to rest from eating.

We returned at dusk and saw several more moose at roadside as we drove. I stopped and took a picture of one that looked a little smarter than the others, but it was getting dark and may not come out.