… on the road again today. My stay around the Coasts of Labrador has come to an end.
But I still remember a huge, mixed-up kind of ramble during the night where I was going around all of these little settlements and cabins out on the coast.
And that’s surprising because I had yet another bad night’s sleep. Like I say, they come in cycles … “ON cycles, you mean” – ed … and we’re in one right now.
So after breakfast and sorting myself out, I took my leave of my landlord and went to find the offices of “Them Days”. That’s a magazine that publishes traditional stories about the Labrador coast.
As you know, I’m still looking for the grave of the most famous man in Labrador. It’s here in the Happy Valley Cemetery, but that’s huge and I couldn’t find it the other day.
Much to my surprise they didn’t know where it was either. But a few ‘phone calls later and I was told “he’s in the United Church Cemetery” part”, which of course is the biggest part of the cemetery.
So after an hour, and with the help of a very vocal local yokel, we came up unsuccessful. But there was a phone number there so I called it. And much to my surprise, the woman there didn’t know where he was either.
But it did lead to an interesting conversation. She asked my name – which I duly gave.
“Eric Hall? Let me see – you were in church on Sunday weren’t you?”
Our Hero – “did you see a thunderbolt then?”.
Anyway she promised to phone me back (and Josée’s phone is a godsend on this trip).
While she was making “further enquiries” I continued to search, and all of a sudden I came across it.
I missed it because I was probably expecting something much grander, seeing how his name was on everyone’s lips as the most famous man in Labrador 100 years ago.
Here then lies Gilbert Blake, the man who rescued the remains of the disastrous Leonidas Hubbard party and who accompanied Mina Hubbard on her trip into the interior to complete her husband’s work.
Ha also led countless subsequent exploring parties into the interior of Labrador and was never given credit for much of what was “discovered”.
The lady from the Church phoned me back to say where it was, and to my dismay, I had to turn down the opportunity of a lifetime.
“I spoke to Gilbert Blake’s daughter. If you would like to see her to chat, she’s available”.
But it’s 550 kms to Labrador City and it has to be done before dark. I was obliged to turn down the opportunityand I doubt that I will ever have the possibility again.
Usually, this rubbish is littered with photos of old cars in people’s gardens. But we’ve never had a photo of a garden with an old aeroplane in it.
I’ve no idea what it is, but it’s small, an early jet-fighter type of plane, and it won’t ever fly again this side of a miracle.
Labrador is certainly a different place from that respect. Nothing ordinary here.
Having fuelled up, I hit the road. About an hour later than I was intending.
About 20 miles outside the town there’s a cleft in the hills where you can see down to the works that are taking place at Muskrat Falls.
As I’ve said before, I’m not going into the rights and wrongs of the project – enough has already been said – but anyone who saw the photos of my first trip to Labrador will seethings differently now.
So off we go down the Trans-Labrador Highway into the interior.
And you’ll notice that it’s not quite autumn yet. The leaves on the deciduous trees haven’t “turned”
And you’ll notice a few changes to the highway too since we first came here. You’ll remember what a struggle it was over some of the worst roads in the world.
Today, it’s an asphalted, paved highway all the way to Labrador City.
With all of the work going on for the Muskrat falls project, a lot of trees have been removed and rock blasted away.
This opens up a whole new vista – views like this one of the Churchill River would never have been possible 10 years ago had they not blasted away some rock to put in a pylon to carry the cables.
You can see where the evergreen trees have been pulled out, and the first growth of deciduous arctic willow that is growing back in its place.
It’s that time of year, isn’t it?
In a week or so’s time it will be the annual tribal meeting of the Innu people, and they are preparing the site ready for the gathering.
I would ordinarily tell you what it’s called, but the problem with Innu names that it’s quite something to read them, never mind remember them.
I talked about the road just now. The one that we are actually on is the third attempt.
It dates from about 2011 – 2012 and it follows pretty closely in most places the line of the second road that we took in 2010.
The earlier road is what they called the “Tote Road” and dates from the period after the occupation of the Goose Bay air base by the Canadian Air Force.
If you thought that we had a struggle in places back in 2010, you can barely imagine what it must have been like in the 1970s.
The road was 10 times worse, single track, and following the contours rather than being graded across the valleys and though cuttings.
But regardless of your opinions, you’ll have to admit that they have done an excellent job of the new highway.
You can see it (and the power transmission cables) disappearing away over the hill in the distance, and it goes on for ever in just this kind of condition.
On the old dirt road, with the 70kph speed limit, in some places it was more like 70 kilometres per week. Here today, it’s a mere 80 kph but with no obstructions to slow you down.
But you slow down every now and again to take a few photos.
You’ve seen the scenery before but I bet that you’ve seen nothing like this.
There are miles and miles of forest where it seems that we have had a major forest fire fairly recently. You cans ee that some of the trees are scorched and blackened, and others have been completely destroyed
The whole of the place is littered with miles and miles of scenery just like this.
About 80 or so kms (I can’t remember now) from Labrador City I pull into Emeril Station to see what’s happening.
This is on the line from Sept Iles to Schefferville and serves the iron mines and the Innu community out there.
We have a line of wagons waiting for a locomotive, and also this dismantled dumper lorry – one of the huge 50-tonne ones- waiting to make their way north.
But I don’t see any locomotives, although I can hear a whistle away in the distance on the line to Wabush and Labrador City.
50 kilometres or so outside Labrador City, we can see that autumn has finally arrived here.
We’re deep in the interior now, and on the north-facign slopes exposed to the arctic conditions, they will be the first to catch the cold air.
Not quite the brilliant colours we are used to, but we are a couple of weeks earlier than usual this year.
Before I had left Happy Valley, my landlord had given me an address for B&B in Labrador City. I phoned her (thanks again, Josée) and she did indeed have a room free.
It took some finding with the roadworks but it was worth the effort. Not only was it the best place where I’ve stayed, it was also, believe it or not, the cheapest. I’ll be coming back here again, that’s for sure.
And hats off to Strider. He struggles on fuel as you know, but since he’s had his overdrive fixed, he seems to be a little better.
So much so that instead of the maximum 420-km distance that he seemed in the past to be able to travel, we’ve just come a mammoth 542.7 kilometres and although he’s below a quarter of a tank, the orange light hasn’t come on.
It is a good road these days – 80kph with the cruise control on all the way – and it’s still not what I would like, but it’s a vast improvement all the same and Strider can be proud of himself.
