Monday, 24 July 2006

Trout River to Rocky Harbour (Newfoundland)

It had been raining as we'd sat in the kitchen shelter listening to Cyril (the tide had been rising - a common time for it to rain according to Cyril. High tide was at around 11:30 pm) and although the morning was overcast it was mostly dry. I was planning to take the 10 am boat trip on Trout River Pond ($35) so I could afford to have a relaxed start to the day. I had some breakfast and then went into Trout River to find the boat tour office; it was closed, so I went in search of a cup of tea instead. There was a mist drifting from the sea and through Trout River, and it was heavy with smoke as I guess a lot of house must still burn wood for extra heating. The only place open was the Sunset Cafe, and I was immediately seduced by the cooked breakfast - so I had 2 breakfast within half an hour!

When I went back to the boat tour office it turned out that I was the only person interested in taking the tour, and they wouldn't go out with less than 8 people. I thought about doing the Trout River Pond hike instead, but the cloud base was very low and much of the walk looked like it was in the bush. As it was misty on the coast, that ruled out the coastal walks too.

I went back to the campground and packed up the tent. From Trout River there was a climb on the road up over 200 metres in a kilometre or two. It was cool and drizzly, but sheltered from the wind until I reached the top of the climb and was back on the Tablelands. The cloud was still clinging to the mountain tops here but was dry enough at least to stop and attempt some photos. It would have been great to see the Tablelands under a blue sky.

I don't like the system they have in North America of charging for access to National Parks. If you want to take a boat trip or do a hike you have to have at least a day-pass (which is quite expensive at $8.90) so I had a pass which covered me for the morning boat trip - which didn't run. A waste of money. A National Park should be a national resource paid for out of the national coffers and not by taxing the people who care enough about it to go and see it. Other than daily passes, you can only buy an annual pass - which isn't much good for a visiting tourist. It seems to be deliberately extorting as much possible from visitors and it puts me off from using the the park. I stopped at the Discovery Centre on the way back to register my complaint.

I cycled down to Woody Point and had lunch at the little Granite Coffee House while waiting for the library to open. I'm behind with the blog again and need to do some catching up. The library was quite busy and when I got booted off the PC I went to the Old Loft Restaurant for dinner. I was waiting for the 5:30 ferry across to Norris Point so I had some time to kill. I did a little more blogging before getting the ferry across Bonne Bay to Norris Point. The cloud still lay like a thick blanket over the hill tops and soon after I arrived on the other side it started to rain, so I pedalled off in search of the KOA campground where I knew Mike and Kelly might be from an email I'd received. They were still there so I squeezed onto their site for the night.

Distance: 49.6 km
Cycling time: 3:20
Total distance: 4470.9 km