Back on the Rock

The nickname for the island of Newfoundland (as opposed to the Province of Newfoundland Labrador) is The Rock. And it’s pretty apparent why. As soon as you start driving north on TransCanada Highway 1 from Channel-Port aux Basques where the ferry lands, you are treated to views of the Long Range Mountains. These are a northern extension of the Appalachians and here are not as high, but far more rocky.

It may be a rock, but it is beautiful, and we are glad to be back. This is looking at the western flank of the Long Range Mountains (which, as their name says, run up the whole western side of the island) and up that very pretty valley you can still see some snow.

We came back to Grand Codroy RV and Tent Camping Park. It’s a very popular place and just a 30 minute drive from the ferry dock. You can tell when the ferry comes in, the campers soon follow.

Even with a full park there’s plenty of room to breathe.

The campground is on the Grand Codroy River in the Codroy Valley. This valley has world famous wetlands and enough soil that there’s a dairy farm.

Matey and I walked the short trail through the woods here.

Besides lovely glimpses of the river I found two flowers which I must tell you about.

The first is Canada Mayflower (Maianthemum canadense).

In some places it carpeted the understory.

The second is this tiny flower, Moneses uniflora. It grows around the Northern Hemisphere in temperate, moist coniferous forests and has at least eight common names. You’re looking at the backs of the blossoms as they hang down.

It was hard to turn this blossom up and take its picture, this is the best I could do. My favorite common name for this tiny beauty is Frog’s Reading Lamp.

Later we took a ride to walk the Port aux Basques Coast Trail from the All Trails App. We thought it odd that the route there took us on this very narrow dirt road.

When we were almost to where it said to park the road turned to this deep sand. We parked just before the sand at a wide spot by a sign that told us we were on the T’Railway ATV trail. No wonder! This ATV trail is a Provincial Park that runs 900 kilometers from Port aux Basques to St. John’s. It follows the roadway from the narrow gauge railroad that was replaced by Highway 1 and finally closed in 1988 after 90 years of service. The roadbed became a park in 1997. In any case, it’s a multi-use trail for hikers, snowmobiles and ATV’s and not pickup trucks.

The Port aux Basques Coast Trail was actually a walk along the beach, and we didn’t go far as the wind was blowing the sand in Matey’s eyes.

We explored the cove a bit and found this wreckage. We couldn’t tell what it had been, but it had hand hewn beams and wooden pegs.

Since the beach trail didn’t work out we drove back to the Cape Ray lighthouse about four miles away.

The road ended at the lighthouse, but this track went down to the shore. Bud was going to drive down, but I told him the road ended on the map, we should just park and walk.

It’s a good thing we did. This is looking back up from below the point where the track kind of falls away into the ocean. Someone tried to bypass the eroded part and sunk these ruts deep into the boggy soil.

We walked between the ruts and the bank and came down to another rugged and beautiful spot on the coast.

These were the wave washed rocks. I think that’s pink granite.

Bud found some kelp that he was examining closely. He said it smelled good. He might have tasted it.

It’s so interesting to poke around the coast here. It’s always beautiful and again, you can see why they call this place The Rock.