We rose to a lovely sunrise and Wendy took this great photo of the inlet in the early morning light.
We had an early breakfast with Bob & Thelma before picking up the rental car from the Hertz office, which was located at our hotel - very convenient!
Our hotel, the Marriott Courtyard.
First, we had to pick up the customs clearance papers from the shipping agent in St. John's. Once we had the papers we needed to collect the cars, we headed away from St. John's on Highway 1, the Trans Canadian Highway or TCH. It was a lovely dual carriageway which went through wonderful open country with many lakes. It was very reminiscent of the lakes of Ontario that we drove through in 2010.
After 90kms we reached the turn-off for Argentia. We drove on for a further 45kms when we reached the sea and the port of Argentia. This is where the summer ferry from Nova Scotia docks.
We quickly located the container depot and were shown the container that held our two cars. It was opened up and the dock workers reversed both cars out. Here is mine being removed from the container.
....and now Bob's car.
Wendy drove the Landcruiser back to St. John's whilst I drove the hire car. Here she is in the wing mirror of the Hertz Honda.
Typical long straight roads of Newfoundland.
We got back to St. John's at about 1pm, which gave us time to sort the cars out as well as doing a bit of sightseeing. Bob and I fixed our route stickers on to our cars. I'll take a photo and post it later to the blog.
We then went to a local shopping mall to buy Wendy a new battery for her cell phone and to stock up on snacks and water to take in the car on the drive.
A few photos of the very pretty colourful houses of St. John's
We returned to the hotel to learn that Kenny and DeeAnne, who should have arrived at 1am, were now in fact arriving at about 5pm. We decided to take the short drive out to Cape Spear to see the easternmost point of land in North America.
The Cape has a lighthouse and has lovely views across a bay towards St. Johns. We all walked down to the rocky shore to stand as close as you can get to Europe!
I drove the car as far as I could to the east and we took this photo of the Garmin showing us at 52 degrees West.
Close by, we saw this sign commemorating the opening of the Cape Spear National Historic Park by the Prince and Princess of Wales in 1983.
We left the Cape for the drive back to St. John's and drove past a huge cruise liner that was docked in the port.
We then heard from Kenny that they had arrived and we agreed to meet them for an evening meal in the centre of the town.We collected them from their hotel and had a great welcome dinner at a very good steakhouse. It was the perfect way to get the drive off to a great start.
We leave St. John's tomorrow at 9am for the 300 mile drive to Twillingate, where Kenny tells us he has just learnt that there is an iceberg stuck in the bay! It should make for some great photos.
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