Wednesday 17 July - Corner Brook to Port au Choix

We slept late, enjoyed a good breakfast in the Glynmill Inn dining room, then drove around Corner Brook. There are some spectacular views from a high coastal road. As we drove around, we spotted a Dominion store and remembered that the Dollarama clerk had mentioned there was a liquor store "in Dominion" -- sure enough! So we stocked up on wine and beer. Deciding to equip ourselves for picnics, we stopped at Walmart for a cooler, plates, cutlery and glasses, as well as some food, then hit the Trans Canada. Back at Deer Lake we turned north and eventually onto the Viking Trail. We were sometimes on the coast, sometimes in scrubby forest, on sometimes flat, sometimes hilly highway. We left the highway to visit Rocky Harbour, where we enjoyed lunch at a cafe/gift shop and chatted with the owner, who had lived in Ottawa for a time. Apparently, though there is a building boom all along this coast, the permanent population is about 1/3 lower than than it was some years ago. Lots of seasonal residents and guests. Traffic was sparse and the only crowd we saw was where we ate lunch. The large parking lot for one of the hiking trails was packed, though, so I guess that's where everyone was. Signs along the highway frequently reminded us to be "Moose Alert". One even mentioned that there've been 3 moose-related accidents in 2019, compared to 11 in all of 2018. Late afternoon we reached Port au Choix, where we had a room reserved at the Sea Echo motel. The desk clerk was the first person I've encountered here with a thick Newfoundland accent. She gave us a map of the town and mentioned there'd been a caribou sighting earlier today. We walked over to the harbour,

then back to the shore behind the motel. No sign of caribou. After a bright, warm day, clouds have moved in and it's very windy. In Port au Choix, as all along this coast, the homes are often brightly coloured. They're no longer painted, however, but covered with vinyl or aluminium siding.

Photos of the Day allow 5 sec to load