John and Cathy in Newfoundland 2013: First Full Day on the Rock

July 5
Our journey to St. John's yesterday was uneventful but a tad long. It seems that passengers using AirMiles are treated to the deluxe Air Canada package which, translated, means that we were assigned seats at the back of the plane on every leg of the journey and had the two stops along the way--Winnipeg and Toronto. Virtually the entire day was spent getting here!
Mustn't complain, though. We arrived safely and on time. Our car--a Ford Escape--was waiting for us and with the assistance of our GPS we found our hotel in the dark.
This morning we met Jason and Heather Caslor for breakfast at the Bagel Cafe. Jason was the band teacher and all-round great guy for two years in Outlook. He is presently a professor in the Music Department at Memorial University. He and Heather are expecting their first child sometime in late July. It was wonderful getting caught up on the years that have passed since we last saw each other.
Later, our first day's adventures took us to Harbour Grace, a town of 3300 that stretches 7 km along Conception Bay. It is only about two streets wide. Like so many of its sister communities in Newfoundland it has suffered from the collapse of the fishing industry, for centuries the backbone of this island. Our landlord at the Rothesay House Heritage Inn B&B where we are staying tells us the it used to have 30,000 citizens. The only hint of fishing still in evidence is a smallish structure along the water front that serves as a front for Norwegian factory ships that drop off fish that will be sent back to Norway. From the looks of the establishment, very few locals are employed.
On the way to Harbour Grace we detoured north from St. John's to Flatrock, Torbay and Pouch (pronounced pooch) Cove. Flatrock has an interesting grotto, Our Lady of Lourdes--fashioned by a local priest on the famous one at Lourdes. On a non-secular note, the view from the top is quite marvellous: there really is quite an impressive flat rock formation the extends into the water. The drive for the most part fronted the Atlantic Ocean, making for a relaxed and pleasant drive. The roads in Newfoundland seem quite well maintained. There isn't a lot of traffic once one leaves the TransCanada. Interestingly, my mental picture of rural Newfoundland has undergone an adjustment. For example, most of the houses in the villages we passed through are well maintained--and many of them are both new and very large. Alberta and offshore oil money must have really injected a lot of cash into the economy. Occasionally, we saw huge half tons with the equally huge tires reminiscent of oil workers in Alberta. In fact, there seem to be quite a number of pricey vehicles with Alberta plates.
Brigus is a lovely, picturesque village with several beautifully restored and maintained houses. Like our B&B here in Harbour Grace, the dwellings are colourfully painted. We visited a museum, Hawthorn Cottage, dedicated to a famous Arctic explorer, Robert Bartlett, who was born in Brigus. The guide, Elizabeth, was most helpful as she filled in background on the town's favorite son. The museum is listed with the the Historic Sites Association. Unknown to me before today, Bartlett evidently accomplished great things on the high seas, especially in the Arctic.
Never ones to miss an opportunity to sample good food, we had soup and a bun at the North Street Cafe, included in the 2009 edition of Where to Eat in Canada.
Our final destination for the day was Harbour Grace, a town with a long, and not always happy history. We booked into the Rothesay House Inn B&B. Our hosts George and Linda Butler couldn't be more hospitable. Interestingly this heritage site, a home once owned by a wealthy merchant, was moved from Brigus--they dismantled it and moved the sections on schooners. In the meantime, Hawthorn Cottage (not a cottage in the traditional sense) was being moved piecemeal from Harbour Grace to Brigus.
Dinner at Rothesay House was marvellous: thick tomato soup with a hint of orange, Atlantic salmon with an original honey-based sauce, roasted baby potatoes, asparagus and carrots. Dessert, Scottish Sticky Toffee Pudding sent our blood sugars into the stratosphere--but worth the risk.
It turns out that our visit coincided with a lovely community event in Harbour Grace. On the first Friday of each month they have a music night ("St. Paul's Music Cafe") in the hall attached to the oldest stone church in Newfoundland (1885), St. Paul's Anglican Church. The sizeable crowd, with a noticeable absence of teenagers and young people, filled the hall to enjoy local musicians. There is no set program--whoever wants to perform simply comes onto the stage and does just that--to a warm and supportive audience. It was like an amalgam of a hootenanny (60s folk music), sea shanties, country and western (with the emphasis on hurtin' songs), bluegrass, and Stan Rogerish numbers culminating with all the performers on stage and the entire audience (with one exception--John who is monotone) finishing the evening with a rousing version of "Jack Was Every Inch a Sailor." There was a real sense of community in the audience--people enthusiastically chatting with friends and neighbours during breaks between songs. We sat beside a friendly couple whose two sons both work in the oil sands at Ft. MacMurray. We mentioned that the church had been locked when we visited it in the afternoon, so during intermission we had a private tour of the church which has a wonderful pipe organ. It served as a garrison church and has a royal seal, one of only two such designations for churches in the province. Garrison meant that it was chosen as the church for British troops when they were posted in the area. There are ancient tombstones in the church yard, including some of pirates such as Peter Easton who drove the Basques from Harbour Grace in the early 17 century. It turned out to be a serendipitous end to a lovely day. We enjoyed an entertaining evening.