Bonivista and Elliston NL - Sept 3rd - 5th

Thursday morning, we woke to a beautiful sunny morning with mist floating on the water. It's supposed to be a much warmer day. We shall see with this wind lol. By 7 am a couple of the "fishers" were already out on the water.

Here is a night shot Ray took.

Today we packed up again and decided to take the long way, along the other coast of the Bonavista Penninsula to Bonavista as we couldn't check in to our B & B until 1 pm. The Tickle Cove Sea Arch is the first destination.

In Newfoundland and Labrador, a tickle is a short, narrow salt-water strait or channel between islands or landmasses.

This sea arch is a wave-weathered rock wonder which formed due to the power of the Atlantic Ocean. Sea arches form at headlands, or areas of rocky land that jut into the sea. The waves wear away or erode the rock from both sides of the headland, creating sea caves that eventually join to form a sea arch. The Tickle Cove Sea Arch is an excellent example of this coastal feature, and is made of sedimentary rocks, including red sandstone, siltstone and conglomerates. Do you see curved cracks filled with a white-looking mineral? A closer look at the arch’s cliff faces reveals tension gashes filled with quartz, recording the great stresses these rocks encountered on their journey to this current location.

After a bumpy 7 km run on sort of crumbling paved backroads we arrived. It's well worth the drive. Real cool looking rocks for this picture.

There's about 1/2 km walk to the arch, up and down over the rocks using 2 set of stairs as well. This site is also a UNESCO Global Geopark.

Ripples in the rock caused by wave action

There's a bit of a viewing platform if you didn't want to get a closer look.

But not Ray lol

I stood there and took this picture for you Dianne.

We continued along the road towards Bonavista. 

Bonavista is one of the oldest towns in Newfoundland. It has lots of history, adorable old buildings, and an iconic lighthouse.

It’s a mix of newly restored and falling down buildings. It has tons of history. While it has lots of shops, restaurants, hotels, and attractions for tourists, it also feels like a real town where about 3000 Newfoundlanders live and work.

For generations of mariners along this coast, the light at Cape Bonavista was their only connection to land while out on the dark sea. Built in 1843, the light at Cape Bonavista is one of the few in the world where you can still climb up the stone tower and see the same seal oil fueled catoptric light apparatus that was used in the 1800s. One of the most photographed places in Newfoundland and Labrador, this is a prime location to view whales, icebergs and puffins.

We arrived too early for our check-in so continued on to the Bonavista Lighthouse. We decided to see as much as possible today in the sunshine. Tomorrow the clouds start coming in and rain on Saturday. Apparently we've been real lucky to see so much sunshine. The first week we were here is the first time they had any "summer" this year. July was mostly foggy.

This lighthouse is rather unique as a house was built around the tower instead of beside the lighthouse. It is also rather amazing that this light can still be used. It's in working order. The newer automated one is on the steel tower beside the lighthouse.

Inside the lighthouse, this is "the kitchen".

The parlour that was only used for special occasions.

These are the steel weights that have to be wound up from the deckat the top to keep them turning. This had to be done every 2 hours, day or night. Sort of like a pendulum on a Grandfather's Clock.

Up the stairs to the second floor bedrooms.

The only Puffin we saw here. Unfortunately visitors have been picking at this piece of art and taking bits of it.

Across from the lighthouse are huge rocks/islands. The gulls have taken over the Puffins nesting spot trying to catch them to eat them, their eggs or fish they caught. There are a bunch just flying around, but too fast to catch on camera. This is the end of the season for them. Last week apparently there were still hundreds and today probably less than 100. I could see a few in the binoculars flying around. This picture below shows all their burrows.

There's one!

Back to the tour of the lighthouse ...

Then we climbed the tower to the light.

The crank still turns so is completely operational should they wish.

The short rise below is endowed by hundreds of Inuksuks'

Just down the road is the John Cabot Statue, with free rv overnights in the parking lot.

Next down the road to the Dungeon Provincial Park and the dual arches. We took the gravel road to it. Pretty bumpy and potholed. Free range for sheep, horses and cows. lol Breath taking views.

Awesome campsite... fresh milk anyone???

The Dungeon:

Look how clear the ocean is.

There were tons of places along the road you can camp in a smaller RV as long as you have some clearance. We've noticed tons of small spaces one can overnight in your RV in Newfoundland.

Lots and lots of sea stacks in Newfoundland

 

Time to have lunch. We chose Mifflin's Tea and Tap as this place was suggested to us by our friends Cory and Deb that were here a year ago. Ray had the Newfie Sampler and I the mussels. Yum.

After lunch it's time to check-in. We were only 3 minutes away from our B & B. We basically emptied the car and carried on. This time to Elliston, where maybe we'll see some Puffins as weheard reports there are still some there. We lucked out! There are still a few there being pestered by the Gulls. Ray with his big camera wasn't fast enough. Pictures are a little fuzzy as he had to heavily crop the pictures on my phone.

Yay me! 

Next up, looking for Root Cellars. We drove around and found a few. There were 3 right at the path to the Puffin Viewing Area. 

The town of Elliston, located at the tip of the Bonavista Peninsula, is best known for its identification as “The Root Cellar Capital of the World” due to a documented 130 root cellars located in the town. One of the oldest root cellars in the town, built in 1839, is still in use today!  

Time to go back to the B & B and put our stuff away. Ray has a room and I have a room. Both beds are only doubles, but we should sleep better with more space. In the livingroom the couch reclines ... bonus. I picked this place for the comfort and laundry, no view. The only downside is the bedrooms are upstairs and the bathroom is on the mainfloor. Took pictures from their website.

 

Reclining couches.

And one of the main reasons .... free laundry. They even provide the soap.

I started our laundry. At 6 pm we went back out to have dinner at the Bonavista Brewing Co. which was right next door to the Mifflan Tea and Tap. They sure have lots of choices of beer, so I ordered a flight of 4. They also have a great non-alcoholic one for Ray. We decided on a deluxe pizza and it's delicious.

Friday we chose a lazier beginning. We slept in until 6:30 am! Huge for Ray especially. By 10 am we headed out to see more stuff while the sun is out. We're having a change in weather tomorrow to rain.

First up  the John Ryan Premises.

The Ryan Premises is a group of buildings that belonged to fishing and retail company James Ryan Ltd. in Bonavista, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. A National Historic Site of Canada, it is preserved as an example of a large-scale merchant operation in a Newfoundland outport. The fishers were treated pretty unfairly and barely existed.

Newfoundland and Labrador’s outport economy depended not on cash, but on merchant credit for much of the nineteenth century. Each fall, fishers traded their annual harvest of salt-cod to local merchants for clothes, food, fishing gear, and other supplies from their stores. Fishers often received these goods earlier in the year on credit, but did not know the price at which they purchased them. Merchants set the price for goods taken on credit at the end of the fishing season, balancing the prices of goods against the prices merchants would get for fish in international markets. Such price manipulations maximized the opportunity for merchants to profit from the fish trade, but left their clients with the prospect of simply breaking even or falling into deeper debt each season.Known as the 'truck' or 'credit' system, the price manipulations of this particular cashless exchange had advantages and drawbacks for all parties involved. Merchant credit helped fishers withstand poor fishing seasons and provided them with goods they could not produce locally, such as molasses, tea, and nails. However, many fishers could not catch enough cod to pay off their credit and sometimes fell into deeper debt each year. Some merchants also exploited fishers by charging too much for goods and paying too little for fish. The merchants, meanwhile, had a guaranteed clientele through the truck system, but had to absorb any losses when the cod fishery failed or when fishers failed to pay debts.

The truck system emerged in Newfoundland and Labrador in the early nineteenth century, when a resident fishery replaced the English migratory fishery. It was not unique to the colony and had existed in parts of Britain, for example, since at least the fifteenth century. Credit-based economies appeared most commonly in rural mining, fishing, farming, and logging communities where cash was scarce and where only a very limited variety of locally produced goods existed to meet residents' needs.

Learning about the cod fishery is pretty interesting. Mostly run by the English and Irish. This being a Parks Canada National Historic Site, admittance is free this year until September 8th.

What a big fish!

Doctor instruments at the time.

A traditional Newfoundland homemade anchor is called a killick, which uses a heavy rock locked inside a wooden frame to hold small fishing boats and nets in place.

A model of the original layout of the Ryan Premises.

Apparently  Atlantic Cod is a ferocous eater and will eat anything!

Now for a walk around the outside. (This picture taken from the other side of the harbour)

This was the salt shed, nicely painted recently. I think the rest of the buildings could use some "love".

Here are some Inner Harbour Views.

The big blue building houses "The Matthew" John Cabot's Legacy Ship.

Back in the car to the Matthew Legacy Ship which is just on the other side of this site. While we were waiting for our tour, we got a video call from Kristi and Amelia before Kristi went to work. So nice to see their  faces. Amelia had lots to tell us about their fishing trips in their new boats. Hard to connect with a 4.5 hour time change. When we are up they are sleeping and then gone for the day. At 5 pm BC time it's 9:30 Newfoundland time and we go to bed. lol

View looking over at the Ryan Premises.

The Bonavista Matthew is a full-scale replica of Caboto’s 1497 vessel, a 15th-century Caravel. It was built in 1997-98 by a team of seven shipwrights and four carpenters from the local area, under the direction of a Master Builder. Its construction marked the 500th Anniversary of Giovanni Caboto’s voyage celebrated in 1997. Today, the vessel serves as a lasting reminder of the voyage and discovery that changed the course of history. It is a conduit to our past, connecting us to the first European discovery of the New World that found a reason to return, sparking settlement in North America.

Several years after the ship was built the non-profit society decided to build a boat shed for it. It barely fits. They would leave it outside for the summer and put it in in the winter, but found that being made of wood it took a toll on it so they permenantly keep in in the shed now. The society replaced the keel.

The room you enter first tells the story of John Cabot through a young man's eyes.

A doctor's chart of the human body centuries ago.

Once the tour ahead of us leaves the shed, we're taken in. Good thing as a bus tour just arrived. There are tons of bus tours everywhere we go. We try and stay ahead of them by going everywhere early.

Cog to pull up the anchor. The poles come out so you can move around that area of the ship.

This is the rudder, usually manned by one person. In heavy weather as many as 6 seaman would tie themselves to the rudder and the wall to hold course. The captain would yell instructions from the top deck. The deck is all sloped so water coming in this huge hole would flow to the middle of the ship and drain out the gunnels.

First Mate Cabin. Looks like he was drunk.... just ask the Beach Boys.

The square "table" was their kitchen. Their provisions stored in the raised box. They ate their food cold ... no fires on a wooden ship.

Captain's cabin and chart room. There was only one other bunkroom, for the carpenter. Everyone else found a dry place on deck to sleep. They all did 4 hour shifts.

They built the catwalks around the building to help get the ship in and out of the shed. It would take a whole day to move it out and put back in. Now it stays in place.

The next spot we went to is to the Old Days Pond Boardwalk. A beautiful kilomenter walk around a pond on a boardwalk. Lots of water reflections for Ray.

A super gorgeous walk.

Going on 1:30 so time for lunch. Today we chose Ragged Rocks Gastro Pub. A cozy little place. Again pretty close to where we're staying. Ray ordered a moose burger and me the nachos. Both delicious. I have enough left for dinner too. (No I'm not drinking a bud! It's actually Iceburg Beer)

Wow look at the double patty moose burger with a whole cesear salad!

Back in the car for our final, well my final trip. Back to Elliston to search out more Root Cellars. We did pretty good.

This is the prettiest one of all and the one Ray wanted to find as he noticed this one our trip yesterday.

There were several more we found but they were pretty decrepit so we didn't take any photos.

After that we came back to the B & B where Ray dropped me off and went back to the Dungeon and Cape Bonivista Lighthouse to get some more pictures with different lighting. The clouds are coming in for the rain tomorrow, but the sun is still peaking through at times. I incorporated his better pictures in the blog.

By 4 pm, we were settled into the couch and working on the blog and pictures. What a busy couple of days. Dinner is leftovers.

Saturday morning we woke to the forecasted clouds. Lazy morning as we have nothing particular to do. I will do a final load of laundry this afternoon so we are good for another week. I think we will find a bakery to have breakfast today.

Off to The Lovely Grand Bakeshop. Good thing we got there when we did as it backed up considerably as soon as we sat down at our table.

Waiting for our treats and coffee.

Once we sat down this is how busy it got!

We did a bit of driving along the ocean and small streets for something to do. 

This little shop we thought about getting some fresh seafood but when we went in it was all frozen.

At 11 am we headed back to the cabin until later when we went for lunch at the Little Dairy King. We both had a fried chicken leg and mashed potatoes and fixin's. The chicken was great but the rest not so much. They did have delicious milk shakes though.

Beside the shop there were old fish drying racks.

Well that was our adventure here. The clouds have moved in and are looking pretty black. I think we are in for a storm tonight. Cape Breton was hit badly overnight and there are reports of washed out roads and flooded roads. Hopefully it doesn't get that bad for our drive to St. John's tomorrow.