Sept 10, 2019
The sun was bright as it rose above the trees. Debbie was still sleeping so I slipped out quietly to go for an early morning paddle in my kayak. There was a slight breeze and it had a bit of chill to it. It is obvious that the summer is over and fall is creeping up. The leaves have not yet started to turn color. I paddled in the bay for about an hour and a half, checking out the coastline and the small islands in the bay. The coastline here is rugged with very few beaches. The rocky shore falls right into the ocean and spruce and pine trees grow aggressively to the edge of the high tide line.
I returned to the trailer and Debbie was up and had started breakfast. We had agreed that we were going to explore Twillingate today. We enjoyed a breakfast and a shower and headed north to Twillingate.
Twillingate is a bustling fishing town, with several fish plants. The town has a series of small coves right inside the town with small quays and fingers reaching out into the main harbor. We are now in the off season but it is evident that Twillingate has capitalized on the tourist trade and supports many small quaint restaurants, B and Bs, and offers iceberg tours and kayaking adventures. The harbor opens up to the Atlantic and is directly in front of “Iceberg Alley”. We dropped into Annie’s, a local restaurant, and I enjoyed a fish and chip meal and Debbie a bowl of pea soup.
We visited the small local museum, which features many artifacts of the history of the local fishing industry. We then toured the Wooden Boat Building Museum. This museum is situated beside the oldest wooden church in Newfoundland. It was built in 1842 and is still being used today. It is in pristine condition.
The displays inside the Wooden Boat Museum depict the history of the wooden schooners, longliners, dories and punts which are the backbone of the fishing industry. The entire main floor exhibits depicts the many aspects of how the wooden boats are built and provides stories relative to the different boat building techniques, materials and tools used to build these sturdy boats. We visited the upstairs floor, which is an active wooden boat building shop. The resident boat builder is Tony, who spent the next hour showing us how he is building the 15 ft. wooden punt. (The Newfoundlanders also call them Rodneys). He is using traditional building methods. Tony comes from a long line of wooden boat builders. He showed us how the boat is designed from a small-scale wall model, and where the wood and materials are harvested from the local forests. He then explained the actual assembly processes. It was a very informative tour. We bought a ticket for the punt that Tony is building. It will be raffled off in mid December.
We left Twillingate, for Crow Head. The end of the road is at the base of the Long Point lighthouse. This lighthouse stands 300 feet above sea level at the top of the headland overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. It is still a fully functioning lighthouse. Inside the main building is a display that features the events and stories surrounding the Titanic disaster. The Titanic actually sank 400 miles south of this area, after striking an iceberg. This area is part of “Iceberg Alley”, a large region of the ocean where icebergs drift into because of the ocean currents. This is one of the best places to observe icebergs. This lighthouse plays a significant role in keeping ships aware of the many dangerous reefs and locations of icebergs.
Before we left Nanaimo, our friends Jim and Nan had given us a small satchel of pebbles that they had collected on the beach at Neck Point in Nanaimo. As we looked out over the vast expanse of ocean and watched the waves crashing against the headlands below us we felt this was the perfect place to throw out those pebbles. We watched as they arched out into the turquoise waters below
It was now late in the afternoon and we made our way back to the campground. As we arrived we noticed that Robert had made it into the campground. We had last seen him in the Pinware campground in Labrador.
We were both tired so we had a light snack, Debbie read and I worked on the blog and then it was time for bed. Tomorrow we plan to explore another part of the north central region of this interesting province.
Quilting in a Kayak 