Cape Spear

Here we are at Cape Spear one of the roughest places on earth that I've ever been. It is also the furthest place East in Canada that we can go.

See the sign says so. It was also an army out post during the second world war set up to defend ourselves against those nasty Germans.

A sign warning about the dangerous waves just in case you were to dumb to figure it out on your own.

Pretty rough ... EH

One crazy broad holding herself up against the wind

Here it is. The exact spot!

Just a pic to prove that we were there.

I was there too! Hard to imagine.

A sign about how parks Canada takes care of places like these. And they really do! A fabulous job at that.

The real thing.

More coast line pics along the way in here.

A long and winding road getting here

A picture of Signal Hill and the entrance to the narrows of St. Johns harbour from this angle. Remember? See the Citadel on topof the hill?

The end

Back up on Signal Hill

Here we are again, up on Signal Hill. Here is Grace trying to get some video amidst the howling wind. Signal Hill not only got it's name from the flags strung up signaling the different ships coming in. In 1902 a gent by the name of Marconi used it to recieve the first ever transatlantic wireless signal ever sent that far. Critics said that it would never work cause the signal would just end up shooting out into the earths outer atmosphere. Marconi maintained that it would bounce down off the radio active atmosphere surounding the earth and go right into his transmiters / recievers. He was right and here we were right were it happened.


Just a little sign putting it all into context



A drama in true life getting under way here. Could that be a frieghter out there in high seas coming in ?

Here's the trusty pilot waiting to guide her in.

Just look at the rugged landscape around here looking down on it from the top.

Man it's rough out there.

She can hardly wait to get in here I'll bet!

Ah we,re getting close

Going, going, going

Here we are we made it. I felt like I was part of the effort here.

Here's the pilot coming out of the narrows, past the canons on guard....... against the Russians or something I guess now.

Home safe home going into the dock area to unload all those precious things from the orient.

And here is me watching it all from on top of the citadel.

Signal Hill and St. Johns Harbour

Signal Hill , the citadel overlooking the aproach to and the narrows leading into St. Johns Harbour as well as the Harbour itself. Incredible view. Seventy K an hour winds when we were there. That's normal

Always was a very strategic place to guard the harbour from. Sometimes France owned it and some times England. It was captured and lost many times over the last 300 years. Flag signals flown on the hill forcast the arrival of military and merchant vessels.

The entrance to the narrows leading into the harbour

As you can see, a very rough coast line.

A light house at the entrance

On the horizon ( double click on the pic ) you can see the light house on the hill at Cape Spear, the farthest point East in Canada. ( Stay tuned in next blog )

One can see why this is such a good harbour out of the wind

The city of St Johns built around the harbour

Gaurd house protecting the harbour in times past

Pilot boat coming out to the entrance of the harbour to guide a freightor in.

Very rough sea out there.

Nine weeks and counting

Today it has been nine weeks since we left home. I find it hard to believe that it's been so long already. I think we are changing a bit but I can't really say how. I know that at first I allways felt like I had to be getting somewhere and I was really stressed by not knowing what to do next. It's still like that a bit but not as much as then. It's become easier ( but not that easy ) just to see where we end up tonight. It's harder when I'm tired and that happens a lot. Living in such cramped close proximity in the van can make us a bit testy with eachother at times. That takes some getting used to also. In the last 63 days we have spent 55 living in the van. We have met a lot of people. Been to numerous RV parks, usually for about $25.00 per night. It's nice to be able to plug into hydro there. They also have showers and flush toilets. Spent an equal number of nights sleeping in parking lots or dock areas for free. That's called "boondocking " in RV language. There are whole websites out there dedicated to it. I'm not always comfortable sleeping in parking lots at night. We've to date taken 1979 pictures, and driven 9079 kilometers. We've taken seven ferries, the longest ones being 6 hours in length and the shortest only ten minutes.

On Saturday we will be leaving "The Rock" for Port Sydney Nova Scotia again. This time we leave from the town of Argentia close to St Johns on the east side of Newfounland. It will be a much longer ride then when we arrived in Channel-Port aux Basques. It's 15 hours long. We leave at 4:00 PM in the afternoon and arrive at seven the next morning. We have reserved bunkbeds on the boat to sleep in over night. Another new experience.

I think one of the more profound things I've discovered are the national parks, and national heritage sites of Canada. They are extremely well organized and very beautifull, always established in a meaningful way to reflect their part of the greatness of our country. Some are even world heritage sites. I was never really familiar with them before.

Tonight we are parked in a little RV place in Clarke's Beach just over from Brigus on the West side of Conception Bay. It's blowing hard outside, (it's always blowing hard) the temperature is dropping to only 10C overnight, and they are forcasting rain for tommorrow. It is nice and cozy in the van however. We have lots of lights on, a candle on the table, music playing, and a heater going. Grace is reading and I've just spent a few satisfying hours blogging and reading news.It's 11:00 PM and time for bed. Tommorow we head to St John's for our last two days on the island. Here is one last pic for the night that someone took and the E-mailed us of a boat trip we made about five weeks ago on Cote Norde when we were there.

The Skerwink Trail

One of the things that brought us to Port Rexton was the Skerwink Trail overlookng a portion of shore line along Trinity Bay that is just overwhelming with beauty. Tuesday was a briliantly sunny fall day and we took advantage of the weather to hike the trail for several Kilometers to the next town over called Trinity East.

Grace trying out a walking stick

Part of the trail fixed up with steps

Very rugged coastal shoreline

A shot into the sun

Lots of sculpted stone cliffs

More sculpted rock

The Fishers Loft Inn we stayed at for a few days, partly to get a break from living in the van and partly cause it was so close to the trail head, and partly cause it was a very peaceful place.

Salad and vegetable gardens used in the kitchen at the Inn