After hours upon hours of driving we finally arrived at the L’anse Aux Meadows. When people say that Colombus was the first European to arrive, they are dead wrong. The vikings have history here from 1000AD and this is where you find it! I was super excited to kick of my learning session here with an evening storytelling session where people dress as viking characters and tell all of the tales about how the vikings lived and traveled here. All the while I sat sipping on appleberry cider which is just superb.
After the storytelling we left the traditional viking hut and walked outside to the sunset to be confronted with my first ever male moose with his giant horns poking up into the sky. Wandering around behind him was mumma moose and baby moose. I saw five moose that day so I was pretty excited!
The following day we returned to the L’anse Aux Meadows site for a more historical look at the area. It left me with a very fine respect for the Norse people in actually managing to cross the Atlantic Ocean with such basic boats. It also made me want to go to Iceland… but anyway, after this we went to the Norstead site as well and got to see Snorri the famous viking boat.
And so we were off again in shocking weather this time bound for the Gros Morne National Park. Upon arrival, we set out on the Green Gardens Trail for an overnight campsite. I must say that it at the time was one of the hardest hikes I had ever done, falling over three times into prickle bushes on unsteady ground. Upon arriving at the campsite, it was so windy that it was a challenge to get the tent to stay where it was let alone erect it in ridiculously high winds. Eventually we succeeded… barely, and ended up having to put heavy rocks inside the tent in each corner to try and stop it from blowing away while we were in it and even this didn’t work the best.
The following morning we packed out and made it across a couple of river crossings, minus a sock that I lost in the river and on to the Gros Morne Mountain trial to hike the big one. We started that and set up camp in the evening at the campsite ready to summit the mountain in the morning.
And so morning came, bringing with it more horrific rain. We got up, hurriedly summitted the 806m mountain and then proceeded to rapidly pack up camp and hike our way back to the carpark. People looked upon us strangely as we proceeded to take every single item of clothing off and get into the car in bra and undies with the heating jacked up to try and feel our bodies again.
That night after sitting at a laundromat for a couple of hours trying to dry everything, we caught the Newfoundland Ferry back to Cape Breton Island. Spent the day at the Louisbourg Fortification National Historical Site which was pretty interesting before getting our way to Halifax.
Halifax was an interesting time for me. While my significant other at the time was working, I had nothing much to do out in the sticks with the campground but I managed to make an agreement with the lady who ran the caravan park to do some gardening around the campground for our stay as her normal gardener had just had a hip replacement. One of the days after gardening I walked an hour each way to the Walmart and bought a set of knitting needles and a couple of balls of wool, thus beginning what would become my knitting obsession. Scarves, hats, I even attempted to make a blanket which eventually started falling apart because I am a horrendous sewer. I worked a promotions job for a couple of days also to make a little bit more money and on some of the days I got to go and visit different attractions around Halifax. And I also bought and cooked my first lobster over the campfire despite their protests!
One of the biggest drawcards for me was the Titanic history. I went to visit the Titanic Museum and learned about Halifax’s role in the rescue and recovery. I also went to the graveyard where they buried many of the victims bodies that they recovered. It was incredibly sad, but great to visit too. As a part of this they also had information on the Halifax Explosion which I didn’t know much about at the time, but found very interesting.
Time in Halifax came to a close and we drove on to Peggy’s Cove and watched the waves there crashing upon the rocks. We stopped in the quaint town of Lunenburg to camp. The last leg of the Eastern Canada trip was about to begin.
For the last leg of the eastern Canada trip, stay tuned…
Thomas Takes On.... 