We did the counter-clockwise version of the Newfoundland-TransLab circle in 2010 and had a great time. We spent three and a half weeks in Newfoundland and then worked our way home via the Trans-Lab and Quebec. We left August 21st and arrived home September 29th. We were traveling in our van.
We had decided we'd take the Trans-Lab home from Newfoundland after learning they had just completed the section between Happy Valley/Goose Bay and Cartwright Junction the previous December. Completion of that last section meant the Trans-Lab could now be driven end-to-end.
A few things come to mind.... (in more or less random order)
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Decide how you're going to pronounce 'Newfoundland'
- The only part of historical New France still under control of the French government since the Treaty of Paris is
The Overseas Collectivity of Saint Pierre and Miquelon and it's only 25K off the coast of Newfoundland. We took the (passenger-only) ferry from Fortune, NL with our bikes and spent two days on St. Pierre. We didn't have reservations for the ferry or a place to stay on the island. During the crossing we struck up a conversation with a local and learned her sister owns a B&B. When we reached the island, we had the tourist office call the B&B (
Chez Ines) and a room was available. Ines was friendly and wonderful and gave us maps and local insights and made reservations for us at a nice restaurant,
L'Atelier Gourmand.
Oh là là!
The second day was a bit rainy so we spent part of it in the local library and the librarian recognized we were tourists and brought us a few English-language books about the island's history. Also- we even enjoyed such simple things as going into a hardware store or pharmacy to look at how different things are from what we normally see.
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Random Passage was a 2002 Canadian mini-series about the struggles of a colonial Newfoundland outport community. It was filmed near Trinity and the movie set can still be toured at New Bonaventure. We had bought the novel early in the trip and had been watching the DVD set each night so we greatly enjoyed the tour. I see the DVD set can be bought used on Amazon for about $10 if that's of any interest.
- The Maritimes have very rich music and theater traditions. Keep an eye out for any opportunities to attend plays and live-music venues. We loved seeing '
Terese's Creed' at the
Rising Tide Theatre in Trinity (and wish we had been able to see other shows).
- We enjoyed sitting down to a
Jiggs dinner one Sunday with local folks. We had seen a hand-written notice on a bulletin-board about the dinner being available and someone gave us directions to what looked like a long-closed gas station. The only sign (and it was barely visible) said 'Yes, We're Open' but it wasn't clear what was open. Inside were a six-seat table and two four-seat tables and all but two seats were filled. We were given a friendly invitation to the open seats..."if you don't mind company". And of course we didn't. It turned out to be much like a big family dinner back home.
- If you happen to be a fan of the Appalachian Trail, consider that its extension, the
International Appalachian Trail, runs through eastern Canada to Belle Isle, NL. We walked a section of it in Gros Morne National Park.
This older film about it is an eye opener but has a mistake at the end. It says more info is available at iatnl.ca but that should be
www.iatnl.com.
- If you happen to be interested in geology, I see the IANTL web site currently includes an article about the Cabox Geopark Information Center at Benoit's Cove opening last November. Further searches led me to the
Canadian Geoparks Network. Very interesting! We learn there are Geoparks and there are Aspiring Geoparks (i.e., under development). For us tourists, these are interesting geological areas to research further.
The UNESCO World Heritage sites are well worth a visit....
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Red Bay Basque Whaling Station in Labrador is very interesting historically. It's a European summer whaling station founded in the
1530s (!!)
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L'Anse Aux Meadows dates to around the year 1000. (!!!!!)
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Gros Morne National Park. We also took the tour boat at Western Brook Pond and were sorry we hadn't planned on hiking from the dock at the far end of the fjord.
(Those three are the well-known ones. The
list of World Heritage Sites in Canada also includes
Mistaken Point Ecological Reserve in Newfoundland and several very interesting sites in Nova Scotia.)
We also enjoyed seeing the reconstructed
Marconi wireless station at
Cape Race in southeastern Newfoundland. The wireless station relayed the distress signals from the Titanic some 107 years ago this month (and it was at
Signal Hill, St. John's that Marconi received the first trans-Atlantic wireless transmission in 1901.)
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