A walk in the woods

July,, 3-4

Summer is short here, the plants know this well and make good use of the season. So, right now, every growing thing is green and racing toward reproduction before it turns cold again. There are multitudes of wild flowers in every available niche and the conifers are laden with new pine cones. This all makes for very pleasant hiking. We saw lovely landscapes and beautiful flowers, and some spectacular waterfalls. We walked through enchanted forests, deserted tablelands, along the rocky coast, through peat bogs, and beside fresh water ponds. With every step we saw things that were unspeakably beautiful and all we could do is pinch ourselves and relish in the fact that we were here.

It got even better....one walk turned into a ride when we took a boat cruise on Western Brook Pond. The "pond" was once a glacier carved fjord, that has since been cut off from the ocean. It is also MUCH larger than what you think of as a pond being ten miles long. For our science friends, it is one of a very few ultraoligotrophic, pristine freshwater lakes in existence. It is 350+ meters deep in some places and is surrounded by sheer granite cliffs rising as much as 2000 ft above the water surface. It is a very unique body of water in that its water volume turns over only once every 16 years (as opposed to several times a year for many lakes/ponds). The isolation of the place is brought home by the fact that we had to hike 3.5km to get to the boat dock and were told that the boat had to be brought in four pieces by helicopter.

We left a little of our souls here in Gros Morne and are already making plans for a return trip. For now...it has started to rain, and we are now going in search of Vikings and Icebergs.

Posted by Sara (with contributions by Shawn)