Camping in August

I'm going to do a few posts about my holidays back in August, since I didn't get around to it at the time. Patrick and I travelled across Newfoundland to go to PEI. We spent a week camping in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, which is the most number of days I've camped consecutively. I've wanted to do a long-distance camping road trip for quite some time (like going cross country) so this gave me a taste of what such a trip could be like. Anyway, here's a few photos of the camping specifically; I'll put up photos of the sights later on.

This is Patrick's tent that we used; it's just large enough for two people to fit in. While sitting in the tent in one campground that was dominated by RV's, I heard some kids walking pass exclaim "Wow! That's a small tent!" The owner of the campground was incredulous when he saw the size of the tent.

The back of the loaded-down truck with tailgate being used as a cooking storage space. The big bag of stuff wasn't ours, but stuff I was transporting to PEI for some friends who were moving.
Patrick, having mastered his family's old French gas stove, served as the chef, whereas I acted as the prep cook and dishwasher. Here he's cooking up some sausages and frying some potatoes I believe.
Being the East Coast, the weather was not always spectacular and sunny. On one night when it started pouring just around supper time, we fortunately had a spare tarp to set up a crude shelter so we could cook and eat in relative dryness.
Another meal, cooked on that rainy night, of chicken, potatoes and vegetables and gravy. Not thwarted by being outdoors, we ate pretty good.

"The St. John's Left Turn"

At a lot intersections in St. John's, left turns are not permitted. Since I'm still getting to know many parts of the city, I will often have a plan in my mind of how to get somewhere that will be foiled by one of these "No Left Turn" intersections. In many cities, one would just make a left turn at the next intersection and then go down that side street and turn left again to get back to the street you originally wanted. In St. John's, this doesn't seem to work most times, as it might be quite far until the next street, or because the city lacks a grid-like pattern.

So I've occasionally found myself performing a manoeuvre I have decided to call "The St. John's Left Turn" (illustrated below in a sketch I made - the path of the vehicle is the green dashes). Since turning left isn't allowed at the intersection, I go straight through it and then make a left turn off the road into the next avaiable parking lot (conveniently, there always seems to be a business with a parking lot of some size not too far from these no-left-turn intersections). I whirl around in the parking lot and then go back on the street in the opposite direction, so as to make a right turn at the intersection on to my desired street. Voilà, a left turn.

Berry pickin'

I've been going out berry picking about once a week, when the weather's good, in the last while. September was blueberry picking, and Patrick and I went out to Blackhead (just outside of St. John's) several times, walking up the hill along the East Coast Trail and then going off-trail berry hunting. (All the photos herein were taken with my phone, so they aren't the best). The blueberries were good and thick, and I now have a freezer largely filled with bags of blueberries.

This is the view of St. John's (between the hills in the distance) from up the hill in Blackhead.

The sea was quite foamy and it was reflecting off of the rocky shore, resulting in interesting, irregular shapes.

Yesterday I went out to Logy Bay with Patrick and his dad to go cranberry picking, again along a section of the East Coast Trail. Cranberries are sneaky little berries, hiding under other vegetation, and I had to be pretty much down on my knees before I could spot any of them. They were sparser than the blueberries, although I did find them in bunches when they were growing near a stream or on boggy ground.

Some unhidden cranberries:

Looking down the hill toward the coast (Patrick is kneeling down picking just near the coast).
Just before leaving to go home, we stopped in at MUN's Ocean Science Centre, where we had parked as it's at the base of the trail. They have two tanks with harp seals in them that we watched swimming around for a bit. They have a web cam that you can connect to here.

And darkness descends

Yesterday's forecast for St. John's

Something a little foreboding about one day of sun and then clouds as far as one can see.

I've been away from the blogging for a while now, but I might have enough spirit to get back at it again, at least here and there. I've got some trip photos I'll try to whack up soon.

How big is that plant in the window

My garlic plants looking out the front window (dreaming of being big trees, perhaps). This is the big excitement in my life at the moment (teaching occupies my days but it's not exciting). I planted two garlic cloves a week ago. The one on the left started shooting up within a day and is now just over 6 inches tall. The other clove, on the right, started about four days ago. I put the plants in front of the window during the day and pull back the veil curtain, and when I'm walking up to the house in the afternoon it has appeared to me as though the plant is peeking out, waiting for me to come home (I miss having a dog).

And yes, they are planted in a plastic ice cream container. I've become one of those old-lady-types who saves all my plastic tubs for reuse. Or in the case of this one, gets them from other people since I don't buy ice cream much these days. In other old-lady-behaviour news, I've also started filling a jar with boiling water to take to bed with me to keep my feet warm on cold nights, since my room can't be heated well without making other parts of the house scorching. And my hip was aching, but that was from fencing lunges.

I've planted some green onions today (by snipping off the white bulb bottoms of green onions from the supermarket; they already had little roots on them), so we'll see how that goes now. The space by the window will be getting crowded.

More cold

No, not a mistake photograph - this is a frozen pond with drifting snow blown by a fierce wind (see below).

This is my first experience of a real winter for several years now (since early 2006), so I'm getting accustomed to cold again and also getting back into winter sports I haven't done in years.

There was some good snow earlier in the month, so after school I was heading up to Pippy Park (right in St. John's) and going cross-country skiing or snow-shoeing. The trails were pretty well groomed there due to skidoos using them, so to snowshoe I went off-trail and ended up frightening some dog-walkers when I finally re-emerged on to the trail from the bushes and spruce trees.

The other weekend I went "up the Southern Shore" (south of St. John's down the coast of the Avalon peninsula) to visit my boyfriend Patrick at the cabin (a cottage we'd call it in PEI, but a winterized one) he's living in for the winter at Kingman's Cove. We went for a walk through the woods (no need of snowshoes as it was a packed trail), but then couldn't find a return trail through the woods and so ended up walking along the frozen pond for about a kilometre in a bitter wind (and unblocked wind since we were on a pond). We walked backwards to keep the wind off our faces, and then when we reached the end of the pond we were able to walk over a hill across the barrens (wind at our backs, fortunately).


Caked with snow from the walk on the pond (all in good fun). I turn pink both when cold and hot, just the colour I'm meant to be it seems.
Part of the community of Kingman's and its cove.
The snow melted (except for frozen banks) this past week, but then froze all over the ground, so there's a lot of ice about. I've considered skating instead of walking along the sidewalks. I went with Patrick for a walk in one of the parks and ended up sliding on ice whilst grabbing hold of fences and flailing about to regain my balance like I was in Mr. Bean sketch. Unfortunately, there's no photographs to document that.

The pink snow

The yard on Christmas morning, snowbanks coated in topsoil - what happens when winds run across plowed PEI fields (you can see one in the very back of the photo).

Hockey is best kind

("best kind" = "great" in Newfoundland-speak)

So beyond writing papers that bore me stiff, I've started playing ice hockey here. One of my professors organizes people who aren't superstar players to get together and play just for fun. As he puts it, if you can skate backwards, you're too good to play with them. He invited students from our class out to get some more players. I've wanted to play hockey for years but always had the problem of finding people my age who weren't overly good, since I'm no good myself. So this seemed like a chance.

Now, if I hadn't known some guys from my class were going to be there, I probably wouldn't have gone on my own since I really lack confidence in my hockey ability (and rightly so). As it was, one friend, Andrew, convinced me to give it a try, and so I got Patrick, a fellow I've been going out with, to go with me to the used-sports equipment store to help me buy basic stuff like shin guards and gloves and a stick (I saved some money because I can fit into the large boys' size equipment - hooray for being small!). Patrick gave me his old helmet which was on the small side for him, and I already had my own skates.

To set the scene for you, it was 12 men of all ages and me. They all had full hockey gear - shoulder pads, big jerseys and padded pants, you know all that stuff that makes a person look even bigger. I wore my fencing breeches and a long-sleeved shirt, both of which added no volume, so I imagine I looked pretty tiny. One fellow told me my gear looked "old-school", like a picture of his grandfather playing hockey back in the day when they wore actual sweaters, slim-fitting pants and no padding.

I had a great time and have been back another two times for the same. I'm definitely one of the poorer players, but as the only girl I'm probably going to slide by on that fact for quite a while. We're playing non-contact which is actually a problem for me because I can't stop all that well, so I've occasionally checked someone because I couldn't change direction in time, which the fellows find pretty funny (one buddy has called me the "enforcer" of the group). Although when I've run into someone and fallen down as a result (being the lighter of the two bodies in a collision, it's sort of bound to happen), the fellows usually apologize to me profusely which I'm trying to train them out of by hopping to my feet as quick as possible and telling them not to worry.

So that's my fun new thing, and maybe if I keep at it for a few years now I might actually get better!

Marker fumes, fries with dressing, and fires

For Halloween this year, I dressed up as a tiger (I had a pair of orange tights I got real cheap once with the idea of a costume, so it stemmed from that). I used permanent marker to make my stripes, and boy do tigers have a lot of stripes! I ended up smelling like a permanent marker while wearing my costume. I was told repeatedly that my costume was very "cute", so I guess it was worth whatever brain damage I suffered from marker fumes.(I'll answer in advance that I attached the felt nose and whiskers with double-sided fabric tape, since loads of people asked me that.)

On George Street they hosted an event called Mardi Gras to celebrate Halloween on November 1. I've not run into anyone yet who knows why they call it Mardi Gras; from what I know that's a pre-Lent day.

On said Mardi Gras night, I got to try fries with dressing and gravy, a local variation on fries with the works (the dressing is what is known as stuffing to some people - what you have with turkey or chicken). It is one of the best foods I have ever had. I will not describe it any more as my mere words will do the taste no justice.

Bonfire Night (aka Guy Fawkes' Day) still seems to get some attention round here, mostly in the form of people setting stuff on fire (not in the form of organized community bonfires like in the UK). There's been a few stolen cars set ablaze; a couple in the soccer field near where I live.

Along the southern shore

On the long weekend, I did some hiking on the East Coast Trail on the peninsula jutting out from Fermeuse (see map). I forgot to bring my proper camera with me, but my phone worked well enough to take a few pictures.

A view of the rocky stretch of coastline along the trail (it went through the woods with offshoots to viewpoints at rocky cliffs along the way).

These stones, on the top of a very high cliff, appealed to my sense of symmetry.

We walked right out on the top of this archway, looked down over it's edge, then walked farther down the path to where I took this photo before we realized that it was open underneath.

I saw some of the twistiest trees in my life during this walk. Along one little stretch of woods, it looked as though all these trees had laid down in surrender or perhaps to die:
These particular trees nearby seem to have laid down to writhe in agony before dying:
Oddly enough, the trees on the other side of the path were all fine - like one side of the path was cursed.

Cleaning the Plastic Forest

This morning I joined volunteers with the East Coast Trail Association for a clean-up of a section of the trail below the municipal landfill. Plastic bags, styrofoam, newspapers and anything else light has blown down from the dump and filled the forest below. It's been called the "plastic forest" in the media, and there's an article here about it.

Bags had entangled themselves in the branches, were entangled in tree roots buried in the ground, and were wrapped around the bases of tree trunks. I unwrapped some 40 bags from the base of one tree. Someone compared it to being able to tell the age of a tree by the number of rings, so I joked (in the loose sense of the word) that perhaps we could tell the age of the dump by the number of bag layers.

This photo shows a heap of bags that I pulled out of a little hole to the right of the heap. Some were buried as far down as a couple of feet. The woods just kept growing around these things, the roots wrapping all around some bags and all the trees were pretty healthy-looking. So for all those nae-sayers who think we will bring about the end of all the ecosystems on Earth, well I think we may hinder them some, but life is pretty tough and adaptable.

I spent some time with a small rake trying to pull bags out of the tree-tops which was really tricky in some cases like this tree where the bags have pretty much tied themselves on to the branches.

The mound of bags of garbage that we picked up. It was a bit odd to be picking up plastic bags to put them in large plastic bags that are going to go back up to the dump from where they came in the first place. However, the garbage at the dump is now being buried straight away, so at least most bags won't be able to blow down the hill any more.

A closer-up of Sugarloaf Mountain where the trail continues on to.

Hiking and screeching

On the weekend our student society held it's first event, which we called the CFA event, that standing for "Come From Aways" (people not from Newfoundland). We did a hike along the East Coast trail out to Cape Spear, the most easterly point in Canada. Here it is, with a line of secondary education students walking toward it (we had fabulous weather for it - clear skies, and a wind of course).
This is just some weathered wood I thought looked cool. Couldn't call it driftwood as it's on top of a very high cliff.

In the evening, we gathered again to go down to George Street for supper and then across the street to one of the bars for "screeching in" in which 17 of us participated (an initiation for non-Newfoundlanders I suppose you could call it). It entailed a performance of sorts by some fellow in a sou'wester, and we all had to eat Newfie steak (bologna), drink a shot of screech (we were warned not to let it come in contact with our skin), kiss a (frozen) cod, and in response to the question "Is you a screecher?" reply with: "Indeed I is me ol' cock and long may your big jib draw". And of course we were each presented with a certificate to commemorate the occasion:
I had no idea that man was acting on behalf of the Queen!

It's been a while there now

I've been in St. John's 19 days now and not written a word! How unlike me. Well, things were a bit hectic with the move since I had to find a new place to live at the last minute, but all worked out well and here I am settled into the life of a student again. My program (intermediate/secondary teaching) is pretty busy, so you probably shouldn't be expecting me to write as much as I did when travelling (and it would end up being stories of my research papers if I did). I will try to pop something up here when I do get out and see the province.

I arrived here to an evening and a day of fog, so it was that long before I could even see the place I was living in. Since then the weather's been pretty good though, lot's of sunny days and I've not had to walk to the university in the rain yet (it's rained mostly at night).

My first weekend here I was down around Signal Hill with some fellow students, and we walked along the paths and staircases and picked wild blueberries.

There are loads of wild blueberries around here; I've been out walking in the woods elsewhere since and am always finding some. Berry picking seems to be a provincial past-time. I'm certainly for it.

My first days here I was surprised to here girls calling other girls "b'y"; I'd always thought it was a term reserved for males. I wouldn't refer to a woman at home by "buddy" so I just figured it would be analogous, but I stand corrected.

I learned that the "fishing net" I found in the hall closet is for covering up the garbage when you put it out to be picked up - to keep the birds out of it. I had wondered why the sidewalks were covered in "fishing nets" on certain days.

Newfoundlanders out-do even Islanders for friendliness, so it hasn't been hard to get to know people. I've been meeting lots of people in my program as well, from Newfoundland and the "Come From Aways" (of which I'm now one, despite being Away currently). Been downtown a couple of times and for a hike on the East Coast Trail from Blackhead to Fort Amherst. I've gotten involved with our student society in planning events, joined intramurals and ran a road race for the first time in my life the other day - 3km and I came in 9th place in womens' with a time of around 12 minutes.

The Harbour from the Battery.

One of the hills in the downtown (I navigate back from the downtown by going up). I won't be rollerblading down there! It's not even one of the worst.Waves reflecting off the rocks below the East Coast Trail.
Gulls in queue.

Why I never made it to Newfoundland before moving here

Because the trip takes about 20 hours not including waiting-for-ferry time.

See this Google map of getting here from PEI.

Yes, that's right, there's no road through Newfoundland along the south shore. Up, over, and down again.

The Badlands

I met up with some of my friends from Edmonton: Jocelyn, Amanda, Anna, and Ross in Drumheller, Alberta. We were camping for the weekend, so we spent the Friday afternoon/evening setting up, cooking over the campfire (Ross is a good campfire cook) and just hanging out.

The farming plains of southern Alberta:

Saturday morning, Ross went golfing while the rest of us went to the Royal Tyrell Museum of Paleotology which has a great collection of dinosaur skeletons, skeletons of other prehistoric creatures and loads of fossils. My favourite was this little guy, who clearly looks like a pre-historic Ey-ore and its name is even Erysis?

We met up with Ross in the afternoon and all piled in one car to go see the hoodoos (the pillars in the picture below). They're formed by erosion, so of course they're also changing due to erosion, getting smaller but then new ones can form as well. The hills in the background are typical of the Badlands with the sedimentary layers forming stripes.

Then we visited the old Atlas coal mine (there's still coal in Drumheller, but it's not being mined any more because it's more the household cooking type so not in demand anymore - although with the price of other fuels going up, who knows?) and we got to ride on the restored, battery-powered (so it didn't produce any source of ignition) coal/man train and climb up the tipple.

Then, on the recommendation of our tour guide, we went down a gravel road to check out the ghost town of West Monarch (once had 500-1000 people living in it). This is what it looks like now.

Anyway, the road was fine except to where there was some puddles, which when trying to avoid we fell into a grass-concealed ditch-of-sorts (perhaps created by spinning tires before?) from which we tried valently to extricate ourselves, but to no avail. Here you can see our attempts to build up height and traction under one wheel (there was conveniently a scrap heap nearby so I scuttled under the barbed wire fence to bring back useful things).

So we ended up stuck out in the heat waiting for a tow truck, after I had said earlier in the day "Wouldn't it be terrible to be stuck out here in this heat?" (thinking of all the old cowboy films). And after having wondered whilst on the bus the day before if cactus plants did grow in the Alberta Badlands, I discovered first-hand (literally) that they do when I got this fellow stuck in my forearm and then hand:

Anyway, the getting stuck was an unexpected adventure, but dinner that night, once we got back to the campsite, never tasted better.

On the Sunday after we broke camp, I went up to Edmonton with Ross and Anna, and I stayed with Anna's welcoming house until I flew back. Anna and I wandered around Edmonton and the university campus, both of which have become massive construction sites since the days when I was there.

Then it was time to fly back to Charlottetown and end my holiday to prepare to move to St. John's (and find a new place to live, but that's another story).

West Coast finally

I arrived in the city early on Monday afternoon, hardly able to hear a thing because my ears had been popping going up and down the mountains on the drive from Kelowna (my ears pop even on small hills, like Nova Scotia and New Brunswick size and up. I assume it's because I'm from PEI and was never up a mountain until fully grown. I'm a sensitive barometer, basically).

While walking around trying to find a hostel I had to admit to myself that Vancouver is a nice city. I hated to do so because Vancouverites are always bragging up their city - "oh, it has the ocean, and the mountains, and it's international..." and so on. Anyway, they're right, dammit. I ended up staying at the Univeristy of British Columbia because all the hostels were full, presumably because of the Radiohead concert that I found out was going on. My room had this great view of the mountains and the city.

On the bus out there, I was even pleased to see that the locals say hello and thank-you to the bus driver. I haven't seen that in many big cities. A downside would be the local young people have a most annoying accent. And speaking of accents, I don't know if mine was a problem but several people seemed to have trouble understanding me and others seemed amused by my (to me) mundane answers to their questions.

From the university, I walked down to the beach (meeting one of my old Acadia students along the way, small world that it is) and had my first contact with the water of the west.

The next day, I hit up Stanley Park and wandered amongst the big trees.

I visited the aquarium in the afternoon; here's the beluga whale who recently gave birth, thus she has stretch marks/love handles on her (she's swimming upside-down as she's wont to do on occasion, so the rolls are on the top of the picture).

Lion's Gate Bridge and North Vancouver under the clouds that were hanging around.

My foot was really killing me, so I actually went to a doctor to get it checked out and found

out it was just a really bad soft tissue bruise. So the good news was that I wasn't damaging myself by walking around, but I still had to take a day of rest of sorts. So I sacrificed my plan to go to North Vancouver and check out the canyons there.

My last day I wandered around Chinatown, Gastown, and the East Hastings district (they were all within 30 minutes walk of the bus station). Around East Hastings was especially interesting, as that's where a lot of the street people are, and I saw folks lining up for the soup kitchens, people sleeping on the sidewalk in the middle of the day, and just a lot of people who looked worn and down on their luck. So the other side of the glossy city, I suppose. Strangely, that was one part of town where no one was begging for spare change.

Oh, and the final good thing about Vancouver - you can get 20-plus pieces of freshly made sushi for 5 bucks.