Day 58
We depart St. John’s on the Trans Canada Highway 1 and exit onto route 13 where we parked the coach in a gravel pullout. Took the car South to Ferryland about a 50 minute drive. As we begin on Route 13 we are greeted by a sign “Caution Potholes” and they weren’t kidding. Fortunately, it was only 11 miles on Route 13. We arrived in Ferryland just as the fog rolled in. We toured the Colony of Avalon an active archeological dig. The colony was first settled in 1621 by the English. The structures were made of rocks which were very plentiful. A Dutch attack in 1673 and a later French attack in 1696 burned the place to the ground. The English settlers returned and rebuilt on top of the burnt ruins. We walked on the cobble main street of the colony while viewing the colony’s buildings. The colony had a drainage system which lead to a privy along the seawall built by the colony. The construction allowed the high tide to come into the lower part of the privy twice a day to clean it and thus, this was probably North America’s first flushing toilet. That’s me standing next to it! That’s also me at the bottom of the well, look closely. During our tour, our guide kept insisting that there were islands in the cove but we could not see them due to the fog. We went into the museum to view many artifacts discovered there. When we came back out the fog was gone. We headed to the Ferryland lighthouse and hiked the lighthouse trail, climbed the many rocks around the area and did get to view the islands. Back to the coach for dinner and then hit the road westward to our nighttime stopping point, the Clarenville Walmart. Driving at dusk isn’t recommended due to the moose danger. Sure enough, we had to stop for a bull moose crossing TCH 1. This moose was huge, his eye level was almost equal to mine and I sit about 8 feet above street level. The antlers were also huge. We were told the antlers weigh about 150 pounds which makes for very strong neck muscles.
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