Thursday, July 19, 2001

St. Barbe, Newfoundland to L'Anse aux Clair, Labrador

Today we arrived in LABRADOR!!!!!!

It was cold, windy, and foggy when this photo was taken, but we are here at our ultimate destination!

We took the "Labrador Marine - Apollo" ferry this morning, from St. Barbe, Newfoundland to Blanc Sablon, Quebec.  The ferry travels about 20 miles across the Strait of Belle Isle, which separates Newfoundland and Labrador.  The ferry actually lands in Quebec, but the Labrador-Quebec Province line is only about 3 miles from the ferry landing.

After leaving the ferry at Blanc Sablon, we rode as far as the paved road goes into Quebec, to the small village of St. Paul's River.  That length of paved road is only 38 miles - that's it.  A dirt road continues for maybe five miles to the village at the absolute end-of-road in Quebec in this area!

The landscape we encountered riding down the Quebec road was unlike any we'd ever ridden through.  We went along the beaches at times, and up along very rocky hills at times.  The beaches actually had sand (Blanc Sablon means White Sand), unlike the totally rocky shore along Newfoundland.  Also, the beaches and some of the shallow rivers many times had hundreds of very large and some smaller rounded boulders.  These were uncovered at low tide, and made the beaches look like they had very large (1 ft. to 4 ft.) marbles sitting in them.

The low hills were of almost total rock, with a black lichen growing on all rock surfaces.  The actual color of the rock underneath was mostly red, with some black.  The vegetation was almost totally tundra, and almost no trees, except at the lowest elevation transition from beach to hill.  But this tundra was extremely green, and that, along with the black colored rock hills, was very striking and beautiful.  Add to that the beautiful little bays, and the scenes were stunning.

Oh yes, Black Flies!  We had been warned that Labrador would be swarming with Black Flies.  They can make life miserable for people and animals alike.  Fortunately, we met a fisherman in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, who not only warned us but also gave us the name of the best insect repellant he'd used over the years ("Muskol").  We bought a small bottle, and did it ever come in handy today!  The first time we stopped to take a photo, the Black Flies swarmed around us instantly!  We immediately put on the Muskol, and found it really works.

The fog during the day was interesting.  We crossed on the ferry in total fog, starting about 8 AM.  When we reached the dock in Quebec, it looked fogged over, but as we rode down the Quebec side it cleared and was beautiful with blue skies.  Then as we came back to Labrador, the Quebec side got foggy and the Labrador side became clear.  In all, we had a beautiful day for riding.

When we got to our motel in Labrador, we had a nice view out to a little bay, Clair Bay (L'Anse aux Clair).  As we looked out the window, we saw that we had our very own Iceberg floating just outside our bay!!  So we rode out on a high cliff area overlooking the sea, and had a marvelous view of "Our" Iceberg.  In addition, there were two more very large icebergs up and down the coast, and half a dozen quite small ones.  ("Our" Iceberg is sitting just on Deane's left shoulder in the photo.)

Now if icebergs weren't enough, there are TWO POLAR BEARS roaming around the towns here!  It's true; this is not a "Deane and Norm story".  This morning on the ferry, we had heard that the two were seen last night roaming around the ferry terminal on this side.  Upon checking into our motel, the desk clerk confirmed that the two (thought to be a mother and good sized cub) were seen in this area, and said that she had driven around this morning on her way to work to try to see them.  It is thought that they rode an iceberg down to the Labrador area, and finally left the melting iceberg near here.  You can bet that we are very careful in watching where we go.

We just had to try Labrador specialties for dinner tonight.  We had Caribou Hamburgers, "Bake Apple" pie, and had our drinks cooled with chunks of "genuine Iceberg ice"!  (Bake Apples are a local name for "Cloud Berries", a peach-colored berry that tastes something like apples.  And, yes, our waitress assured us that the ice really did come from an iceberg.  In the spring, some local man goes out to icebergs with a boat, and takes chunks of ice to sell to the restaurants and bars, so they can sell it to tourists like us.  Our restaurant keeps it separate in a special container until they sell it.)

Well, its been a great day.  We've had a wonderful time getting here, and Labrador (and the small part of Quebec) is well worth all our time and energy to get here.  We'll report more tomorrow.

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