ElsieD

Today we are travelling down the Avalon Peninsulasula, going south from St. John's. The route we are travelling is called the Irish Loop, presumably because it was settled by the Irish. We plan on seeing a few things along the way and will end up in St. Mary's for the night, a metropolis of around 440 people. We are staying at a place called the Claddagh Inn and had thought to go for dinner somewhere, then figured in a place that small, there wouldn't be a lot, if any, choice. So we will eat at the Inn, andto be able to do so, we had to pre-order our main course, which we did last night. We passed another piece of road art this morning, this one was at the end of someone's driveway.

Kerry, those are partridge berry tarts.

For dinner we went to a local institution that had been recommended to us last night by a local and Gary, John's BIL recommended it as well. So the four of us traipsed over. As you can see, it doesn't look like much and inside the place, well, you don't go for the armosphere. But if fish and chips are your thing, this is where it's at. Sue and I had the small which was one piece of fish, Gary and John had the medium, 2 pieces of fish. You can also get the three piece one called - you guessed it, the large! The dinner comes with Newfoundland dressing over the chips and gravy is poured over both. I believe chromedome can confirm that it is very common here to have dressing and gravy on the chips. (Last year we found that if you ordered a turkey sandwich, it too came with dressing and cranberry sauce as part of the sandwich.) Not being a lover of soggy anything, I got my gravy on the side. But then I tried the gravy over some of the fries and dressing, found out that I liked it and finished eating it that way. The gravy was good too, they make beef gravy from scratch. We are on our own now which means I have better control over when I can post. So, rather than getting everything at once as you are getting it tonight, I will post throughout the day, whenever I have something I think might appeal to you. The first picture is the two piece fish and chips, the one next to it is the one piece with gravy on the side. Oh, and the fish was cod.

After our boat trip we went to the Anglican Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in St. John's. There we had "tea in the crypt". The place was packed and since the place is run by volunteers, service was a bit slow, but very friendly. Even the priest was in attendance making small talk at every table and welcoming everyone. This is not a formal English tea. It is mostly sweet except for a couple of scones. Altogether a splendid way to spend an hour, and a bargain at $10 per person. Missing from the last picture are a couple of scones. Someone had scoffed them before I had a chance to take the picture.

We boarded the sightseeing boat at Bay Bulls at 11:00 and off we went to the Witless Bay Ecological Reserve. The reserve is made up of several islands. We did see thousands of puffins but they are very small birds, only 6" to 7" and since tour boats are not permitted to land on the island we only saw them from a distance. I have included a couple of pictures of them mainly so you can see their habitat. Sadly, it was hard to see their colouring which was a disappointment as I really wanted to have a close up look. A few interesting facts about puffins are that they mate for life, they can dive to a depth of 300 feet, the babies are called pufflings. Another bird we saw was the murre. The murres breed in colonies so close together that they can touch their neighbours and the female lays one egg per season. All the eggs have different markings and the adult recognizes their egg by the markings on it. They can dive to a depth of 600 feet. We did not see any whales. Other than that, the excursion was interesting. When we started out it was a bakmy day. The farther out from shore we got, the colder it got. I was happy to be wearing both a light fleece and a jacket. The boat rocked and rolled quite a bit which made it hard to take pictures. I was using a tablet and it doesn't lend itself too well to taking pictures with one hand. One other thing I learned was how one fishes for cod. They are bottom dwellers and you catch them with a lure which has a weight in the middle and a hook on each side. Bait is not used. You lower this down until it hits bottom and then bring it up a couple of feet. Then you lower it again, raise it, and repeat. You snag them on the side with said hook. Jigging is the process of raising and lowering the lure. The attached pictures are of the dock in Bay Bulls, the nesting spots of the puffins and murres and a bald eagle whose picture I barely managed to snap.

Great question. I have no idea, but I'll try to find out.

Oh, one more thing. They take moose accidents and sightings seriously here.

Good morning! We are about to begin our travels in earnest today. Sue and Gary are already here and ready to roll. We are off shortly to Bay Bulls where we will be taking a boat tour to the Witless Bay Ecological Reserve. Newfoundland has a lot of quaint place names. We will see a huge Atlantic Puffin colony, apparently 1/2 million of them, Humpback Whales and hopefully some icebergs. The day is overcast but no rain is called for. Later this afternoon we will be going to "tea in a crypt", again something we did last year that we enjoyed. We actually did have a breakfast supplied hotel breakfast this morning but I didn't take any pictures because it was just the usual scrambled eggs and sausage. Nothing exciting. I have been told it is time to go. More later.

Oopsie, I attached the wrong picture. This is what we ate tonight. That's what happens when your eyes are at half mast.

Okanagancook, i'll watch the video tomorrow. The accents here can be pretty thick. The people here often add an s to their verbs. Like today, when at check-in the young lady said "when you leaves your keys"....... Rotuts, Tim Horton's used to have very good donuts. This was years ago. They made them at each location so they were always nice and fresh. They no longer make them on site. From what I understand, they are shipped to all the outlets from some central location. If anyone knows more than this, I'd be curious to hear it. Anyhow, I no longer buy them, they really aren't all that good. Remember, though, DD used to have the DD wih the handle? Those were GOOD! Having checked in, and done some unpacking, we went to the liquor store aka Newfoundland Liquor Corporation. Bought some Pinot Grigio and stuck it in the fridge in our room. Then we went to a place called Pi Gourmet Eatery. We had been there several times last year and really liked it so decided to go there tonight. I had a smoked salmon calzone and John had the Carnivore pizza. Both were good, but we did not tarry as we were keen to get back to the hotel. We made one wrong turn on the way there which added about 10 minutes to the trip. We have a navigation system in our rental but sometimes the arrow has you going one way while the voice tells you to go another. So we are trying to figure out where exactly we are going, it is dark, we are driving in an unfamiliar city and there are many, many one way streets, weird intersections and to top it all off, it is very, very hilly. Turning around is no easy matter. We are back in our room, sipping a glass of wine, the football game is on and it won't be long before we call it a night. Tomorrow morning John's sister and BIL are arriving from Calgary and we are spending the day with them. Hopefully I will have pictures of whales and puffins to share with you. There is a canvas print over the desk of a pair of puffins and I'll take a picture of it and attach it as well. I should have lots to tell you about tomorrow.

We have landed and have checked into our hotel room. Since I promised to show all our meals I'll begin with our lunch. As you know, you know have to buy your airplane lunch and they are usually not very good, especially in the cheap seats. So, we bought 2 sandwiches from a place all Canadians will be familiar with - Tim Horton's. A turkey and bacon sandwich for him, ham and cheese for me. We ate them once we were on our way. We are now on our way to get something to eat for supper and also to find the local liquor store for some wine. Our room has a fridge which is handy as we are white wine drinkers. I'll post more later tonight.

We are at the airport waiting to board our flight. As we seem to have interested folks from different parts of the world who may not know too much about our province, I thought I would start this blog by giving you an overview of Newfoundland and Labrador (NL). Before Newfoundland became part of Canada in 1949, it was a British Colony. Cupids, a town on Conception Bay, was settled 406 years ago, and is the oldest continuously settled official British community in Canada. Most of the early permanent settlers came from southwest England and southeast Ireland although the French also settled here and in the 17th century Newfoundland was more French than English. French is still spoken in Port au Port Penninsula, on the western side of the island, with English spoken everywhere else. Just off the coast of south west Newfoundland, St. Pierre et Miquelon are islands that are still a colony of France. There is a regular ferry service between Fortune, NL and St. Pierre et Miquelon. Geographically, the capital of St. John's is on the same latitude as Paris, France and Seattle, Washington. In size, Newfoundland and Labrador is a little smaller than California, slightly bigger than Japan and twice the size of the United Kingdon. NL covers 405,212 sq. kilometers (156,453 sq. miles) with over 29,000 kilometers (18,000 miles) of coastline. By itself, the island of Newfoundland covers 111,390 square kilometers (43,008 sq. miles). The population of NL is 510,000, of whom 181,000 live in St. John's. While there are some larger towns, vast areas are sparsely populated. In Newfoundland there are no snakes, skunks, racoons, poisonous insects or arachnids. There is also no ragweed - allergy sufferers rejoice! There are over 120,000 moose and it is home to one of the world's biggest caribou herds. They also have some of the continent's biggest black bears. Note: This information was taken from the official Newfoundland and Labrador web site.

Agreed. When we (ahem) bypassed Baie Verte we were on the Trans Canada turned right someplace and went through Gros Morne. Spectacular. Also saw signs while going through the park telling us how many moose/car accidents there had been that year and how many people had been killed. We thought that rather unnerving and so were very vigilant. From Gros Morne we went to L'Anse aux Meadow. We stayed in Port au Choix on the way up and back, and in St. Anthony for one night. The terrain sure changes, doesn't it?

If we had only known...... I just looked it up on the map. I can't say we would have visited there if we had had more time, but you never know. Some of the best places we saw last year were those off the beaten track. We would go off the highway and follow all these little roads to the end.

A few words about the picture of the roadside garden. We saw literally hundreds of them along the highway in the Northern Penninsula. We were told that although the land belongs to the provincial government, anyone can stake out a garden. They keep these for as long as they want to, or until the province needs the land. In contrast to other parts of he province, the land here is very barren. Mostly rock, every now and again you see a few trees. The soil by the roadside, in contrast to thd rest of the area is quite fertile. These gardens are meticulously maintained. When we first saw them, we didn't know what to make of them as here they were, in the middle of nowhere. Sometimes there wasn't a house in sight. From what we were told, theft is also not an issue, it seems people respect other people's property.

Quite right. That is where the initial settlement was. As you can see, pretty much all that is left are the outlines of where the buildings stood. What they have done, though, a bit away from the original site, is created a re-enactment of the original village. If anyone is interested, i'd be happy to post a couple of pictures. To tell the truth though, I was much more moved by the outlines of the original, wandering around and wondering what their lives were like back then.

Where did you live? Last year we started in St. John's and ended our trip in Deer Lake. We took in the northern part of the Avalon Peninsula, Bonavista Peninsula, up to Gambo, then north through Musgrave Harbour, Twillingate to Grand Falls. We were worried about the amount of time we had at that point and so had to give Baie Verte Pennisula a miss. We did explore the Northern Penninsula to the extent that there were roads, and visiting L'Anse aux Meadows.

I'll take a look. Last year when we were there we were in one grocery store only and that was more by accident than design. The liquor store was attached to it and we had gone there to buy some wine. Since it was right there we had a look around and I recall that I thought the produce was expensive. I'll report back.

Me too!

Well, how neat is that! It looks as though the individual tart pans come out. Do they?

I wrote to the place where we are staying for 2 nights to ask what I might possibly find in the cupboards. The answer was sugar, salt and pepper. The places I have stayed in where the pepper was provided, the pepper was in one of those shakers and no longer resembled pepper. I have decided to pack a pepper grinder and some sea salt. I may even pack some chipotle powder.

This is true. But NL (to use the short form for it's proper name, Newfoundland and Labrador) is a sparsely populated area outside the capital and a couple of bigger towns here and there. For example, one place we are staying in has a population of 439. The places with the kitchens are bigger, something like 4,000 in one and 2,500 in the other. So, I may be able to get the goods to cook with, but maybe not. Those of us of a certain age will remember The Rolling Stones singing, "you can't always get what you want".

We will have cooking facilities on 3 of the nights we are there, the rest of the time we are in hotels and one night in a B & B. I'm not sure if any staples are supplied at any of these places and I don't want to be buying a bunch of stuff to cook with only to leave it behind. I'm glad you asked the question because I will get in touch with the two places that have kitchens and find out what I might expect to find in the cupboards. If they have any staples I will seriously consider cooking something. One place we are staying in for two nights is a cottage with a bbq and since we can no longer bbq ourselves, that may be tempting. If I do cook, it will likely be pretty basic stuff. The rest of the time I will be taking you out to eat lunch and dinner. We aren't much on breakfast.

Wow, Sartoric, that's quite the feast!

We were there last year (husband's first time) and the Legion in one of the places we were staying in was serving up a Jigg's dinner. However, they were serving it at 4:30 in the afternoon so we gave it a miss thinking we would have another chance. And sure enough, it was on the menu in another spot. And they had had a power outage that day and had not been able to prepare the meat that was required. And those were the only two times in two weeks we saw Jigg's dinner mentioned. It is on the list to eat if we find a place serving it. I also wanted to bring some savoury back but I never did. It too, is on the list.