Part 2

On the way to St John's we visited the Samonid Interpretive Centre at Grand Falls-Windsor. Newfoundland is very much wild Atlantic salmon river country. I expect all the rivers that have their origin inland support the annual upstream breeding migration of these fish. Therefore, it is not unusual to find fish ladders on those streams where human development (dams & weirs) obstruct their upstream journey. When the migration starts, water is allowed to pass through the ladder. As is passes under the Interpretive Centre there are windows in the walls of the fish ladder to allow people to view the passage of the salmon. Unfortunately, the centre was not open when we were there but it was still interesting to view the ladder and read the interpretive boards located around the grounds.

St John's, a city of approximately 100,000 people, is often described as a mini San Francisco. The same hilly steep streets and distinctive colourful houses. Although the houses are of a distinctly different style to those of San Francisco. St John's has a long and turbulent history. An excellent harbour, once leading out to seas teaming with cod, encouraged European settlement as early as 1528. When the land was claimed by the British for Queen Elizabeth I in 1583 the British, French and Dutch fought tooth and nail for control until the ultimate British victory at Signal Hill in 1762. Despite the long years of conflict, the harbour maintained its status as the world trade centre for salted cod well into the 20th century. The harbour is still an important part of Newfoundland today even though in 1992 cod fishing was made illegal within a 320km radius of provincial shores. Suddenly, 20,000 fishermen and plant workers were out of work. This was meant to be a temporary measure to allow the depleted populations of cod to recover. This has not happened.

Signal Hill is one of the most famous of St John's landmarks. It was the site of the last North American battle of the Seven Years War between the French and British and ended French aspiration to control of eastern North America. There is a small castle-like building at the peak honouring John Cabot's arrival in 1497 and Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee. It was near here, in 1901, that Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi received the first trans-Atlantic wireless message from Cornwall, England.

After an early morning look around the city centre and a stroll down George Street, St John's famous party lane (not much activity at 8.00am in the morning though!) it was off along the south east coast of Newfoundland and down the Avalon Peninsular toward Trepassy in the south. The first stop was Cape Spear, a WWI and WWII defensive position, an important light house and fog horn and also the most easterly point of the North American continent. Further down the peninsular is the "barren lands", caribou country, and it was soon obvious why it is called that. Kilometre after kilometre of rocky land with sparse patches of stunted spruce(?) trees. Newfoundland, and the Avalon Peninsular in particular, is home to the most southerly caribou herd in the world - about 5,000 in total. They are so plentiful we didn't see one caribou all day!! Ah well, luck of the draw. But, having said that, there is a lot of country out there to hide many more than 5,000 caribou!

The next day saw us up at Signal Hill as the weather had improved and we were able to take advantage of the views of St John's offered from this vantage point. It was then time to get to the airport so Jeanette could make her plane home to Ottawa. After we said goodbye to Jeanette, Bill and I headed back toward Corner Brook. But first we made a detour through Maberly. Maberly has significance for Bill as it is also the locality where he lives in Ontario. Maberly, Newfoundland, also holds the title of "root cellar" capital of the world! I had never before thought to analyse the meaning of the term "root cellar", even though I had heard it used in popular North American vernacular many times before. But, it dawned on me when I saw the context in which these structures are used. They are used to store root vegetables (derr!) grown in the gardens of the owners. Vegetables grown in these colder climates consisted of potatoes, carrot, parsnips, swedes etc all stored for the winter in the root cellar. There were root cellars along the roadside all around the small settlement of Maberly.

Off the coast line at Maberly there is an island that supports a puffin colony. But without a powerful set of binoculars or spotting scope it was impossible to see the small birds.

From Maberly we ventured on to Cape Bonavista. This is where, allegedly, Giovanni Caboto (John Cabot) the Venetian citizen, carrying letters from King Henry the VII of England, made land in June 1497. Just 5 years after Columbus landed in the Dominican Republic and Haiti, Cabot claimed this "New Founde Land" for England. It has not been possible to categorically confirm this as the location, but local tradition identifies Cape Bonavista as the site. There is also an important light house and fog horn located at the cape to assist modern marine navigation. From there we ventured back to Corner Brook making it about midnight.