Tag Archives: trans canada highway

Monday 15th September 2014 – ON THE ROAD AGAIN

Next morning I troll off early towards Antigonish. It’s a long way away and I have plenty to do en route.

It’s quite an uneventful drive at least as far as Fredericton where I stop to pick up my purchase from Saturday. And in due course I’ll post a photo of it and tell you all about it.

Back on the road south-eastwards and at a certain moment a few miles south of Fredericton, I’m surprised by three tanks that drive over a bridge across the Trans-Canada Highway. And I don’t mean water tanks or that kind of thing, but proper great big self-propelled armoured machines with long guns. I wonder what’s up with them.

david alward campaign bus smashed window trans canada highway moncton new brunswick canadaJust gone past me is a campaign bus for one of the candidates in the forthcoming elections and if you look very carefully on the nearside you might see something black flapping in the wind. It seems that someone has put out one of his windows, and the driver has covered it over with a black plastic bin liner to keep out the rain, but that’s burst now due to the air pressure as he’s been driving along.

And as we approach Moncton it seems to be brightening up now. We have blue skies and there might even be some sun about to make its appearance. It makes a change from the grey miserable misty morning that we had.

I struck gold in Princess Autos. They are having a sale and I bought an 25-inch power bar for $9:99, a set of 22 spanners, 11 metric and 11 AF, for $12:00, and a tyre pressure gauge for $0:99. An absolute bargain, that all was.

The only downside of this was that they didn’t have a cheap set of sockets to go with the power bar. But these were unbelievable prices.

And at the Salvation Army Thrift Store down the road they gave me a senior citizen’s discount on the CD that I bought. I’m not sure whether to be pleased of humiliated.

And on the Trans-Canada Highway, which is effectively a motorway with dual carriageways, just outside Moncton there’s a railway level crossing. And there’s another one too just a mile or so further on, by the Dieppe and airport turn-off. This isn’t something that you see every day on a motorway. We would have endless amounts of fun with a railway level crossing on the M25 in the UK.

wind turbines wind bent tree fort beausejour tantramar marshes new brunswick nova scotia canadaBob Dylan once sang “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows”, and that’s certainly true around here, isn’t it?

I’m at my lunch stop and you can tell that we are at the border between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia because tthere’s a pile of wind turbines down there taking full advantage of this screaming wind.

Where I am is actually in New Brunswick and there’s not a wind turbine in sight. I know that I have a “thing” in favour of wind turbines, owning four myself, but this lack of wind turbines in New Brunswick is just plain absurd.

fort beausejour new brunswick canadaWhere I am is actually at Fort Beausejour and we’ve been here before, haven’t we?

It was freezing cold then in the middle of winter so I didn’t stay there long. And I didn’t stay here long today either as I was in quite a rush – just long enough to take a couple of photos and eat my butties. I’ll have to come back here yet again.

I made it to Antigonish right to the minute and Hannah was bang on time too. We went for a meal and a really good chat and she told me all about her first couple of weeks at University. She’s the first of our family to go to university straight from school by the way, and she’s at St Francis-Xavier University, the best University in Canada if not the English-speaking world. I don’t know about anyone else but I’m intensely proud of her.

The downside of this is that I have left it far too late to find a spec for the night and I’ve ended up in a wickedly-overpriced motel. Still, you can’t have everything.

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Sunday 14th September 2014 – BACK IN CENTREVILLE

truckstop trans canada highway kings landing new brunswick canadaLast night, I had one of the best nights sleeps that I had ever had. Flat-out almost from the moment that I pulled up at the truckstop at Kings Landing and I didn’t feel a thing, except for the torrential rainstorm that hit us at about 04:00 or something like that.

And I have to say that I needed that sleep because I was dead to the world.

I bOught a coffee in the truckstop and then moved on along the highway a good few miles to warm up the car as it was quite cold. Then I stopped to type up my notes.

mars hill wind turbine maine usaOn the way back to Rachel’s, I came over the brow of a hill to see Mars Hill swathed in a misty haze way in the distance and it was looking quite spectacular.

You can’t see the wind turbines in this haze and you can’t see my property, but it’s to the extreme right og the hill on the downward slope.

Meanwhile, back at Taylor Towers, it seems that out little jaunt into the USA has been cancelled. There’s been a bereavement in the family and of course that takes full priority. Rachel and I thus spent a very pleasant and fruitful few hours tidying up the house and sorting out a huge pile of rubbish which we burnt outside in the fire pit. Clearly Neitzsche, who once very famously said that "out of chaos comes order" never met anyone from our family.

When the family returned from paying their respects, Darren and I moved a huge pile of stuff from outside and stashed it away ready for the winter. It’s not going to be long before it’s here.

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Tuesday 9th September 2014 – I’VE LEFT CENTREVILLE …

… and I’m now at my other spiritual home, the campsite at the country park at Mactaquac, near Fredericton.

It wasn’t quite as cold this morning – a balmy 9°C would you believe – when I set off to the tyre depot to pay my respects to everyone there, and I ended up for an hour or so doing some photocopy-editing of a photo in an old historic book that someone has found. It shows all of the kids who went to a local primary school in 1935 – including Wallace McCain, he who had his chips just a few years ago – and someone has succeeded in identifying them all.

Consequently we were doing a “cut and paste” on the photocopier so that all of the kids would be labelled with their identity.

From there I went to the Bank at Florenceville to do some stuff down there and then set off for Woodstock. And by the time I got to Woodstock I was half a mill … "you said that last year – and the year before" – ed. I did a little food shopping and at Canadian Tires I bought a small hydraulic bottle jack. There’s a good reason for this in that the jacks in these hire cars are sill jacks, and totally useless on uneven ground. And of course, I might be going to Labrador as you know.

But then again, I might not. It’s snowing in Alberta already and there are people snowed in at their homes and so on – early September and WE complain about our weather! I want to see what the long-range forecast is before I commit myself.

On the motorway down to Fredericton, I was right about something of which I had caught a glimpse earlier. You may recall, from all of our previous visits to Canada, that they have these road trains – an articulated tractor unit towing not one but two small trailers – a lead trailer and a pup trailer (although when they have to reverse, the drivers often call the pup trailer something like “the mother of a pup.

But I was convinced that I’d seen not one but two Day and Ross lorries, each towing two full-sized trailers on the motorway around Montreal and so I had the camera poised as I flashed along the Trans-Canada Highway.

articulated lorry two trailers trans canada highway new brunswick canadaSure enough, I was not wrong about that. The lorry here in this photo on the other carriageway is pulling two full-sized trailers. I’ve seen plenty of lead-and-pup combinations in my time, but never this.

And doesn’t Strawberry Moose take a superb photo, especially when we have a closing speed of what must be not far short of 250kph. Well done, Strawberry!

At Fredericton, they hadn’t done my press pass info so I had to hang around for a while so I went up to Home Depot for a nosy around. There was nothing interesting there but I did meet Danny, the store assistant who comes from Croatia and with whom I’ve had several good chats before. And at Value Village, I bought a few more CDs and a book on Quebec and the Maritime Provinces.

Finally, I picked up my press pass and my parking permit and now I’m here. I’ve had tea and I’m going to have an early night, I reckon.

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Tuesday 17th September 2013 – BRRR IT WAS COLD …

… this morning. Winter is here by the looks of it. Mind you the beautiful clear sky had a lot to do with that – all of the radiant heat disappearing through the night. But I really ought to stop complaining and get on with some work.

Still, you can’t keep a good man down, and not even me, and so I was off down the road into the gorgeous day.

southern new brunswick moncton trans canada highway 2Skirting the edge of Moncton and climbing into the hills at the back, some of the views were terrific and it was a total pleasure to have had a good day to see them for a change.

This is a view from the top of a bank somewhere along Homestead Road and somewhere down there is the truckstop where I spent the night, and of course the Trans Canada Highway as it closes in on Moncton. It’s a shame that the photo can’t really do any justice to the image but, like I said, it was something to be able to see clearly today.

In Moncton, it was largely disappointment. Princess Autos, the big motor factors, had nothing that was of interest and even if they might have done, the staff, while helpful, know totally nothing about their stock and so they were of no help at all.

UPS doesn’t have a budget freight service and the guy there suggested the Post Office for me to ship back a few things, but Home Depot did even better. A Ryobi plus One impact bit driver and two lithium batteries plus charger for just $119. You can’t even buy the batteries for that in Europe, and the bit driver costs more than that alone.

shediac fishing port new brunswickFrom there it was to the seaside, which was why I came down here anyway. This is the fishing port of Shediac. It’s only half an hour or so from Moncton and it’s one of the most beautiful places in New Brunswick. Strawberry Moose and I had a really good wander around and he made quite a few friends, both animal and human, more of which anon, and I took plenty of photos.

From here, we followed the Acadian Trail northwards. The Acadians were the original French settlers of the area and after the fall of Nouvelle France to the British they were obliged to take an oath of loyalty to the British Crown. Many of them did so of course, but some refused and those were deported to other French possessions (such as Louisiana, where they became known as “cajuns”) in North America, although once tensions had eased in the Maritime Provinces many of them filtered back

new brunswick beach grande digueIf it weren’t for the fact that the water here is absolutely freezing even in High Summer (this is the Northumberland Strait between New Brunswick and Prince Edward Isle – no Gulf Stream here) this would be a splendid place to come. There are lots of little beaches (but like in most areas of North America, quite a few of them are private) and lighthouses and all of that kind of thing to entertain the tourist.

Unfortunately, the tourist season is very short and Sunday was the last day for that and so there isn’t much that is open to the public right now, but who cares anyway? I’m enjoying the weather and the sea air.

bouctouche new brunswickSome of the small towns are quite pretty too. This is Bouctouche, a little further north along the Arcadian Trail, and the photo was taken from the steps of the large church.

The bridge is comparatively modern and at the side of it you’ll see a ramp down into the water and on the other side of the river, heavily overgrown, is another ramp. That seems to indicate “ferry” to me because even as late as the 1980s there was nothing like the number of bridges that you see today and the whole route was punctuated by ferries. A water-borne paradise and I for one am disappointed that it’s all gone.

But Bouctouche, or rather the huge Bouctouche sand dune, is where I’m heading. There’s a big car park quite discreetly hidden amongst the trees and that is where I plan to have my overnight stop.

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Monday 28th May 2012 – DOWN TO THE RIVER

It’s Monday today – time I was heading for the hills.

Consequently I went round to the tyre depot to say goodbye to everyone, and then I set off northwards.

wheel comes off trailer st basile new brunswick canadaThe first bit of excitement today occurs at St Basile.

It looks as if that pickup has pushed that trailer into the tyre place here at St Basile to have a tyre fitted or something, and as it’s drawn away from the depot, a wheel has come off and gone hurtling across the yard.

They are going to be there for a little while while they sort all of that out.

edmundston new brunswick canadaOn the outskirts of Edmundston is a big Ford garage, and there on the front they had a Ranger 4×4, black, 2000, extended cab.

It was a bit tatty, painted over rust and that kind of thing with a few new bits recently fitted, like a drivers side rear spring hanger rear mount. Sold as seen, they wanted $5900 which is flaming extortionate if you ask me.

Nevertheless I approached a salesman and he came over with the keys. And as you might expect, the Ranger had a flat battery and so he couldn’t start it up. And so he went to fetch the battery pack and it wouldn’t start with that.

His response to all of that was “il ne start pas” (he really did say that!), baissé’d his bras’es and wandered away from the scene.

So what is all of this for a garage? Cars on the forecourt at that kind of price and not only can they not start them up to show to an interested customer, they couldn’t even be bothered to make an effort. It’s a fine advertisement for a garage, that it.

degelis quebec canadaWhen I came by here in 2011 I somehow managed to miss out on visiting the town of Degelis, up in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains just over the Quebec border.

I needed to put that right, and so here I am, even if I don’t have a great deal of time to be diverted from my mission. This is the view of the town from the hill towards the north end of the town.

“Dégelis” in old French means that it never freezezs, and this is a reference to the volume and force of the local water which creates too much friction for the river to freeze over.

barrage de temiscouata quebec canadaAnd when you see a street called “chemin du barrage”, you know that there’s going to be a dam and hydro-electric turbine somewhere in the vicinity.

The road down to there follows the track of the old Temiscouata Railway that we encountered at Cabano in 2011, and this takes me after a couple of miles to the barrage and turbine. It’s a nice place to go for a wander, and also to eat my butty.

fort ingall cabano quebec canadaI drove through Cabano and out the other side and went to visit Fort Ingall, something else that I didn’t manage to see in 2011.

This is a reconstruction of a fort, built in 1839, after excavations in the 1960s had revealed its exact layout. Back in those days, the USA claimed all of the land up as far as the lake here and the British were having none of that – hence the area was quite heavily garrisoned.

fort ingall lake temiscouata cabano quebec canadaYou can see the attraction of fortifying this particular area. Not only is this the site of the main portage between the St Lawrence and the Saint John watersheddings, the view down the lake from the roof of the watchtower is stunning.

Any group of people fortifying this spot not only would control the portage, but would control the water traffic travelling up and down the lake and thus cut off all of the communications and trade between Lower Canada and the Maritime Provinces.

heavy traffic trans canada highway quebec canadaAfter much binding in the marsh, my road takes me back to the Trans-Canada Highway over the Appalachians.

When you look at all of these lorries coming along here from Halifax and Saint John, it really does make you think about the people in charge of the Témiscouata Railway who couldn’t make the railway line pay back in the 1980s.

Put the loads of just a quarter of these lorries onto the rails, powered by the electricity created by the hydro plants along the line, and not only would you have a thriving railway line, you would also have a great deal less pollution and environmental scarring of the landscape.

And the way that oil prices are going and all of the electricity that Canada can create, Canada will come to regret slashing its rail network to shreds.

junk yard aladdin's cave quebec canadaRegular readers of this rubbish will recall the yard of Les Oakes in Cheadle, Staffordshire. I always thought of that place being unique in the world,and so I was astonished to find the same place here in Quebec.

It’s another old guy who travels the country looking for “exhibits” to collect and restore, just like Les Oakes, and he took the trouble to show me around.

I was speechless (which doesn’t happen all that often, does it?) and I made a note of the address so that I can come back here again to scavenge stuff for my property.

wooden trestle bridge quebec canadaOooohhhhhh!!! Look what I have found!!!

At one time, the entire railway network of North America was built on wooden trestle bridges and viaducts but little by little, they have been replaced. You will have to look long and hard to find one that survived.

And here we are, in the Appalachians on an old dirt-track road and the trackbed of the old Temiscouata Railway passes overhead on a trestle bridge. This has cheered me up considerably.

stunning cloud formations quebec canadaMy route to the river is going over some impressive roads, thanks to The Lady Who Lives In The SatNav.

But it’s not just the roads that are impressive, it’s the weather, and in particular, the cloud formations. This is one of the most stunning cloud formations that I’ve ever seen, Spanish Plumes not excluded.

And you’ll notice that the light is now slowly starting to go. I need to put my foot down.

st lawrence river riviere du loup quebec canadaAt last I encounter the St Lawrence River – right down there between the towns of Riviere du Loup and Trois Pistoles, as taken from a ridge just outside the town of St Paul de la Croix.

Once I hit the shore, I’ll be looking for a place to stay the night and then head to Montreal. This will be my last night of sleeping in the Dodge as tomorrow night I’ll be in a motel so that I can properly wash all of my crockery and cutlery before I file them away in my storage locker until next time.

I can’t wait to come back.

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Friday 23rd September 2011 – I DON’T REMEMBER …

rest area trans canada highway exit 253 kings landing new brunswick canada… switching off the car engine last night. I crashed out completely almost as soon as I pulled up on this service area at exit 253 on the Trans Canada Highway, just up the road from King’s Landing.

It was cold when I woke up, with a light drizzle coming down. But a cup of coffee soon warmed me up and I carried on northwards towards Rachel’s to say goodbye.

abandoned railway line saint john river new brunswick canada There’s an old abandoned railway line that runs from Woodstock to St Andrews, and these railway wagons over there might give me a clue as to where the tracks might have been – it’s not easy trying to trace abandoned railway lines in Canada, unlike in the UK where every last metre has been recorded.

The wagons here are for sale so that’s interesting, but I wonder if the railway line is included in the deal.

presque isle stream saint john river florenceville new brunswick canadaMy road round to Rachel’s took me past the Presque Isle stream. We saw that a few days ago at the other end of Centreville near the USA border, and here is where it flows into the Saint John River just a couple of miles below the town of Florenceville.

It’s quite a surprise not to see an kind of settlement around the confluence of a couple of rivers.

After all of the goodbyes and so on, I left Centreville at 21:30 to break the back of the journey to Montreal, but I didn’t make much ground. The nearer I came to Edmundston, the more my eyes started to close, and when I reached the big Irvings truckstop on the Quebec border I called it a night.

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Thursday 22nd September 2011 – I HAVE A MEETING …

… with someone in Fredericton this afternoon so I need to have a drive down there this morning and I can’t hang about to take photos along the road.

It doesn’t stop me observing things though, and I’ve just seen a lorry heading north along the Trans Canada Highway with some freight containers with the word “TROPICAL” written on them. And that reminds me – when I was in Saint John the other day I saw a ship in the harbour there unloading a pile of “TROPICAL” containers. Maybe they are the same.

Having had my meeting, I can go for a good wander around the city and see the bits of the city that I haven’t managed to see so far.

st pauls united church federicton new brunswick canadaAnd there are plenty of things to see here. It must have been a wealthy place in the past.

This is St Paul’s United Church, and that sounds too much like a church for the local football club if you ask me. However it refers to the 1925 merger between the Methodist, Congregational and Presbyterian congregations who now all worship here.

The building itself dates from 1886 and has one of the most impressive spires that I have ever seen.

york house fredericton new brunswick canadaAccording to the sign at the side of this property, this is the York House Parking, so one assumes that this building is York House.

There is a plaque telling us that it was formerly the site of the New Brunswick Baptist Seminary from 1836 to 1872, the first Institute of Higher Education to admit males and females on an equal footing.

And if a beautiful building like this is so anonymous and the only plaque relates to a previous building, then that previous building must really have been something.

governors palace fredericton new brunswick canadaI hadn’t managed to take a decent photo of the Governor’s Palace in Fredericton when I’d been here before, and as I went past it this evening it was all floodlit and looked absolutely splendid, so this was clearly the moment.

It was built in 1823 for the Governor of new Brunswick and after 1893 became the headquarters of the New Brunswick Mounties

From here I headed up the Trans Canada Highway and made it as far as Kings Landing when I was obliged to pull over for a kip.

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Tuesday 20th September 2011 – I WENT FOR A LITTLE …

… drive out today, on the eastern bank of the Saint John River.

First stop though was into Florenceville, and we now have the deeds to our property, a safety-deposit box to keep them in and also a direct debit with the council to pay the property taxes on the property.

From here, I continued my drive upriver.

hydro electric power plant dam beechwood perth andover new brunswick canadaOne thing that I hadn’t noticed before was that there was a dam across the Saint John River here just on the outskirts of Perth Andover.

It’s called the Beechwood Dam and it was the second to be built on the Saint John River system, dating from 1955. Apparently it was shrouded in controversy due to the fact that it interrupted traditional First-Nation water-borne movement patterns up and down the river.

view of saint john river perth andover new brunswick canadaFrom the other, western side of the river there are some stunning views a couple of miles south of Perth Andover.

Here I am on one of the old sections of the Trans Canada Highway (I think that in places it’s on its fourth reincarnation) and you can see exactly what I mean . And it would have been even nicer had I had the right kind of weather for it.

motel hartland new brunswick canadaWhen I came by Hartland in 2010 I stayed in a motel on the top of the hill north of town, but I forgot to take a photo of it.

One of the things that I wanted to do this year was to put that right, and so I came past here this afternoon with the intention of rectifying matters. My room was one of those on the front row over there just by the telephone box.

worlds longest covered bridge hartland new brunswick canadaFrom this spot there’s also a good view of the covered bridge down the hill at Hartland. It’s the world’s longest covered bridge apparently, 391 metres long.

These covered bridges are often described as “kissing bridges” because young couples would often go for a ride through them and while the horse concentrated on the road, the couple could occupy themselves with other things, out of the gaze of the public. In this bridge, they would have plenty of time for other things too.

lorry scrapyard Simonds Well Hartland new brunswick canadaHere’s somewhere else that I wanted to visit. I’d been here once before but I didn’t have too much time for a wander around. Today however, there wasn’t anyone around to ask if I could go for a walk around, and you need to ask for permission to do that sort of thing in North America.

It’s certainly the kind of place that I would like to visit when I’m on holiday. It’s home from home for me.

mccain food processing plant florenceville new brunswick canadaOne more place that I wanted to capture on film was the largest food-processing plant in the World. It’s the McCain potato-processing plant in Florenceville, down there on the banks of the Saint John River.

I’ve been told that one third of all prepared chips sold in the world is a McCain product, so that’s some going. It’s hardly surprising that you can’t move on these roads for potato lorries during October.

So I’m going back to Rachel’s for an early night. I’m going to be busy for the next couple of days.

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Wednesday 20th October 2010 – I ALMOST FORGOT TO BLOG TONIGHT.

Yes, I was about to go to bed for an early night. I’m in Corner Brook for my last night in Newfoundland – a B&B in a private house at $50 for the night and they even let me use the kitchen to cook my tea from my supplies.

puncture casey chrysler pt cruiser canadian tires clarenville newfoundland canadaSo a cheap night tonight – but it needed to be, because this morning I had a nasty surprise. Casey had a flat tyre. 2000 miles down the worst roads in the world and not a thing, and a puncture on the Trans-Canada Highway. And so off to Canadian Tyres it had to be.

But it wasn’t all doom and gloom because they were having a sale of inverters – and I picked up a 75-watt and a 150-watt for just $19.98 for the pair.
And then, incredibly, at Walmart, a 40-watt slow cooker for just $9:99. So off to the dollar store for a pile of tins and so on and I now have all that I need to cook my meals in the car as I drive.

newfoundland railway ruins bridge joeys lookout gambo canadaWe’ve talked about the Newfoundland railway before and every so often I’d been encountering relics that looked very, very railway-like.

Here from my good spec up on Joey’s Lookout, whoever Joey might have been, near Gambo, I had this view and I don’t think that I’ve ever seen anything looking more like a railway line than this. It’s ironic in a sense that the railway, the 20th Century form of transport, has cut off access to the bay for boats, the previous method of transport around here

douglas dc3 dakota cockpit gander air museum newfoundland canadaAnother good stroke of fortune was that the Air Museum at Gander was open and while the girl in charge knew nothing about the missing artefacts she did know two authors of aviation books who are “friends” of the museum.

One of these men worked on the project for the replica flight of Alcock and Brown’s Vimy to celebrate the 75th anniversary. So if anyone knows anything about these objects one of these will.

hunter trapper selling rabbits by roadside gander newfoundland canadaOutside the museum was a fur trapper selling rabbits that he had trapped.

This took me by surprise. I thought that they only did things like that in the Last of the Mohicans but here he was – a genuine 21st Century trapper doing his stuff at the side of a main road in the middle of civilisation. If you were to read this in a novel you wouldn’t believe it.

newfoundland railway relics elmwood bridge canadaA little further on I can actually get in touch with the railway line.

This is a beautiful bow girder bridge across the river at Elmwood. And having been for a little walk along the line, I can tell you that it’s single-track and judging by the radii of some of the curves, narrow gauge too.

So now I know.

bed and breakfast guest house corner brook newfoundland canadaSo now it’s an early night in my guest house at Corner Brook.

There won’t be a posting tomorrow as I’m spending the night on this 7-hour crossing to Cape Breton Island where I’ll be picking up where I left off from my 2003 voyage.

And if I don’t blog the night after, it will be either because wherever I will be staying won’t have internet access, or else the ferry will have sunk. And don’t laugh about that either. On October 14th 1942 the Caribou, one of the predecessors of the ship I’ll be sailing on, was torpedoed by a U boat while crossing over the Gulf of St Lawrence.

And the ship I’ll be sailing on – it’s the first voyage since its rudder and steering gear have been repaired. So anything can happen – and it probably will, but I’ve got my Strawberry Moose to keep me warm.

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Saturday 16th October 2010 – WE MADE IT TO L’ANSE AUX MEADOWS TODAY

l'anse aux meadows viking settlement norse newfoundland canadaThe view is spectacular and you can understand why the Norse chose this particular site.

There are two crescent-moon shaped bays, both well-sheltered, next to each other surrounded by cliffs to the prevailing northern side, and a low bank behind to stop the easterly winds. The boats could be brought right up to the village when weather conditions were right but a sandbank has intervened these days.

l'anse aux meadows viking settlement norse newfoundland canadaUnfortunately, the place was all closed up and locked, but having driven all of this way to get here, I was not going to be thwarted.

A visitor centre with a low roof miles from anywhere where there isn’t anyone about is not going to be a barrier to anyone who is sufficiently determined, and 10 minutes later we were in the park.

ruins viking norse remains l'anse aux meadows newfoundland canadaIt’s a little confusing at first – they have built some replicas of the Viking buildings, but these are some way from the remains of the original Viking ruins.

The remains of the original buildings are surprisingly open. They are not fenced off at all to anyone so you can wander around them.

bog iron l'anse aux meadows viking settlement norse newfoundland canadaThere are all kinds of traces of bog iron too just floating on the surface of the bog. The Norse travellers would have found this very useful to repair their ships.

But after that I had to clear off smartish-like because the heavens opened and I was soaked to the skin just walking back to the car. And I don’t have long here and I have a lot to do.

You may not think it but Newfoundland is huge, much bigger than it looks on a map and I have to travel from here, at the extreme north-east, down to the Marconi station at the extreme south-west, and its over 1300 kms, would you believe.

deer lake motel newfoundland canadaAnd so in a kind of minimalist mode I’ve made it this evening to Deer Lake where I can pick up the Trans-Canada Highway eastward.

The motel isn’t as cheap (by a long way) as I’d been hoping, but around here there are not so many choices. There was a cheap bed-and-breakfast but no-one answered when I knocked on the door. It made me wish that I had bought a mobile phone as well as a Sat-Nav.

beautiful scenery north west newfoundland canadaThe drive along the Viking Trail down from l’Anse aux Meadows to here was almost 500 kms, you know and we went through some wonderful scenery, because Northern Newfoundland really is beautiful.

There are some really nice mountains and massifs and had the weather been better and had I had more time, I could have taken hundreds of photos along here but I was in a rush.

moose newfoundland canadaWe also saw some of Strawberry Moose‘s cousins. One was quite a good clear shot which came out blurred due to the darkness that was surrounding me.

As for the second – there were about 3 vehicles in a line – I was the middle one – and in the darkness and we were travelling at speed, suddenly the front car slammed on his brakes and screeched to a stop, and we saw four long legs in the headlight beam disappear into the forest. He had just had a close encounter with a moose. It was noticeable that for the remaining 30 kms to Deer Lake his speed dropped from over 100 kph down to about 70 kph.

Tomorrow I’m back on the highway and I want to do all of it to Saint Johns in one go. If I can find somewhere cheap to stay I’ll do 2 nights there, visit Cape Race and the Transatlantic Air Museum, and then head back to the south-western corner (Newfoundland is like a big triangle) to my ferry Thursday night.

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