Today was bright and sunny to start off but increasingly clouded over. The weather here has been cool - around 16 degrees on average - a far cry from the 30+ degrees in Ontario but it's great for sight seeing. And we have even been able to sit on a patio for lunch. 

Today we planned to go to Quidi Vidi and Fort Amherst. 

Quidi Vidi (pronounced Kiddy Viddy) Village is a scenic fishing village in St. John's, located just beyond Quidi Vidi Lake, where the famous annual St. John’s Regatta takes place each summer. It's a gunshot away (a short distance) from our hotel. Quidi Vidi Village was used after World War II for the construction of a United States’ Air Force Base. I guess that explains the U.S. flags we saw flying in front of some homes. Nowadays, however, the village is a quiet community, where you can walk from one end to the other in five minutes flat. The village is a little sheltered corner of the east coast, with a glimpse of the Atlantic Ocean from inside "The Gut", which is what the harbour is known as. The village is also home to Newfoundland's largest microbrewery, the Quidi Vidi Brewing Company. They brew "Iceburg" beer which I am becoming quite fond of. We walked through the village in 5 minutes flat and then decided to hike some of the trails. I didn't realize how out of shape I was in until I tried to keep up with Kyle who was bounding ahead of us all the way. We took some beautiful pictures and then went downtown in St. John's to sit on a patio for lunch. After lunch we ventured to Fort Amherst.
 
St John's harbour is known as the Narrows and is bracketed by the North Head and South Head, which are points of land that jut out to form the mouth of the harbour. Due to it's large natural harbour, Elizabeth I claimed Newfoundland as an English colony in 1583 but this was contested for many years. In the 1770s, a military installation called Amherst’s Tower and Battery was installed at South Head overlooking the Narrows. This installation has been known as Fort Amherst since the 1840s, and the Fort Amherst name has also come to apply to the surrounding community. We had to park a distance away and walk to the point. Along the way there are many homes on the edge of the cliffs overlooking the mouth to the harbour. I don't think I'd like to walk up the many stairs to get to my front door at some of these homes. Fort Amherst’s lighthouse history dates back to 1810 when the first lighthouse in the location was erected on top of a barrack at the fort. 
In 1832, Newfoundland was given the right to govern itself, even though it still belonged to England. The very first act of the legislature was to provide funding for the lighthouse at South Head, which had previously been paid for by local contributions. A new Lighthouse Board was soon formed and commissioners were appointed.
In 1849 the Lighthouse Board decided to build a new stone lighthouse adjoining the old one, and it was finished by the spring of 1852. The new lighthouse was the first lighthouse in Newfoundland to receive a Fresnel lens. A Fresnel lens can capture more oblique light from a light source, which allows the light from a lighthouse equipped with one to be visible over greater distances.
During WWI the lighthouse was extinguished and St. John's harbour was closed. A drill house was built near the lighthouse and soldiers held gunnery practice on the grounds. The buildings deteriorated, and a new lighthouse, powered by acetylene gas, was built in 1919. Almost 200 soldiers lived at Fort Amherst during World War II. In March of 1942 the fort was struck by torpedoes from a German U-boat, causing only minor damage. In 1949, the Department of Transport decided to destroy the lighthouse buildings and the fort. Despite protests, the buildings were all razed over the next few years. The 1810 limestone lighthouse building was destroyed in 1954, and the adjacent barracks were removed in 1959. Some ruins of the military installation still remain. In 1951 two new houses and a new lighthouse were constructed. Assistant Keeper Leo Power, who had come to Fort Amherst Light Station in 1943, reminded the builders that he had 11 children — he wanted to make sure there would be enough room for everybody. After his stint as assistant keeper, Leo Power became keeper at Fort Amherst in 1953. He remained until his retirement in 1972 on his 65th birthday. We got a whole new perspective seeing the ocean from the mouth of the harbour and hundreds of feet below Signal Hill. 

We still had a couple of hours before dinner so we decided to check out another little fishing village called Petty Harbour/ Maddox Cove. This was another quaint fishing village and we took in all the sights (harbour & a mini aquarium consisting of about 12 small tanks of various marine species which are released in the fall). We made our "contribution" to the aquarium fund and then headed back to the hotel to rejuvenate. 
  
It was the heel of the day (evening around sunset) when we finally went for dinner. 
 
All in all the day was a bad good (very good). 
 
New fact about St. John's heard on the radio: it has the most instances of drunk driving charges in Canada.  William Amherst. After his victory, Amherst realized stronger fortifications were 
By the way, our hotels wifi is not working so the blog may be delayed as I have to use wifi at restaurants to update the blog and download pictures. REALLY not happy about this development (and neither are all the teenage boys staying here)!  Jeffrey who had helped defeat the French at Louisbourg in 1758, constructed on South Head. 
In 1665, the Dutch sacked and burned St. John’s, prompting the English to establish fortifications known as Southside Castle at the entrance to the harbour. The French attacked St. John’s in 1696, 1705, and 1708, and after the third assault they destroyed Southside Castle before withdrawing. The French gainedAfter Newfoundland became part of Canada in 1949, it was decided that a new lighthouse and accommodations were needed at Fort Amherst. In 1951, two dwellings and the present twenty-five-foot-foot-tall wooden, pyramidal lighthouse were built on South Head, and the old stone lighthouse and barracks were demolished shortly thereafter.