Rocky Harbour to Port aux Basques

Today was one of the highlights of the drive. We were visiting the Callaghan Trail in the Gros Morne National Park. The trail, to the top of Gros Morne Mountain, was dedicated to the British Prime Minister, James Callaghan. I was at school with his son, Michael, who told me about the trail when we mentioned we were visiting Newfoundland. Pierre Trudeau, the Canadian Prime Minster at the time, arranged for the trail to be named after Jim Callaghan in recognition of his environmental and peacekeeping efforts around the world. It was an extraordinary coincidence that the day we happened to be going to the trail was the 35th anniversary of the dedication, which took place in Ottawa on September 16th 1976.

On a miserable rainy morning, we drove from the hotel to the Park visitor centre where Wendy took this photo of Kenny with a friend of his!

We bought our entrance tickets and Wendy signed the visitors' book as follows:

It was a short drive to the trail, where we parked our cars and walked through the woods to the plaque commemorating the dedication to James Callaghan. It was a particularly beautiful spot with a short wooden bridge going over a fast running stream surrounded by dense woods.

The start of the trail.

The plaque in English and French.

The bridge on the trail near to the plaque and the stream rushing beneath it.

To prove we were there!

We carried on past the plaque for a short way up the hill and then turned back to the cars. The trail is a difficult hike to the top of Gros Morne Mountain and we weren't able to see the top as it was shrouded in clouds.

Our best view of Gros Morne.

We saw this plastic bag attached to a tree which described what a moose has to eat.

We returned to the cars and drove a few kilometres to Norris Point where we visited a 1920's "Saltbox" house maintained as a small museum.

A misty view of the inlet below Norris Point.

We returned to the hotel at Rocky Harbour, packed our bags and then left around noon for the 350 kms drive to Port aux Basques, where we were to catch the ferry to Nova Scotia. We drove back to the Trans-Canadian Highway at a place called Deer Lake.

Past Deer Lake, the weather improved and we had some wonderful views of Newfoundland scenery.

We reached the Cabot Strait, the channel between Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, and saw a very rough sea! We started to wonder if the ferry might be delayed.

We reached Port aux Basques and drove straight to the ferry terminal to find out what time we should check in. The ferry was scheduled to leave at 11.45pm and we were told to return at around 9.30pm. We drove down to the centre of the town and saw this bizarre mural which showed a car that had driven over a small child lying face down in the snow! We think the child was possibly playing on the snow, but who knows?

Port aux Basques Town Hall.

We reached the lighthouse at the entrance to the harbour and could see our ferry on the horizon, trying to come in.

As we had plenty of time before the ferry sailed, we drove out to a place called Isle aux Morts, so named because of the number of shipwrecks off the coast.

 

Bob saw a sign to a seafood restaurant, so off we drove down a side road to look for it for dinner. It was a great success - a small place serving wonderful fresh cod. As we were having our meal, we could see our ferry still waiting outside the harbour. It appeared that the wind was too strong for the boat to dock.

We drove back to the terminal and learned that the ferry was not going to be able to dock until the wind died down. The wind was now at gale force!! We waited in the terminal until nearly midnight, when we talked to an official of the ferry company, who suggested we book into a hotel and they would call us when the ship docked. So off we went to St. Christopher's Hotel, where we checked in and went to bed. As we did, we heard the wind rising to a howl outside. It seemed very unlikely we would be called in the night. We will just have to wait and see what happens.