Last full day in Newfoundland

Today the weather was really crappy with overcast skies,occasional downpours and light mist all day long. Yuck!

We left our Air bnb shortly before 11 AM and slowly worked our way south east of the city to Petty Harbour and our favourite Newfoundland Restaurant "Chafe's Landing" where we had our usual seafood chowder and then split a 2 piece plate of lightly battered fresh codfish coupled (this time) with a really yummy Caesar salad.

With time to kill and really nasty weather we headed north to see some small towns on the north side of the city.

Later, (about 3 PM) we visited Avalon mall where I saw this T shirt in a store. Had a good laugh!

 From there we went to our hotel to check in. We requested the airport shuttle for 10 AM tomorrow morning only to be informed that the shuttle was in for servicing and they didn't know when it was coming back. And that was the extent of their conversation.NO apologies or anything. Weird. I went back to the front desk after we dropped our stuff in the room and said that the shuttle was the only reason we were even staying here and quite quickly the lady said they would pay for a cab for us. I can't imagine we are the only people here needing the shuttle.

We dropped the car off at 4 PM and asked them to drive us back to the hotel. We put 4453 kms on it. Considering St John's to St. Anthony is 1100 km (each way) we did a lot of extra driving!

About 7 PM we decided to head down the street to the Denny's we went to when we first arrived but a minute or two outside in the cold, rainy conditions convinced us to see what the hotel restaurant had on the menu. We selected nachos. Hmmmm-not so good. Caro called the salsa "marmalade" because it was so sweet. Not one bit of "zip" in it.

We will watch Survivor tonight (comes on at 9:30 PM) and hopefully get a good night sleep.

South from St.John's

Today was the last day for serious driving.

First,we tidied up a bit. Some clothes items were never used.

Yup, swimming suit and shorts just took up space; actually the swim suit was "just in case" we ever stayed in a place with a pool but I thought the shorts might have gotten some use! Ha!- this vacation has probably been the worst we have ever had weather wise (but as always we have had a fantastic time).

Our first stop as we traveled down the east side of the peninsula was at Ferryland-the home of Lord Baltimore's first colony

Established in 1621 (one year after Cupids) it was apparently the capital of English Newfoundland. The French destroyed the original town in 1697 (as they did shortly thereafter at Cupids). We got lucky here because normally you pay to go to the "dig" but the office/visitor centre was closed for the season. A school road trip was happening at the time we arrived so we assume the site may have been opened up for them and we were able to "sneak a listen" to a local guide explaining some things. We got  most of our info from the placards located around the site however as we really couldn't "blend in" with the group ha ha.

Next we started driving around the coast line looking for nice views. There were many today.

We had high overcast clouds with the odd sprinkle or two but nothing too difficult to deal with. In fact I got out of the car at one point when we were on the "tundra" area between the east and west coasts and had to deal with mosquitoes.

We drove the remainder of that portion of the peninsula circling back through St. Mary's and then straight north before hitting the Trans Canada and turning east to St.John's. We were only gone for about five hours so we had time to to head back downtown St. John's for grand kids souvenir shopping and a meal at one of the down town pubs. Good food!

Tomorrow is our final full day here in St. John's. We leave this basement suite in the morning. We have slept beautifully here and this place really suited us nicely. Our car rental is to be returned by five and we have a room rented at the same place we stayed at the first night we arrived.

Howling Winds-Part 2

We were out the door about 10 AM heading north west.

Our first stop was the town of Cupids. I don't remember reading about this important town before but once we got there and saw a new building called the Cupids Legacy Centre we decided to check it out. What a good decision that was! It turns out this town is the first English town in North America, founded in 1610; ten years before the pilgrims landed in Plymouth. The centre showcased this towns' many "firsts" and was really interesting. I have found that I really did not know much of Newfoundlands long European history so I am always happy with each museum we stop at with what I am learning. In 1910 the town decided to hold its' 300th anniversary and as part the celebration they acquired a massive union jack flag. That flag is in the centre and is so big it is hanging folded in half. We were told it is the second biggest union jack in the world (second only to the one flying at Buckingham Palace).

With that unexpected pleasure completed we headed north to the small city of Bay Roberts. There is a well known hiking trail there called Shoreline Trail. It is about 6.3 kms long and has only a height variance of 100 metres. Of course we had winds at 40 bazillion kms/hr making walking difficult at times. The first half of trail is truly wonderful with beautiful views and paths sometimes beside the sea cliffs. The second part is just getting back to the start using the roads in the area.

There were also historical markers and you could see where old settlements used to be located at.

The remainder of the day was driving around looking at the scenery and the small towns. Quite nice. Also,because the Jimmy Kimmel show from the US has been making fun of the town of Dildo we had to go there. Mehhh. But...the town has been there since the mid 1700's so I think the name came first and the new meaning of dildo came much later.

Supper was purchased at Sobey's again.

Sunday hiking

Another great sleep and by the "crack" of 10:30 we were out the door to Signal Hill.

Getting there turned out to be a bit of an adventure as a marathon was being run and we ended up driving all over the place to get to the proper access road for the hill.

We parked near the bottom and walked up using the goat paths etc ending up (initially) at the Queens Battery-located a ways beneath the highest point. We continued upwards and soon were at the top. From there we hiked down using the numerous steps and pathways built along the edge of the cliff. At one point there was a chain to hang on to prevent getting blown off the side. And of course it was extremely windy! But it was blue sky.

The trail (seen in the photo above) ended up in the tiny enclave called Quidi Vidi. It is very much like a typical cliff hugging village here in Newfoundland although it is well within St.John's.

With that 90 minute hike over we headed back down south to Petty Harbour to the restaurant we ate at yesterday. We had the same thing; seafood chowder and fish and chips. Mmmm Good. The chowder is made in-house and the fish is purchased daily from the local fishermen. Below is a photo of the harbour there.

After that we drove around for over an hour exploring new territory for us. We finally stopped at the local sea side park located maybe a kilometre from here.

It turns out the park is located on part of the Eastern Coast Trail so we took the opportunity to hike about a kilometre of the trail before turning back.

Supper was a few items purchased at the nearby Sobeys.

We also got word from Andrea (our hostess) that her reservation for the next couple of days had cancelled out and the place was ours-Great news! Also we are not using Air Bnb for this so instead of paying about $74/night we are paying $50.

HOWLING WINDS

A great night's sleep last night followed by a lazy morning. A glance out the window indicated lousy day with rain/mist and very windy.

We had heard that Petty Harbour, located just south of St. John's was pretty and it sure was. A beautiful little fishing village that was had tourist buses coming into its' narrow winding streets.

The photo above is a panorama shot of the harbour entrance and town.

We ate lunch in wonderful cafe there. I had seafood chowder. Super delicious (made right at the cafe).
Next we off to Cape Spear. Now that was an experience. The wind was insane! While walking up to the light house we saw an older gentlemen actually lose his balance and get blown off his feet.We helped him up and asked if he needed our help to which he said "no"; only a second or two later to almost get blown down again! We grabbed him and got him safely to a nearby bench. He looked pretty scared at that point. We then proceeded up the hill to get his wife and let her know of his issues. We assume they were from the cruise ship P&O Arcadia (just in from Southampton we believe).

The hill has an interesting history from the days of WW2.

There was a fishing boat out near the Cape as well. I suppose that for those fishermen the weather wasn't too much out of the ordinary.

We wanted to tour a bit more just north of the city but the weather got too rainy so we headed back to the Air Bnb where Caro washed clothes. We ventured out a couple of times to pick up supper etc. but that was basically it for our day.

Whales

A great sleep last night and by 9:30 we were on our way to Bay Bulls for a boat tour.

It is late in the tour boat season but we lucked out big time because we saw a couple of whales (it may have been the same one, just at a different location). It was a juvenile humpback and it was feeding right beside an island, at times coming right up beside the rocks there. The boat guide was saying they hadn't seen this before. While looking through my binoculars I saw the tail come out completely when it dived. How cool is that?

I also wanted to see puffins, which we did. These juvenile birds were too small and fast to get a photo but I was able to see them very nicely using the binoculars. We didn't really need binoculars to see them because they were swimming nearby and flying around but the binoculars were a great help

After the tour we headed into St John's where we walked the downtown, visited "The Rooms" (I think it must be the provincial museum), then toured Signal Hill. 

A panorama shot of the harbour and harbour entrance from Signal Hill (photo above)

We have quickly realized that there isn't enough to keep us busy here as we had hoped so we have been looking at how to utilize our remaining time. I even phoned Westjet to see how much it would cost to come home early (too much!). Time will tell how it goes

Air Bnb contacted the host of the Bonavista house we screwed up on and requested a partial or full refund (they did this as per our request- it was a faint hope that we might get a bit back). The host said "no" as was his right to do so. Interestingly the host then left a review of us on Air Bnb. This left us in a quandary. We can't see the review until we write one (which I wasn't planning to do). What if he gives us a terrible review because of what happened? This would make us look bad and future hosts might reject us. So I wrote a review saying I couldn't give a truthful review because I paid for a night I didn't use. I also explained what happened, expressing (twice) that it was my fault and the host was within his rights to accept our reservation and charge us. His review of us said he would host us again. Hmmm

Paradise!

Well, Paradise on two fronts today.

First of all it was a full day of sunshine and second,we are in the St. John's suburb of Paradise.

We started the day by heading to Placentia. This was a nice trip as we first toured Fort Royal at Castle Hill Historic Site. We hiked some of the same paths that have been hiked for over two hundred years. Pretty neat.

Afterwards we headed to the town site and after some chili at Timmies we went to the O'Reilly house for a tour. A Victorian/Edwardian house, it was really neat.

Upon leaving we made the decision to head to St. John's and do day trips from here. We found an Air Bnb apartment for about $73/night and it is located in the town of Paradise in the basement suite with the owners living upstairs. We will be here for 4 nights and have told the owner we will stay two extra (if her previous reservations cancel out for next Monday and Tuesday).

We went to the local Dominion store (Loblaws- same as Superstore)

Tonight after a late meal purchased at the store I got on line with Airbnb  to see what could be done about the non-stay I got charged for in Bonavista. It was our fault for how things went and it will be up to the owner to decide if we get a refund (or partial one). Time will tell on that.