Harbour Breton, on the Coast of Bays

TransCanada Highway One makes an upside down U across the island of Newfoundland. Between the downward, and coastal, legs of this U there are exactly three paved highways south (outside of the eastern and more populous Avalon Peninsula). We are now at the end of the middle one, Route 360, the “Road to the Coast of Bays”.

It was a long way down. We drove 230 miles from Terra Nova National Park and never passed a stop sign or signal light.

127 miles of that was south on 360 and we didn’t even pass through a town.

We were hoping to see moose and caribou. I saw just one moose munching in the deep ditch by the highway. But we did see a lot of wide open beauty.

As we approached our destination both the weather and the topography changed. This is our first glimpse of the head of a bay, Hermitage Bay, and we are still over 20 miles north of our destination. It was cloudy, foggy and 10 degrees cooler than Terra Nova.

We were now going up and down steep hills as we crossed from Hermitage Bay…

across an arm of Connaigre Bay and finally to Deadman’s Cove on the ocean side of the town of Harbour Breton. We set up camp in the cloudy damp.

The sun was bright this morning when Matey and I went out and walked along the coast.

We didn’t go very far along this extremely well made path.

But we did see this lovely beach…

and just feet from the slope to the beach is this bog which stretches to the hills behind.

I haven’t learned why this is called Deadman’s Cove, but there are three cemeteries just outside the rv park. With all the boldly engraved headstones and bright artificial flowers these are hardly spooky.

A bit later all of us went back out. We went the other direction where there was a pavilion…

and a path and steps down to the beach.

First we walked out on the rocks where we got a nice view of the coastline,

which was pretty rugged in both directions.

We went down on the beach and the sand was pink and black and dotted with little jellyfish.

The edge was something like a cross between sand dunes and cliffs.

Next we drove to another short trail that led to the lighthouse at Rocky Point. We are now looking at the bay of Harbour Breton.

My friends the larches were growing here…

and there was another bog.

It was a small lighthouse…

but there were big views.

The open ocean is actually behind us here, reached through a channel on the right of the photo.

To our left the channel winds back to the town of Harbour Breton.

We came back for lunch to our very private camping spot at Deadman’s Cove RV Park.

After lunch we left Matey in the trailer and went back to town to the Sunny Cottage Heritage Centre.

The house was built in 1909 by John Joseph Rose, a wealthy merchant. He and his wife had no children so the house went to their nephew, Jack Stewart.

Our tour began in the old kitchen. A young woman was to be our tour guide but she wasn’t back from lunch yet, so we started the tour with Jack Stewart’s granddaughter. She grew up in the house. She remembers this old stove and the day bed off to the right which was used when the house was full of her and her siblings.

Most of the house remains original, including tin ceilings and chandeliers like this one in the downstairs hall.

Our official guide joined us here. She said I could open the front door, which isn’t used, to take a picture of the view they had of the harbor.

The dining table and chairs are the originals…

as are the dishes in the cabinet.

The drawing room was beautiful with its striking tin ceiling…

and original fireplace. I liked the inlaid ceramic hearth. Many items in the house were donated by members of the community. Some are from the Rose and Stewart families, others are just nice period pieces.

The house is three stories high with a central stairwell. The railings were all short because Mr. Rose was short.

This was the Stewart’s bed…

and in the nightstand drawer is the nightgown worn by Mrs. Stewart on her wedding night!

In what had been a third story storage area they had some items from the community. My favorites were this first barber chair…

and this old outboard engine.

One of the rooms on the second floor was dedicated to the resettled communities. In the 1960’s the Canadian government paid people in remote communities to move to one community in the region. Harbour Breton was selected to receive resettled people. This is a closeup of the large wall map they had in the room. Each red pin is a community that is no more. Harbour Breton is the blue pin.

The room was filled with pictures, documents and artifacts from those resettled communities. This personal local history touches me.

We have a couple of more days to spend in this beautiful area. Perhaps we can find the site of one of those little fishing villages that is no more.