Port aux Basques
It’s an easy 75 kilometres to Port aux Basques, from where I will take the ferry back to Nova Scotia. All morning, the sun, rain, wind, and clouds are chasing each other like kids in a playground. By afternoon, the sun appears to have won out except for one small but ill-tempered cloud which stalks across the sky 3 or 4 kilometres ahead. No worries though, it passes out of sight. Five minutes later one big raindrop smacks me in the face, then another. It’s snuck up behind me, the bastard; in seconds I’m totally drenched. Two minutes after that, the sun is shining again like it's never been away. For me, though, it’s too late, I’m soaked like a rat crawling out of a sewer. The passing trucks complete my humiliation by kicking up spray in my face as they go by. Sigh… The wind is a scoundrel, too, it’s frisky and it comes from all directions at once.
The trees now are left behind and I enter the tundra again; wide open and exhilarating. I’m flying high! I’m also realizing that my time in Newfoundland is all but done and I’m not ready for it to end.
I arrive in Port aux Basques. It seems a busy place, with gas stations, fast food joints, hotels, and supermarkets, and traffic streaming down the broad highway from the ferry terminal. In fact, its population is only 3,500. That’s just over half of what it was at its height in 1981. Essentially, it’s just a big outport, houses clinging hither and thither to bare rock. Its European history dates as far back as any in Canada, when 15th century Basques fishermen used it as a base for drying their catch before shipping it back to Europe. It doesn’t lack for recent history either; less than a year ago Hurricane Fiona struck with winds of 170 km/hr, the waves overstepping their bounds and washing a dozen homes into the sea. It’s quite a place, Port aux Basques; if you’re coming to Newfoundland for the first time, I recommend you start here; you’ll feel you’ve landed in a storybook through-the-looking-glass type of place.
The hotels are all full but I’m finally lucky with the food; I get a great meal at a Chinese restaurant. I eat and push on to find a campsite. A few kilometres on I find a small road going to the old town dump. There’s a gate to keep you out so I have to wrestle my bike through the bushes to get around. I find a lovely campsite, right by one of the many ‘ponds’ that are found almost everywhere. The water is black as coffee but I enjoy a bath, a meal, and a nice walk. I can see the Nova Scotia ferry looming over the town just a few kilometres away but I won’t be taking that ferry just yet; tomorrow I’ll head east to one more remote outport, La Poile.
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Today's ride: 75 km (47 miles)
Total: 1,206 km (749 miles)
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6 months ago
6 months ago