Continuing our 2010 trip. All photos look much better if you click and enlarge them.
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Highway Gardens
As you drive along the highway you see every 100m or so a fenced off area that is usually tilled. The fencing varies and can be very creative with different scare tactics employed: scarecrows, rags, flags, etc. There are no homes anywhere near these garden and we wondered what the story was. We found out that since soil — especially good, not acidic soil — is scarce on the ‘rock’, people grab a piece of crown land near the highway, fence it off to protect it from deer, and grow some potatoes, etc. on it. They don’t need a permit to do this and there is no issue of people stealing your crop even if it is a few miles from your home with no one to watch over it. Cool.
Cape Onion
Burnt Cape
We continued to Burnt Cape is a limestone barren and has one of the harshest conditions due to cold weather and high winds. It is home to thousands of plant species, mostly dwarfed versions of plants that are present elsewhere, but also home of some plants that are unique to this place. It’s a narrow spit about 3 km long and is a Mecca for biologists.
There are no signs and we drove in not really knowing what to look at. Luckily we ran into a guided tour, which we joined happily.
We followed the tour’s van throughout the park.
The trees here grow horizontally and very close to the ground. The is adaptation!!! The juniper below is a few hundred years old and is entirely on the ground. Trunk, branches. Everything. For scale, the entire area is a couple of metres. Do click on the image for a better view.
Frost polygons are formed through the frost and thaw action where the rocks get crushed smaller and smaller forming distinct depressions in the landscape. The plants take advantage of this slightly protected areas and grow in there.
Carnivorous plant. There must be some insects there.
This plant, Dwarf Hawke’s Bear, blooms once in a lifetime and then dies. It is only exists in the arctic and in Burnt Cape
A couple hundred years old tree. Natural bonsai!
Caribou moss and Woolly moss in the photo below. Apparently, one of them contains a lot of iodine, so if you cut yourself, you can use it to disinfect your wound. I can’t remember which is which though…
The locals use these as naturally heated pools (at the centre of the photo). We started climbing down, but were deterred by the high winds and the steep sheep path along the cliff. maybe another time…
It was such a beautiful day. We didn’t mention yet the amazing meals that we usually have here, mostly seafood. Maybe in the next post.
Tomorrow we leave for St. Anthony and then starting our way back.
Rugged landscape with stunning views. I love it! Isn’t it amazing how plant life adapts to survive the weather?
It truly is amazing! This was one of my favourit spots in our trip. Full of wonder, beauty, and resiliency.
Nothing beats a water view from a high rocky shore. Thanks for sharing. Allan
Absolutely!
Gorgeous views. The plants are amazing. It’s always fun to read about a geocache.
Which reminds me that we haven’t gone geocaching in a really long time! Thanks for coming along!
Absolutely amazing. Of course being from eastern Canada, there are so many places I would describe using those words. I may be biased but I have no regrets moving back home after 17 years in the Toronto area.
You have every right to think this way since you are absolutely right. Sometimes I think that there are no regrets moving almost anywhere from the GTA 😊
Definitely. There is something to be said about leaving the hustle and bustle.
Such hardy plants! I love the coastline of Newfoundland. It’s spectacular at almost every point. Maggie
It truly is, and those plants are a lesson on perseverance!
Love your trips and photos!
Thanks, John! I love having you here and I love your culinary adventures!
All interesting stuff, particularly the adaptations of the juniper trees. What a crazy time in Toronto with tornadoes, earthquakes, and anarchists. Somehow it reminds of the line from the Wizard of Oz. “Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!”
Haha, exactly! But we were safely away in Newfoundland looking at amazing dwarf juniper trees and moss 😊
I’m weird in the sense that I LOVE moss on rocks! So, that’s super cool you mentioned the moss!
I love moss on rocks too. The moss on the ground in Cape Onion was soft and deep and I could have spent the night on it! The moss in Cape Burnt was just cool moss 🙂
Oh my goodness, the views look absolutely breathtaking and the hiking looks like such a treat and an adventure. I bet they look even more stunning in person with the fresh breeze and water air.
Those carnivorous plants look absolutely terrifying!!!
These are a couple of my favourite places, and yes the photos are not even close to reality!
Such strange and beautiful plant adaptations, especially the juniper tree! Good that you found a quite place to wander when things were kind of scary back home.
It was fascinating. And yes, it was nice to be away from the chaos of the time. Little did we know the level of chaos the world will experience a decade later. It seems trivial now.
I also remember these roadside kitchen gardens, that local practice is a lovely story
I loved the sense of community, trust, and comradery that was so evident in Newfoundland!
1 The scenery is brilliant 2 the tiny dwarfed plants are double brilliant 3 I want more info on geocaching.
I guess i will need to write a port about geocaching 😊
Yes, if it’s not too much of a task.
I have to agree with you and say that cameras simply just can’t always capture just how breathtakingly-beautiful a place is: I can definitely imagine Cape Onion looking even more stunning in real life! The biodiversity of this part of the country is astounding, and I’m impressed with your knowledge of the fauna there!
Some photographers that are more talented than me, can capture the beauty of a landscape like this, but I always feel that my photos don’t do justice when it comes to spectacular landscapes. My knowledge of the fauna is restricted to what I have learnt when visiting these places. I wish I knew more, but there is so much to learn that I can’t keep up!
After all that rain and overcast I’m happy to hear that you finally got to enjoy some blue skies and sun! The scenery at Cape Onion looks spectacular (and what a great name). How lucky to have run into a guided tour at Burnt Cape.
These were two of my favourite places in Newfoundland. The weather may have helped, but I think I would have loved it under different skies too. Newfoundland place names are the best!
Lovely post with some great photos. We did some geocaching years ago, and enjoyed it. Maybe we should give it another try; I forgot how fun it is.
That’s what I was thinking! It’s fun and can lead you to new places that you may miss otherwise.
Gorgeous and fascinating. You must be enjoying going through these photos and memories again. Good for you! Look at them again in 20 years from now. Chuckle. All the best, Muriel
It’s a lot of fun, and yes, I hope that I’ll be able to do the same 20 years from now ❤️
Wow those views. As you mention, I’m sure the images don’t do it justice even though you took some great ones.
Thank you!