Blogs from Corner Brook, Newfoundland & Labrador, Canada, North America

Well, it’s finally happening! We’re taking our first major trip since our last blogged adventure, the Hawaii Herniated Disk debacle. That one started with a 54 hour journey from snowy Victoria to sunny and warm Maui and ended with stops in a couple of emergency rooms. But I digress. We are heading out on another adventure to a distant island, this time Newfoundland (and Labrador). We begin with a reunion in Victoria of St. Andrew’s Elementary staff. Dianne was teacher, vice-principal and principal there for the 15 years before we moved to Chemainus in 2004. Should be fun! The trip passes through Toronto which isn’t a highlight given the recent problems at the airport. We are taking a red-eye from Victoria and this gets us into Deer Lake in the afternoon instead of the middle of ... read more

Our sea day turned out to be very interesting as the crew was summoned for a safety drill. It was staged just outside our room and we could watch the goings on and no one knew because of the one way glass. There was a stretcher and a nurse in attendance and then they simulated an passenger evacuation and lowered some lifeboats. It looks like people from all areas of the ship and all manning stations were required to report. After the drill was over they prepared to retrieve the boats but boat number four, our boat, had a be repaired before she could be raised and the ship could move on to Nova Scotia. What the Captain thought would be an hours delay wore on to three hours so that meant that our arrival would ... read more

Day 2 distance travelled 210 km Rob's Cabin -> Ferry to North Sydney, NS After getting crushed in last night's game of drinking chutes and ladders, we were up at 7am ready to wait for our ferry to arrive.....at midnight. So we hiked along a wetland with the promise of the most wildlife on the island. We saw 2 birds and a spider-slug; damn thing was an ungodly freak of nature dangling from a tree by its think snail trail slimy uuggghh. Birds suck and wildlife is fickle, so we bailed and went for a sure thing. Mountain views! welllll as close as you can get in Newfoundland. After an hour and half of almost vertical climbing we hit the top of the "starlite trail". Beautiful! Found a small plastic bucket with a log book and ... read more

A seemingly slow start to a day of accumulated enjoyments. Under dry but cloudy skies our bus left at 9:00 along the Humber Arm of the Bay of Islands. Driving through Corner Brook(20,000 pop.) let me wonder yet again at how the plain cubic shape of architecture can be interpreted in different societies, seen last in Chile and earlier in India and Greece. Many of the houses are small and plain, with fairly small square windows and sometimes an added porch or step. Virtually all are well maintained. Almost universally they have been improved with fairly recent vinyl siding in what seems to be an original small-board pattern. Occasionally a rectangular version of this style is found, and very occasionally a house has been expanded, usually in a symmetrical style. Cook’s Lookout over the city commemorates ... read more

Trout River.Today I saw Mom so her and Dad talked on the side of the road. Then on to Gros Morne National Park. We set up camp had hot dogs then went to bed.In the morning we moved to the next camp site over because it had more trees so we could put up a tarp. We stuck around that day and did stuff there at night we met some really nice people in the camp kitchen 2 Nurses and a family.The next day we went to the information centre, then did the green gardens hike but we didn't see the sea cave.Had a nice diner and talked to the family from before. That night Dad came face to face with a bear in the dark Today we stayed around camp Dad wasn't filing to good. ... read more