Day 1: St John’s and Salmonier Nature Park
On a fresh September morning, I stepped out of my hotel in St. John’s to embark on
a ten-day adventure cruise around the Island of Newfoundland. Our rendezvous was a nearby
hotel, where, along with 100 other passengers, I checked my bags and loaded into a bus for
our first adventure of the cruise, a trip to Salmonier Nature Park, about 60 kilometres southwest
of St. John’s. Our cruise’s staff photographer, Dennis Minty, had been instrumental
in developing the park, which preserves a unique ecosystem, moist and rich in rare mosses.
It is also home to a collection of animals injured in the wild and now held in large, natural
enclosures.
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The plan is to circumnavigate of one of the world’s cultural and geographical
gems — Newfoundland — often visiting places only accessible by boat. |
We returned to St. John’s, boarded the ship and settled into our quarters. In the
front lounge, the president of Adventure Canada, Matthew Swan, stepped into his role as director
of our floating “summer camp” for adventurous adults. (At the young age of 56,
I feel like one of the junior campers.) Swan explains that we are here to combine learning
and fun. The plan is to circumnavigate of one of the world’s cultural and geographical
gems — Newfoundland — often visiting places only accessible by boat. We have
a cruise staff peppered with top-notch resource people in a wide variety of fields — a
geologist, botanist, ornithologist, historian, “culturalist,” archaeologist,
musicians, artist, publisher. (I learn that Adventure Canada has a long history of
engaging luminaries for resource people — Margaret Atwood, Ian Tamblyn, David Suzuki,
Mike Bedell, Freeman Patterson, and others.) We have a Swedish captain, an
Argentinean first mate, and a mostly Filipino crew and kitchen and housekeeping staff. My
fellow “campers” are mostly Canadians, with a good number of Americans and a
sprinkling of Brits, who could have chosen to take a standard luxury cruise, but are here
because, like me, they love learning and adventure. It’s an incredible setup — especially
for someone like me, whose experience on the water has been limited to canoes, rowboats and
the occasional ferry, and whose normal style has been to travel on the cheap, staying with
family, friends or host families.
Night fell as we exited The Narrows of St. John’s Harbour and steamed into the open
sea. I retired to my room to settle down into long hours of the most incredibly wretched
seasickness I hope I will ever experience, thinking a lot about the spaghetti I had bought
in the Montréal airport that somehow didn’t taste quite right. |
About
Steve Fick: Artistic Statement
Daily Journal
Day 1: St John’s & Salmonier Nature Park
Day 2: Change Islands & Tilting
Day 3: L’Anse aux Meadows & Raleigh
Day 4: Cape Charles & Battle Harbour, Labrador Coast
Day 5: Gros Morne National Park
Day 6: Grand Codroy Valley
Day 7: White Bear Bay & Ramea
Day 8: Conne River & Francois
Day 9: St.-Pierre, France
Day 10: Return to St. John’s
Related Stories
Ghost
coast
Torngat
Mountains
Resources
www.fick.ca
www.danielpayne.ca
Adventure Canada
Newfoundland & Labrador
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