Day 12 - July 11 - this wind swept rock...

When Cabot landed on our rocky shore, more than 500 years ago

Cod fish teamed on the banks and bays...

... they pillaged it endlessly....

Will the sun never shine on those pine-clad hills

Where our fathers stood long ago

Will mountains crumble, will the seas run dry

Before our people ever know?

Will there ever be a time on this wind-swept rock

When "have-not" will be forever banned?

While we're waiting for the sun to shine, tell me

Who's guarding Newfoundland?

So sings Don Crewe on his CD "On the Rock". You get the sense that this is a place of story-telling, and the story-telling is done to music - whether in true pitch in the case of Mr. Crewe, or hopelessly off pitch in the case of the gentleman on the ferry last night... but it's the spirit of the singing that matters. I can understand more clearly now why niece Samantha did her Masters in cultural music in St. John's - this surely is a land of music.

We took our time getting up this morning in Port-Aux-Basques, and then off on the road eventually leading to St. John's. Some might not appreciate (I didn't previously) that the road from the southwest corner of Newfoundland to the southeast corner, circles the north, taking 900 kms in the process.

It was raining when we got off the ferry at 11:30 p.m. last evening. We woke to fog, but it burned off and we had a beautiful sunny day with only billowing cumulous clouds, and cooler easier-to-ride-in Kevlar-jacket temperatures.

So we headed off, cruising through the substantial community of Cornerbrook, and numerous small communities. We stopped in Robinson (see the picture of Jim in front of the one store/cafe of Robinson), because Jim and Cathy have a friend with property there. All manner of small places with quirky features (see the photo of the merry-go-round horses and the cement mixer). Through Steady Brook, Deer Lake, and Grand Falls (the falls, sadly, aren't very grand), eventually getting to Gander after 588 kms.

I rode Jim's Harley for an hour and a half or so today - what a great experience: the huge Harley sound ("loud pipes save lives", as Jim always tells us), and the living room chair feel of the full backrest and the foot boards instead of pegs. A totally different ride than my BMW - both have their attractions.

Dinner at the Albatross Restaurant (to be preferred over "Jungle Jim's"... really), and all four of us had a delicious seafood platter of 6 different non-deep-fried fish or shellfish.

We passed today on trying to include Gros Morne National Park - which we are told is beautiful - because it would have meant adding about 3 - 4 additional hours of riding when we'd had a late start.

For tomorrow we tried to figure out how we could take a side trip to a northern fishing community, Twilingate, and also get to St. John's, and also get to Argentia by 3:00 p.m. to catch the ferry we've reserved back to Nova Scotia. We decided it couldn't be done, and reluctantly gave up on Twillingate because we've attached a real priority to getting up to Signal Hill in St. John's as pretty much the eastern-most place in Canada, and a suitable place to designate as our "summit".

What each of us has said is that Newfoundland is the place to which we need to return (with spouses) and spend a couple of weeks exploring... I can't articulate what it is that is so appealing (beyond the obviously engaging accent), but there is something quite special about this "wind-swept rock".