(Sorry for the long time between posts - we're way behind but will try to get caught up soon)
After visiting PEI, we headed east and north, to North Sydney, Nova Scotia, to the ferry terminal for the boats headed for Newfoundland. In the past we haven't needed reservations for ferries, so we haven't bothered, but apparently getting there on Saturday night and planning to be on the Sunday morning ferry was something that was definitely not going to happen. No worries - we just made our reservation for Monday morning instead, and took a day and a half to explore the Cape Breton Highlands National Park. We did a few hikes there taking in the waterfalls, old growth forests, and beautiful seashores.
Monday morning came, and we were parked in line, ready to board the ferry. Our departure wasn't until 11:30 a.m., but they loaded us on at 9:30. The boat was big and pretty nice, but Piton had to stay in the van down on one of the vehicle decks, and we weren't allowed down there once the ship was at sea. The crossing is scheduled to be 4-6 hours, depending on the boat and how rough the seas were, and on this trip it took us about 6 hours to cross the Cabot Strait. Unfortunately, the winds were really strong, and the seas rough, so we weren't able to make it into the harbour under those condition. This meant that we got to cruise up and down the coast, in total darkness, in rough seas, for an extra 6 hours or so. Oh that was fun. We did eventually get to Port-Aux-Basque though, docking around midnight and actually getting the van off the ship around 1 a.m. It was a long day. We'd been told by some truckers that the only road north, just outside of town, would likely be closed due to the high winds. Trains have literally been blown off the tracks in that area, the winds get so strong. That was ok, we were ready for bed anyways. Maybe it would have been better to have had reservations for that Sunday crossing…
Tuesday morning we travelled north, passing through Corner Brook on our way up to Gros Morne National Park. This is where we spent most of our time on Newfoundland. The park is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site because of the geology. Several hundred million years ago, the European Tectonic Plate collided with the North American Plate, and the compression of the plates formed the Appalachian Mountains. Most often when two plates collide, there is a subduction zone, where one plate dives down under the other melting in with the earth's mantle, but in this part of Newfoundland, one plate was pushed up on top of the other, bringing some of the mantle rock with it. When the plates then moved back apart, creating the Atlantic Ocean, some of the rock from the mantle was scraped off the bottom of the plate and left on the earth's surface. This rock is called Peridotite, and occurs in the tablelands of Gros Morne National Park. It was here that scientists were able to help prove the Theory of Plate Tectonics.
Gros Morne isn't just the tablelands though, the Long Range Mountains run through the park, in which some deep fjords were carved many years ago. Western Brook Pond was once one of these fjords, but has since then been cut off from the ocean, making it a freshwater body, and therefore a "pond" instead of a "fjord"; it's an inland lake with massive sheer cliffs flanking it's sides. Gros Morne is also situated on the Straight of Belle Isle, the ocean straight separating Newfoundland from mainland Canada. The seashores here are also a spectacular sight to behold, with volcanic rock formations, cliffs overlooking the water, caves along the shoreline, and sea stacks rising up out of the water. The coastal bogs are also home to a lot of wildlife.
After a few days of hiking, we decided to continue our drive north, and went all the way up to L'Anse Aux Meadows, a National Historic Site. It was here, contrary to popular belief, that the first Europeans came to North America and established a settlement. The Vikings came here, led by the someLief Eriksson, son of Eric the Red. They built houses, even an iron forge, and lived there for a while, 450 years before Christopher Columbus was even born. We didn't get to see any of that though. The visitor centre, contrary to their published literature stating they would be open for another two weeks, had closed its doors for the season the day before we got there. It was freezing cold and pouring rain, and we didn't know which trails would take us to see what we wanted, so we wandered around for a while, but didn't find anything before giving up and heading back to the warm, dry van. Sorry, we didn't take any photos of all that excitement.
We headed back south to Gros Morne again, and driving along the coastal bog early one morning spotted a small herd of Caribou. They spend their summer up in the high country, escaping the heat and the bugs, then come down to the coastal lowlands in the winter where it's a little warmer and the food is more plentiful. This group had come down a bit early, but we were happy to see them. We slowly made our way out through the bog, inching closer and closer over a period of about two hours. It's a wide open bog, so they certainly saw us coming, but we took our time, and showed that we weren't any threat, and didn't get too close. They didn't seem to mind. Watching them feed, play, and rest out in their natural habitual was really special.
We had plans of heading over to the east side of Newfoundland as well, and heading up to Fogo Island (which contrary to the theory of plate tectonics, the Flat Earth Society believes is one of the five corners of the Earth), but were finding from our tourism literature that almost everything was closed for the season, with very few visitors like us still left on the island. We instead headed back south to the ferry, crossing again back to the mainland. The ferry crossing back was pretty rough, I think more rough than usual, because 3 or 4 times we definitely heard a huge crash as dishes in the ship's cafeteria apparently went flying and smashed on the floor. We made it across in about 6 hours though, without any extra delays.
Getting to see the caribou, not having to put up with any of the bugs, and seeing "The Rock" in its fall colours was amazing, but we think we may have to go back again another day, to see some more of the stuff we missed. I would definitely recommend visiting Newfoundland for anyone looking to plan a vacation in Canada.
1 comment:
Gorgeous photos Ian! But I did not expect anything less!!
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