Before leaving the Port au Port Peninsula, Tracey and I visited Boutte du Cap Park just down the road from our B&B. It sits atop towering cliffs, home to hundreds of kittywakes, a species of gull.

My photo of the cliffs pales in comparison to the photo you will see on the park website, so I will leave you to follow the link above for some grand images of the cliffs.

The drive from Cape St. George to Cow Head (circled in red on the map to the left and in the header photo of this post) took us along the Viking Trail (though I have yet to spot a Viking!) and through Gros Morne National Park. We stopped at Norris Point for a view of the distant Tablelands – flat-topped mountains that were part of the earth’s mantle, pushed up as continents collided and then eroded over 400 million years to their current state.

We enjoyed a tour of Western Brook Pond which is renowned in this area (both the tour and the Pond!). The “pond” used to be a fjord, but has long since closed off and is now a huge body of fresh water. The tour guide provided us with fascinating information about the origin of the cliffs we saw – for example they are part of the Appalachian Mountain chain – but I gotta say it was so cold I just wanted the tour to end. 😠

Here’s me when someone offered to take Tracey’s and my photo and asked if I was enjoying the tour.

I’m kidding. We had a good time in spite of the cold and the 2.5 km walk from the parking lot to the dock and back. It was disappointing that the cloud cover was so low and the wind so fierce, but I managed to capture a few interesting sights anyway.

Two boats took passengers out today, both packed with folks wanting to take photos (including me!). What struck me as much as the amazing cliffs/mountains was the sheer scale of our surroundings, how small the other boat was relative to the soaring cliffs. In the second photo, see if you can find the red and white boat. The first photo shows you what to look for.

A recurring magnificant feature was waterfalls. Here’s a particularly stunning one.

Upon our return from the boat tour and our thorough defrosting, we were treated to a tour of the Nurse Myra Bennett Centre for the Performing Arts by Artistic Director Jeff Pitcher. This facility is fully professional and produces two plays in rep about Newfoundland lore for the annual Gros Morne Theatre Festival. It was very kind of Jeff, who spends half his year in Vancouver and half in Newfoundland, to show us his wonderful new theatre. The video below will make United Players activists weep with envy!

We have had a great two days in Cow Head and venture forth to Labrador tomorrow. See you there!