Day Fifteen - TLH pt.2

We camped last night right on the bay in Cartwright. It rained overnight but was clear by the time we woke up, aside from a thick layer of fog that quickly burnt off.

We topped off on fuel in town and headed back south to rejoin 500N, the Trans Labrador Highway. One thing about this road, in most places there is no shortage of beautiful scenery. Lindy even commented once “It’s too easy”, while she was trying to take photos of the landscape. The road frequently crossed brooks, streams, and rivers, previously inaccessible to man.

 

Out on the road we made good time on our trek to Goose Bay/Happy Valley. The roads were smooth and we were able to carry a lot of speed. At one point about 100km from Goose Bay we came across a minivan at one of the pull-offs. It was a couple of, for lack of a better term, hippies from Montreal we’d seen on the ferry heading to Labrador two days before. They had a poorly-repaired flat and needed an air compressor, we were glad to be of service and enjoyed chatting for a while about our travels thus far. While we stood and talked, a gray-jay flew up, edging closer and closer as we joked about how bold they are and soon enough, he was in the hippies’ van. As they walked over to chase him away, he came flying out the door with a snack, a cookie he’d managed to extricate from the cupholder. We cracked up about it for a few minutes and then got back in the truck. As we headed off we came across a reminder of why you must not let your guard down on this road, a Chevy Blazer on it’s side, roof crushed in but no one should have been hurt if they had their belts on.

As we neared Goose Bay the tank got close to E, then the low fuel light came on, then the needle went past E. I knew from previous days we’d be close on mileage, and had a spare 2.5 gallon can with us, so I wasn’t worried. A few kilometers later, we came up on a road grader. We’d past several over the last 2 days so this was nothing new, but as the road narrowed and we moved over to straddle the row of debris he’d piled up on a previous pass, we heard a loud thud followed by a jolt that rocked the truck. Everything in the center console had found new homes. The change was in the floor, cups and bottles knocked out of the cupholders, and the gearshift knocked into neutral. I quickly looked out of the mirror and saw a giant rock bounce off the side of the road. “What the !@#$^????” I stopped and did a quick inspection, saw no fluids leaking, so we eased down the road a little further before finding a good pulloff for an inspection. This is roughly equivalent to what we hit at about 60mph:

And this is what it did:

Initial damage assessment showed denting and tearing in the front skid plates, a gouge and dent in the driveshaft, and some marks on the rear axle. When we got to town and found a lot to pull off in I crawled under and pulled the skid plate off. There was a hole torn through and an impact crater in the front diff, but no apparent damage aside from superficial. It nearly flattened part of the exhaust and nailed the cross member under the trans, but both look like they’ll be serviceable for the return trip home. All in all lucky I guess, but still pretty pissed that we hit it in the first place.

We explored the town(s) of Goose Bay/Happy Valley, which have grown together over the years, and kicked back at the local RV park for much needed showers and internet time.

Day 14 - Red Bay to Cartwright, via gravel

When we arrived in Red Bay last night, it was close to 1:00 AM, thanks to our late night ferry experience. As a result, we didn't get to see much of the town. When the sun peeked over the hills, though, we were delighted to find a really nice little fishing village (not that we hadn't seen any of them thus far). We had been directed the night before on the ferry by an enthusiastic local to go to yet another Canada National Historic Site. This one, though, was generally for the Basque fishing heritage in the bay, but specifically for the discovery of a Spanish galleon from the 16th century, the only one known like it in the world.

It seems there was a lot of discovering going on in this part of the world in the 60's and 70's, as some documents uncovered at a Spanish university led researchers to believe there was a significant shipwreck in the bay. Since a recent wreck had happened in the vicinity under similar conditions (which is still there, by the way), they were able to approximate the location of the Spanish wreck. Sure enough, under roughly 10m of water, lies an almost perfectly preserved Spanish galleon in pieces, to this date. This led researchers to discover an entire settlement, and smaller wrecks as well. One of which, a smaller whaling vessel, has been recovered and preserved and is open to the public. We geeked out appropriately, and enjoyed the morning soaking up this piece of history, in a very nice museum setting.

16th century Whaler Boat on display. 

Model of the Spanish Galleon located at the bottom of Red Bay. 

Local Fishermen.

Shipwreck which helped locate the Spanish Galleon on the bay floor. 

Inukshuk at Red Bay. 

Finally we left, topped off with gas, and made the turn onto the Trans Labrador Highway.

The Trans Labrador Highway, or TLH, is basically the only public road through the province. It is largely dirt and gravel with portions through the larger towns paved with asphalt. There are still areas of Labrador that can only be reached by ferry or plane. The TLH was constructed in three parts. The first, connecting Labrador City to Happy Valley - Goose Bay, was completed in 1992. Additional efforts in 1999 and 2009 completed a full highway system from Red Bay to Labrador City. Paving efforts continue on the Labrador City - Goose Bay stretch, but from Red Bay to Goose Bay there is nothing but dirt. You can read a bit more
here or here.

Along the roads lie a number of wooden sleighs, presumably to pull wood out of the forests in the wintertime, we still need to pose JD with one, since he is our sled dog.

We hit some of the smaller towns along the road, Mary's Harbour, St. Lewis, and Port Hope Simpson, none of which really offered a lot in the means of tourism, save a boat tour at Mary's Harbour to another island. When we pulled into Port Hope Simpson we had a bit of quandry: continue for a while or stop for the night. After fueling up we decided to check out the local "accommodations". There's a hotel that looks closed, a B&B that looked OK, and supposedly an RV park. It's such a stretch to call this an RV park that we completely missed it on our fist pass, and had to get directions back to it. When we pulled up we found a few sites in an over-grown lot, and what looked like a temporary office trailer. Not certain that they even had a bath house, we checked in the office, which was also the local hardware store, where we met the most useless and unfriendly person to date on this trip. After an awkward hello, the conversation spiraled down hill to the point that I wasn't even sure she wanted to rent us a site for the night, and I was determined not to pay this lady to stay at her crappy campground. So we pressed on...unsure of where we were actually heading for the night.

Port Hope Simpson also has the distinction of being the last place to get gas before Happy Valley - Goose Bay, another 415km away. About 100km in we found the turnoff for Cartwright, which is a ferry stop 100km off the highway on a bay. Since it was getting late we opted to head north to Cartwright, which is also the farthest north we can drive on the east coast, and find a spot for the night.

The Skamper, on the other hand, wasn't sold on the idea, and voiced its opinion by jettisoning the propane door out into the highway. Luckily I heard it breaking free, saw it out of the corner of the mirror and was able to get back to it before one of the other vehicles on the road could smash it into an unrecognizable shape. A little worse for wear, I made a hasty duct tape repair and we were back underway. Unfortunately, this would not be our last incident on the highway....

The landscape here is completely unbelievable and indescribable. We have never seen such blues and greens in our lives. It is amazing to think that this land was nearly inaccessible prior to the TLH, and is virtually untouched as a result.

 

Inukshuk and dog. 

A friendly local warning in St.Lewis... still now bears to be seen! 

Day Thirteen - Iceberg, and Vikings, Dead Ahead!

The last strains of, now, Tropical Storm Irene met the western shore of Newfoundland last night. Apart from a bit of wind and a few scattered showers, we didn't see much trouble out of her... until this morning.

It was our goal to make the 1 p.m. or 6 p.m. ferry out of Newfoundland and over to Labrador. With what was left of Irene churning away from the shore, the leftover winds were making travel arrangement next to impossible.   After breaking camp, we made our way directly to the Labrador Marine office to try and see if the ships would even sail with the surf and gusts in their current state.

Upon arriving at the ferry terminal, we realized why our few phone calls had been so um... abrupt and strange.   If you have ever seen the Discover Card "Peggy" commercials, that was basically what we were working with, except it was three women in the office, when they felt like it. If you have not encountered "Peggy" here is a video sample.

After a few trips in line and crudely deciphering what was meant, we had a number and were told to call back at 1 p.m. for the current update/schedule. Here is basically how our conversation at the counter went:

me - "Hi, we were wondering about and interested in the 6pm ferry?"
lady at counter - "Yeah"
me - "Well, is it running"
lady at counter - "Here's your ticket, call back at 1... it doesn't look good"

GREAT!

Having the option of sitting in a terminal all day or finding some ancient viking dwellings, we hit the road. Before making it to the historic site, we stopped in Flowers Cover to see the lighthouse.

Flowers is apparently also home to the bus graveyard. 

L'anse aux Meadows is a National Historic Site of Canada which contains the located foundations of a viking village and a reconstructed village with re-enactors. At first, this sounded like it could be lame, but we were amazed at how interesting and well done it turned out to be. Best part of all, JD was allowed in the park with us. The site was once used by roughly 90 vikings, lead by Leif Eiriksson, who used the site as a base while exploring the Bay of St. Lawrence. The ruins were discovered in the 1960's by a historian working off of a few hunches and the directions of locals.

Our other stops for the day included a visit to the "Deep Tickle Experience" which is actually a jam company that specialized in berry preserves made from fruit found only this far north. We also made our way into St. Anthony to explore the city. Our two main discoveries were another lighthouse and icebergs. We really are in the north!

Leaving St. Anthony's a bit earlier than we wished, we blew back down the road to the ferry. By the time we arrived we noticed that there were far fewer cars in the parking lot, which was either a good or bad sign. Basically, at 4pm they had taken anyone who was standing around and were "waiting to see how this one goes" before selling tickets for the 6 o'clock voyage, which they said was now pushed back to 8:30. There was nothing to do but wait.

We had dinner in the hotel restaurant, located adjacent to the ferry terminal. At one point I popped back in to inquire about an update to find the ladies turning out all the lights. Their answer was, "we don't know anything, and won't until we get back from dinner..."

To make a long story short, we had a standby ticket for boarding the ferry. We got in line, chatted with some locals, and waited to find out our fate. Finally, the official looking man told us to "get in dat line and go up der," which we took to mean "get on the boat." We were Labrador bound, only 4 hours behind what we had expected.

Bring a Trailer - Willy's Style

Not sure what chassis, it was raining and I didn't feel like getting out to examine that closely, but I like it.