Finally Amanda arrives!

Saturday July 16, 2011

Finally it was the day for Amanda to arrive.  Of course it was raining again and has been for the past 3 days. The rivers are overflowing their banks and there are waterfalls where there were only trickles of water previously. We did some souvenir shopping the last couple of days and checked out some of the small communities close by.  Amanda’s plane arrived at 11:20 a.m. and we were on our way to Signal Hill by 11:30.  We took the scenic route through downtown St. Johns’ and showed her all the colourful homes. 

 We stopped at the Terry Fox mile zero and drove down Water Street, the main street. 

Luckily the rain at stopped and the skies were clearing, so we would get a decent view.  It was now 20 degrees, so the day had improved.  We only had to circle the parking lot twice to get a parking spot, so that wasn’t too bad.  Again we had our lunch overlooking the ocean.  It was all Amanda could do to eat her sandwich, she was so excited and wanted to get rolling.  A light fog was drifting in and out so visibility over the ocean wasn’t the best, but Amanda was still in awe.  What a treat we had today, a gentleman brought his Newfoundland dog Schooner, to signal hill put him up on the wall right beside us and let everyone pet him and take pictures.  

Schooner was so beautiful, his fur was as soft as babies hair and he was as gentle as could be.  A local fella was sitting in his car right beside us and gave us some suggestions of places to be sure not miss.  So off we go!  Just as we start on the trail we spy some whales.  Amanda just about jumped out of her skin she was so excited.  She quickly ran back to Hemi to get the binoculars to get a better view of them.  They were putting on quite a show for her even if they were off in the distance.  Of course Amanda and I had to hike down to the next level, it was great going down, but coming up was another story.

 It is so amazing getting up close to the coastline, you can hear the waves crashing the rocks, and the colour of the water is magnified.   We had to scoot back up the path the Tattoo was starting at 3:00 and we wanted to take that in.  Amanda pretty much ran up the stairs as she wanted to go up the Cabot Tower before we headed down the other side of the hill to the Tattoo.  I took my time and gave the old ticker time to re-coup between the flights of stairs.  

The tattoo was great, they did some marching and drills as well as a re-enactment of a battle.  After the Tattoo we drove over to Cape Spear, but the fog was in over there. We will have to come back tomorrow and see if we get a better view.   It is amazing how it can be foggy in one area and 10 kms away the fog is in and you can hardly even see the water. We arrive back at camp and are surprised to have Gerard and Barb arrive with fresh cod and potatoes for our supper.  It is truly amazing our friendly these people are.  We have a short rest and head down to the rec hall.  The campground was having a local entertainer in. 
 What an amazing singer and entertainer.  We even had a few dances,  and finally at 11:45 we drag Amanda back to Elbroko and tuck her into bed.  We can't believe she managed to stay up that late.  It sure was a long day for her, but what an amazing first day.   


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