Easternmostsnowdildoheadlessduck

After a nice quiet Sunday night in I took a hire car out on Monday to see some other parts of Newfoundland. My first stop was obvious – Cape Spear – the easternmost part of the continent of North America. For a few minutes I was the geographically the most eastern person on the whole of the continent of North America. Not bad, since I have also done the closest European person to Africa, when I was in Gibraltar a few years back.

I had a good look around the lighthouse at Cape Spear and a good chat with the lighthouse keeper, who is off on a trip to Devon this summer. On my way out I met two Chinese guys who couldn’t work their expensive camera, so I had a play and managed to fix it so that they could take some pictures (I actually took their pictures for them) and then got some photos of us together too, They were nice guys, but I knew more Chinese than they knew English!

The most eastern photo in The North American Continent

With my Chinese mates

More Iceberg

At Cape Spear

After the start I had a good days drive, visiting a few lovely little villages and coves. Firstly, Maddox Cove and Petty Harbour. I then went around the coast to see both Brigus and Cupids. Cupids claims to be the Birthplace of ‘British Canada’, 400 years ago.  Both places were beautiful tiny little fishing villages with crystal clear ocean and stunning views, no matter which way I looked. Everywhere I have been whilst in Newfoundland has been just stunning. It is one of the most beautiful and amazing places I have ever been. Every corner you drive or walk around brings you to yet another lake, cove, hill, building or port that gets you grabbing for your camera and snapping away. If I didn’t have somewhere to head for I could have driven around all day and not got bored of looking. I’m sure that there must be loads of traffic accidents due to tourists looking anywhere but ahead of themselves.

However, my final stop of the day, whilst still a beautiful little fishing village, was a bit different. It was a place called ‘Dildo’. Yeah, I typed that correctly. A village named ‘Dildo’. It is a beautiful little town with fishing boats and cliff top drives, but it has the greatest name of them all!! As soon as I saw it on the map I had to come and see for myself. They even have a town mascot called – Captain Dildo, who stands proudly outside one of the little cafes. It was a perfect end to a great day and so after visiting the town I made my way back to Saint John’s and dropped the car off. It was pissing down by now and so one of the staff dropped me downtown where I ended up having a great ‘Guinness burger’ dinner in The Shamrock City pub in town. I was the only person in the room in the hostel for the last night so I enjoyed a good soak in the bath before bed.

A few views

of really

cool places

A nice town....

...with some strange stuff...

...called.....Dildo

Captain Dildo himself

Had to be done

It’s been a funny couple of days – I left Saint John’s heading back to Halifax and because of the extortionate taxi’s, I decided to get two buses. The first was fine and dropped me off at a bus stop where I was on the route of the number 14, to the airport. It had started to snow heavily and I was pleasantly surprised when the bus turned up almost straight away, but pissed off when it drove straight past in the left turn lane and disappeared! I decided to walk in the snow, even though it was freezing. I had got a couple of hundred metres when I saw the same bus, sat in a car park, with the driver reading his paper taking a break. He let me on this time and dropped me off at the airport, but I still don’t understand why he didn’t stop for me in the first place the knobber.

Snow in...

..Saint Johns

Arriving in Halifax

The flight was fine and when I arrived in Halifax I noticed that the baggage belts have local landmarks built into them – a pretty nice touch for the airport. I had a return ticket for the ‘airporter’, bus and asked at the ground transportation desk, where a nice lady said it would be here at 3pm. Just after 3pm a bloke came up and asked me if I wanted to go to town. I said yes and was waiting for the airporter. He said he ‘was’ the airporter, but that the now ‘bloke’ on the ground transportation desk had told him there were no passengers. He had just taken over from the nice lady and was obviously a complete dick. How did he know there were no passengers if he had just gone on shift!? At least the airporter driver had thought to ask!

After a well needed haircut in town (at a cool barbers that serves cold beers and during which I met a couple who live around the corner from Buffy in Winnipeg) I went to the cinema at night to see Men in Black 3, which was ok, but behind me was a bloody annoying couple who kept tapping all the time. It really annoyed me and they stopped when I turned around, but then started again. I decided to ignore them. Then when I got back to the hostel, someone downstairs was banging for ages, so I banged back to stop, but someone then came into the room and asked me to stop banging!! FFS!!! I knew it was time to sleep!

Halifax was rainy the next day, so I sat in a nice little coffee shop before having a wander around the public gardens looking at the ducks huddling out of the rain and the ‘Titanic’, model floating in one of the ponds! A nice touch – there wasn’t an iceberg though. It wasted a bit of time before I had to be at the stop for the ‘Airporter’ bus back to Halifax airport though. I laughed as I got on as it was bus number ’17’ again – the exact same bus that had broke down on the way to the airport last week. No such worries this time though.....oh, sorry I lied. Unbelievably, it broke down again!! This time we made it another 5 kilometres or so and were actually on the airport entrance road when it broke down. The engine just conked out this time with no warning and we sat by the roadside for a few minutes before some taxis arrived and started to ferry passengers the last kilometre or so to the terminal. I just grabbed my backpack and walked it. I was then wandering around the airport when a woman grabbed me from behind and said hello. I recognised her but didn’t recall where from, until she said she like my haircut. She was from the barbers yesterday. It’s been a funny couple of days!!

Its the exact ....

...same bus as last week!!!

One legged no headed duck...

Titanic in a small pond in Halifax

On arrival at Ottawa I liked it immediately. It’s a modern, organised place. The bus from the airport had to go about 10 miles to the city, but with special ‘bus only’, roads, it took just 15 minutes to hit the city centre and arrive at the hostel. Now, the hostel – it is brilliant. A stunning house with just four, four bed rooms, a big comfortable lounge downstairs with big sofas and cable TV and great modern bathrooms. It is the best hostel I have stayed in so far in Canada. I went straight out for a look around the city and watched the 1^st game of the Stanley Cup final in a local bar chatting to a few of the local hockey fans. It’s been a good day and to top it all off, the weather in Ottawa is more like summer again. Much better than the snow I had in Saint John’s! The weather forecast is on now and its 3 degrees in Saint John’s – 18 degrees here!