45 km, 3 hours
St. Lunaire-Griquet to Triple Falls Campground and St. Anthony
In the NE corner of Newfoundland, we discovered many interesting things. Perhaps not profound, but small things are interesting too. There are many bogs, the trees are short and therefore provide no shade on a long hot sunny day, and the fresh water is yellow. We noticed the water mostly in Hay Cove, L’Anse aux Meadows and St. Lunaire-Griquet – not as noticeable in the St. Anthony area. A bit disconcerting when you come upon a toilet for the first time… The water is mostly from artesian springs and wells, and is quite drinkable though.
There are also many cords of lumber stacked along the highways, and occasional teepees made from evergreen trunks. These are for domestic heating in winter, and each household can get a permit from the government for cutting in a defined area. The wood is cut and collected each winter by snowmobile and brought to the highway’s edge. Some is cut and corded immediately, and other wood is stacked in teepees to dry. Some wood piles are better organized than others, and in one case we came across a small sawmill near the edge of the road. Each stack is labeled with a permit number, and collected in the fall for the heating season.
Today we rode from St Lunaire-Griquet to the Triple Falls Campground, set up our tent, dropped our gear and then headed into St. Anthony for a nice dinner and supplies. Dinner was at the famous Lighthouse Café with a view of St. Anthony harbor and “Iceberg Alley”. Unfortunately, today we had a view of the lighthouse (about 50 feet away) and that was about it. The food was good (and we ate a lot of it), but it didn’t live up to the star billing we’d heard from several other people.
The fog we woke up with did not lift, and there was a light misting rain much of the day. We’re finding that the cloudy, damp days are in some ways nicer for riding than a sunny day. It may be damp, but the mist keeps us cool, and it is easy to add more clothing if we need it.