It was Pancakes and plums with ham for breakfast, the wind was light and the sun was out.

We hoped in the car and headed north on route 430 towards Cow head, it was a clear and sunny morning. It was a view to the left was the gulf of St Lawrence and to the right was the Mountain’s across a long expanse of tundra and meadows and brooks, about a mile away.  As we passed through small towns such as sally cove, Martins point and Saint Paul’s on up to cow head we would stop and take pictures and video tape the scenery along the way. I must say, you don’t find road kill on the Newfoundland highways, there just isn’t any. What I heard was there are no skunks, no raccoons, no possum. There are things like wolverines, badgers and fox everywhere. One thing we did see in abundance was crows, lots and lots of crows. Kind of eerie at times and there calls a sometimes haunting when you’re hiking. We stopped along the way and picked up some fresh raisin biscuits and some coffee.

Our first stop was Broom point: it is a little fish staging area with a large barn and a few small houses and other small buildings for fishing equipment. Its setting was just out of a book, large rock out copings and the rolling sea behind them a few evergreen trees dotting the landscape. Add a bright blue sky and some wind and you have what we were experiencing.  I was filming some tidal pools and the strange rock formations, and Tom was up talking to the keepers of the place. They said we could go into the barn and look at the fishing equipment and boats if we like. We were content to see all the lobster traps and boats on the outside. One thing you will see in our pictures is their out house. Its this tall building with 2 long boards holding up the front of it, it looks as though you can take the front off and do you business in the open breezes! Amazing how that works….

We started into Cow head and drove through the small rural area of town, along side of swallow bay to the island of cow head, where we found the Gros Moran summer theatre. We parked and saw the trail to the light house and to the Cow head geological features. It was a good hike, nice views from the top of the mountain on the island, really cool little grottos in the trees coming down on the ocean side. We found the light house, and it was in bad shape. It was starting to rust really bad and the trees were growing up all around it and covering the view to the ocean. Tom opened the door to look in and saw it was really rusting on the inside and needed painting badly. Looks like this lighthouse might only be a pile of rusted metal and glass in 10 years or so. We were glad we made the hike to see it, on the back side of the island it was nice forest and meadows, we were wondering if maybe we took a wrong turn and then around the corner there was the familiar sight of Swallows Bay. We made it back to the car, and bid the island good by and drove off down the road toward the northern end of Gros Moran National park.

Our next stop was the arches; they were about 20 miles north of the park. We wanted to drive all the way up to the top of the western arm of Newfoundland, but time would not allow us. We heard that they are building a road from Quebec to goose bay and the road should be open soon, some say this year November others say next spring. Any way I would love to drive to Goose Bay and take a ferry across to Newfoundland from the north. Maybe next year.. I have an idea! We should buy some land alongside the new road and open up a travelers rest… You could pull in an RV, a trailer, pop up or we could rent a cottage, have a small store for supplies and wireless internet connection!!! (Ill keep dreaming, but I think it’s a great idea- Michelle P, I think you would be into it!) Any how back to the arches, we see the sign for the road, pull in and the gate was down. That did not stop us or another car, or even a tour bus! We parked and walked in as the tour buss of senior citizens were unloading (Dave kicked into hi gear- Dave’s holiday) We walked down to the beach area and I was totally amazed at what we were looking at, again only in book or magazine do you see things like this. There were these large rocks about as big as a 4 story apartment buildings some had holes/caves all the way though them and the sea was washing into the caves under them, the rock was smooth and shiny, a type of lime stone I would suspect, you could see further down the beach that some had collapsed over time and that new ones were forming. A great site for sure, I could see making a movie here.

After we filmed and took pictures we headed back up to the car talking to the people on the tour to find out they are going to goose bay for the night.. dam, if this tour could do it, I am sure we could too, just not enough time… We drove back to Green Point, packed up and headed south after taking just a few more pictures, like one last E Mail. On the way to our new destination we continued to be amazed  the wonderful area we have been travelling in for almost a week. Where did the time go?

Our next campground for three days was in Lomond, 40 miles below Rocky Harbour. We picked our campsite after driving around the campground a few times. We set up camp and headed for Deer Lake to have supper and enjoy the night life for at least 20 minutes, what night life?  We did not see any moose on the road coming and going, and the dinner was not worth the trip. We are too use to the great meals prepared by the on site chef. He makes everything taste better each day, rain or shine.