Good Bye to the Rock!

Friday, we took the ferry from Port aux Basques to N. Sydney, Nova Scotia.  This marked this end of our journey through Newfoundland.  It was everything we expected and more.  The following photos are of Port aux Basques as we were leaving on the ferry.

So, as a matter of "putting a bow" on this trip, I thought I would add a few random musings.  First off, we were a little disappointed not to find as much live music as we had hoped for.  Clearly, those infamous "kitchen parties" are held in, just that, kitchens.  We heard live music on George St. in St. John's - although the musicians we heard didn't play songs from Newfoundland.  The guy on the boat on Western Brook Pond certainly sang famous Newfoundland music.  As well, we saw the "Anchors Aweigh" show in Rocky Harbour.  That band showcased a lot of famous Newfoundland songwriters and singers.  It was really good.  I have since found out there is a "kitchen party" show at the same hotel there on Saturday evenings but our timing unfortunately didn't work out for us to see that.  We certainly did, however, enjoy the music we heard.   Here are a couple of examples:

Anchors Aweigh

KJ Hollahan on the boat tour of Western Brook Pond

In the musical, Come From Away, the lyrics in the opening song say;

Welcome to the rock if you come from away,

You'll probably understand about half of what we say.

They say no man's an island but an island makes a man,

Especially when one comes from one like Newfoundland.

Welcome to the Rock!

Well, I have to say that there were quite a few times when we really did only understand about half of what was being said!  I can't say if it was because people were often wearing masks, speaking so darn quickly or, if even without their masks, I would have understood them because of their accents and expressions.  It is a very unique dialect in some places.  We were certainly called "me ducky", "me lovey" and "me dearie" more often than we could keep track of.  It was all very charming and everywhere we went, the people were friendly, helpful and chatty.  

They also have lots of very unique expressions here.  Some were posted around the deck of a restaurant in Hillgrade near Twillingate.

Also, there are unique expressions for the weather and icebergs as we saw when we visited Signal Hill in St. John's and read these signs.

Then, there are the place names.  I have already mentioned the use of the word "tickle" in an earlier blog.  In Newfoundland, “tickle” means a narrow salt-water strait, as in an entrance to a harbour or between islands or other land masses, often difficult or treacherous to navigate because of narrowness, tides, etc.  It also means a “settlement” adjoining such a passage. The following photo is of the "tickle" at St. Lunaire-Griquet.  You can see the narrow entrance to the cove in the background.  Interestingly, the gift shop here was called, Dark Tickle.  There is also a village called Leading Tickles near Lewisporte.

We didn't note all the names we found amusing or interesting and some have already been  featured in the blog about Dildo.  However, there were more such as:  Nameless Harbour, Seldom and Little Seldom on Fogo Island, Come by Chance, Joe Batt's Arm (which took me a minute to realize it was probably about an inlet or body of water rather than a man named Joe Batt's appendage!), Happy Adventure (didn't go there but saw the name on the map), Nicky's Nose Cove, and Lushes Bight.  I am sure there are lots more and it sure would be interesting to know about the history of why these places have the names they do.  Charming!

There were also menu items that we didn't recognize.  

• Jiggs dinner - named after an Irish immigrant comic strip character that is salt beef, spuds, carrot, cabbage and turnip all boiled to within an inch of their lives;
   
• cod tongues - exactly what it says and is served deep-fried; 
  
  
• scrunchions - cubes of pork back fat, fried gently till the fat has rendered and they become salt-spangled porky puffs (they were often served with fish and chips);
  
  
• bakeapple - also known as cloudberries, this is a terrifically tart berry which grows wild in peat bogs and is a little like a sour raspberry (I had some bakeapple ice cream in the Dark Tickle gift shop but actually thought it was a spelling mistake and was baked apple and then didn't understand why it didn't have a cinnamon flavour);
  

• touton - pronounced tow-ton, this is a deep-fried ball of dough, usually served with treacly black molasses (in hindsight, I wish I had tried this);
  
  
• iceberg vodka and iceberg beer - unique in the world, no one else harvests icebergs and turns the 10,000-year old, pre-industrial revolution pure water into booze but the Newfoundlanders (we drank quite a bit of iceberg beer!);
  
  
• partridgeberry - a little like a cranberry, this is a tongue-tingling sour berry which is used in ice cream, sauces, jams, etc. (it was the sauce accompanying a stuffed chicken breast I had in Rocky Harbour and it was very good - but sour); and,
  
  
• crowberry - also known in Newfoundland as a blackberry, is similar in appearance to a black partridgeberry or blueberry (we saw jars of crowberry jam being sold in gift shops); and,
  
  
• lingonberry - another name for Saskatoon berry which was also sold as jam (not to be confused with loganberry).
  
  

I am not a particularly adventurous eater so I have to confess I didn't try any of these except for the bakeapple and partridgeberry.  My sister had scrunchons with her cod cheeks and chips one evening and said they were tasty.

So, sadly, that brings an end to our time on The Rock.  It was a wonderful experience and one I won't soon forget.  There were two particular highlights for me, among all the wonderful things we saw and did.  They were:  meeting Beulah and getting a closer connection to what happened here nearly 20 years ago on September 11th, 2001, and seeing the spectacular scenery in Western Brook Pond.

If you ever get the opportunity to visit this, one of Canada's most unique provinces, grab it and go!  And, one last thing:  BEWARE OF MOOSE!  We talked to lots of people who had seen them but we didn't, thankfully.  Seeing one by the side of the road would have been cool but not in front of our car!  I think the answer is being on the roads only during daylight hours.  The moose are usually seen between dusk and dawn.