Crossing back to Newfoundland and Gros Morne

Sunday, August 4, 2013

The rain and fog continued into Sunday morning as we left our boondocking spot in L'Anse Amour. We needed to get on the 1 PM ferry back to St. Barbe, Newfoundland, so we drove through the last few villages and back to the terminal at Blanc Sablon, Quebec. Being told to arrive two hours before in order to get a first come first served spot, we arrived by 10:30. The office didn't open until 11 AM, so we stood around with others who were anxiously waiting to see if they could get on.

Cheerful sunny morning

Enjoying the Quebec scenery

Blanc Sablon

I had a conversation with a First Nations woman. In the States we would call her Native American. Canada has adopted the term First Nations. She had driven down the gravel Trans-Labrador Highway from St. Lewis for two and a half hours that morning, and missed the 8 AM boat. She said we didn't need to worry about getting on.



As it turned out we were number three of those waiting to get on, and joined a few other RV's in line that we came over with two days before. Two nights seems to be about the limit to visit if you only travel to the end of the pavement and back. The weather wasn't encouraging anyone to stay either!

Almost the last vehicle on the ferry

The ride back over the Strait of Belle Isle was uneventful. Even though there was some chop, the boat was built to stay steady in bad weather. We found seats in the old bar in the front and gazed out onto the gray sea. This boat definitely has some wear on it. The Apollo has a rough weather route. We were curious about it's origins. Many signs on board were also written in what looked like a Scandinavian language and we speculated that it had been bought off a route in that part of the world.

We met a couple from Catonsville, Maryland, my Mom's hometown near Baltimore, who were motorcycle camping. We had heard that a week or so before, the ferry going into Port Aux Basque had hit the dock and thrown the ferry schedule into disarray. Without internet we had been unable to get more information, and the occasional radio station wasn't covering it anymore. The bikers had just come across from Nova Scotia two hours after it happened, so we were able to begin to find out more.



The ferry, the Blue Puttees, had to be taken to Halifax, Nova Scotia to be checked over in dry dock, so they stopped service to the Port of Argentia which is on the eastern side of Newfoundland. That is a 12 hour ferry, the other one is a six hour trip. Everyone with reservations at Argentia has to travel to Port Aux Basques all the way across Newfoundland, to be squeezed onto that ferry. They don't expect to have it back into service until late August. Then there are all the travelers who didn't make reservations and planned to make them just before they decided to leave the island. We met a teenaged girl who was traveling with her father. She said they had been in Newfoundland three weeks, hadn't gotten advance reservations and it was going to be at least two more weeks before they could get a ferry back to Nova Scotia. The Newfoundland ferry was the one reservation I had insisted on making. Guess I knew what was coming!

At this point the rain had stopped. An hour and a half later when we reached St. Barbe and unloaded, the sun was trying to break through and we had gone from 50 degrees in Labrador to the 70's in Newfoundland! Time to take off layers and open the windows! Back through the narrow portal of the ship we went and down the the Viking highway south towards Gros Morne park, a few hours drive away. We had a quick glimpse of a moose on the side of the road. At highway speed with no shoulder large enough for us to stop on, we both shouted moose, high-fived each other and then we were long past the moose.

Opening the bow to let us off

Last off

Partly Sunny!

Fireweed is common on the roadsides, just like Alaska

When we reached Green Point again we decided to stop there for the night and take advantage of their wifi. No hookups, but also no wifi! It was out of service. We stayed anyway because we wanted to go on the Western Brook Pond boat trip just up the road, so we settled in for two nights and hoped for good weather and wifi!

Back to Green Point

A quick addendum- We paid the highest price of our travels for diesel in Labrador, the equivalent of $5.71 a gallon. The gas price is about the same. We decided to buy the bare minimum of groceries and stretch our food by digging into the odds and ends in the pantry, fridge, and freezer, until we leave Newfoundland. We've watched the price of food escalate as the fuel costs have gone up (due to speculation following the Lac Megantic, Quebec train derailment and explosion/fire of petroleum tanker cars). We'll resupply food in Nova Scotia.