St. John’s – Pippy Park
August 7 – August 10
Bonavista to St. John’s Pippy Park
It was a bit of a drive to St. John’s and we were playing tag with a couple of other rigs we had seen along our travels. It was very easy to find Pippy Park with the large signs on the edge of the highway.
Pippy Park is very old, well established, an RV Park and Campground as well as a golf course and a park.
After we got settled into our pull through (the only area that had wifi, weak as it was), we took Lucy and ended up walking around Long Lake, almost a 2 km hike. It was really hot. When we got back, we took a quick drive through St. John’s. Really narrow streets, hilly and scenic.
The next morning was drizzly and much cooler. Felt like snow. We packed our rain gear in our backpack and then went to meet Brendan, our guide from Legend Tours. We would be spending 3 hours with him and several other travelers. Brendan told us about the local lore and legends and showed us all the important historical spots in the area. It was a cold walk up the hill to Cape Spear Lighthouse. Our Parks Canada pass once again got us into the lighthouse for a guided tour. You could really fell the remoteness of the area and imagine how hard it would be to bring a family up there. Generations of the family kept the light going until it was automated.
One of the women on the tour had only three days during which she was expecting to see the whole province, including L’anse aux Meadows. I told her we had been there for almost three weeks and still wouldn’t be seeing half of it. I don’t think she believed me.
That afternoon, after the tour, we found a grocery store and stocked up again with frozen veggies.
Our friend, Doug, had moved back to St. John’s from Sooke and we wanted to look him up. I found him on Facebook and messaged him. He was busy with the Busker’s Festival but could meet us on Monday so on Monday we headed to The Rooms, the museum, and just as we were finishing there, he called us. We met him downtown, drove around for about half an hour looking for a parking spot, and then went for a coffee. We sat outside in the sun shooting the breeze and catching each other up with what was happening in our lives.
Afterwards we were going to go for another drive just outside of St. John’s. Don had the trip planned in his head but instead of going the direction he wanted to, we ended up doing the trip from St. John’s to Torbay, following the road along the coast and then back to Pippy Park, in the opposite direction. W
e came to a little community called Pouch Cove (pronounced “pooch”). It was a very tight spot down at the bottom of an extremely steep road in the centre of the community and we had a bit of trouble getting turned around.
The day before we had gone to Canadian Tire and while we were there, we ran into another jolly fellow with a big white beard. We had to stop and chat with him for a while. Amazingly, as we were heading back up that steep hill, who was standing outside his house? The fellow we had met in Canadian Tire! We couldn’t believe it and neither could he because he hadn’t told us where he lived. He and his wife invited us in for tea and he showed us his garden and fruit trees. His daughter, from Burnaby, was visiting and she had taken her kids to Oakridge for pictures with Santa the two years Don worked there. She had missed last year and so did we. Coincidences!
