Looking back on Newfoundland and Labrador

Richard photographing Google John

It's a weird thing but sometimes I think I enjoy a holiday more after I've come home and I have time to think about it.  While I'm there I'm truly living in the moment.  This was especially true of our holiday with Adventure Canada called 'Newfoundland and Wild Labrador.' It's amazing what we packed into  each day. We got to hike, meet people from the small settlements in NL, explore ancient sites with archeologists, listen to live music and sing with people from across the globe.

Our days were very busy.  They began at 6:30 with Stephan announcing over the PA, "Good morning, good morning, good morning.' There were always three, 'good morning's.' He next gave us the weather conditions and the times for breakfast. By that time we were awake, even if we didn't plan on eating breakfast.

We hiked in Gros Morne, visited the site of the Viking settlement at L'anse aux Meadows and the abandoned town of Hebron in Labrador. Hebron was once a thriving community whose people were relocated farther south with promises of houses and territories in which to hunt and fish. The people, thus displaced, lived their lives as outsiders in the new locations and there is an air of sadness in that place.

On days when we sailed for most of the day there were talks going on in various areas of the ship.  My regret was that I couldn't use Hermione Granger's trick and be at three different places at once. No matter which talk I attended I always felt as if I was missing out on something else. One day the seas were too rough to land so we stayed on board and some of the talks were repeated so I did manage to get in a few extra ones. I think Stephan was disappointed that we couldn't land and he made a point of speaking to everyone about the need for the decision. In some ways I didn't think too much about it because, having never been to the Wunderstand, I was blissfully ignorant of what I was missing.

As so often strikes me when on holiday it was the people I met who made the trip.  That may sound funny coming from a confessed introvert but the people on the ship were fascinating.  Richard has described the voyage as a floating TED talk that lasted for two weeks. We met archeologists, ornithologists, geologists, adventurers, artists, publishers, writers and you couldn't turn around without bumping into a professional photographer. It was a trip filled with intelligent and interesting people and my brain whirred with excitement after almost every conversation.

Margaret Atwood, Graeme Gibson, Scott Forsyth (foreground person unknown)

I feel a bit awkward about writing this next part because it seems a bit like name-dropping but I did meet and talk with these people and the conversations were fascinating. Billy Gautier and I talked about carving, and fell into the comfortable space of artisans sharing what they love. Doug Gibson told marvellous stories about the writers he published in during his career with McClelland and Stewart and Shirley Montague passed her guitar around the circle one night after most folks had gone to bed and only a few of us lingered to sing and play. Margaret Atwood took off her hood to reveal a marvellous hat with cat's eyes and ears on it and said that she bought it at a market in Poland, (I think it was). Terry Fallis sang and played guitar and helped push zodiacs off the rocky beaches into the sea. Gilles Gagnier hosted us at dinner one night and we talked of travels by bike and canoe, Sable Island and the beginning of Merlin bicycles since another guest at the table was one of the inventors of Merlin bikes. Initially we thought it might be tough to do without the internet for two weeks but we had so much to learn, so many stories to listen to and so much technology to play with that we only missed it in the sense that we couldn't share our excitement in the moment.

John Bailey from Google was there with his street-view backpack photographing the wild places to add to Google earth.  Billy was there from Fuji and he loaned out cameras. Both Richard and I borrowed cameras and now have a serious case of techno lust for the new Fuji mirrorless model.

David Newland the host for our trip described the Ocean Endeavour as a floating village. There were about 176 of us plus another 100 or so crew. It is only since I have come home that I have time to appreciate how truly spectacular an experience it was and I haven't even started on the people we met in the small settlements we visited. That, perhaps is a topic for another day.