From what I can tell, almost everyone in the rest of Canada seems to have pretty much the same image of Newfoundland*. They think it’s a desolate island, stuck hundreds of miles off the far east coast of the continent, that is constantly being buffeted by icy gales sweeping down from that massive glacier someone decided to call Greenland.
It’s inhabited by people who speak with a different accent to the rest of Canada, use strange words and phrases, and who weren’t even part of the country until 1949.
And the image is that it’s a land where everyone was a fisherman, or used to be, but now mostly supplies workers to the “oil patch” in Alberta, while those remaining at home more-or-less survive on the dole.
Some Canadians might look at “Newfies” (a somewhat derogatory term) in a similar way to how the English see the Irish. Fun-loving, and a bit “lower down”. Good for a laugh, often because they’re such great humourists, and sometimes just because they do or say something that doesn’t quite “fit in”.
That stereotype being the case, there is no better reason to actually visit Newfoundland and tour its many peninsulas and coasts, than to see for yourself how much of the idea many Canadians have about the place and its people actually fits with modern day reality.
What you’ll find is nothing short of a revelation; the kind of thing that often happens when you travel to somewhere you thought you knew (thanks to the media and pre-conceived notions), but then realise is very different to what you had always thought.
And above all else, the discoveries you’ll make of the natural world on this amazing island will simply be superb. The bays and inlets and bites and arms tucked along the coasts of the many peninsulas are wonderful, whether they’re clad in conifers, or just exposed hunks of rock covered with reindeer moss and low-lying alpines. If you’ve ever seen pictures of the place, that sort of thing may be more or less what you might expect.
But in addition, Newfoundland (especially in the centre of the island, and the tops of those same peninsulas) is one of the most elementally beautiful, pristine examples of almost sub-Arctic wilderness you’ll ever see, unless you somehow manage to drive up to the very far north of Canada itself.
[*Newfoundlanders call other Canadians “mainlanders”, and the people who actually live on the island “liveyers”. Both groups pronounce the province “New-fun-lan”. Only “come-from-aways” (people not from Newfoundland) hailing from places like the U.S. or Britain would ever say “New-FOUND-land”.]
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To travel across the centre of Newfoundland is a bit like driving through the northern reaches of Canada. There are no settlements or even houses for miles, and only a cross-roads every 10 to 20 kms.
If you’re down to a quarter tank of petrol, you always stop if you see a station, because there might not be another one for quite some time. And you’re likely to see signs such as “pizza – next turn – 100km”, or “road to southern ferry, exit in 298km”.
But if you want to see forest primeval in this world, central Newfoundland is made for you. The land is so full of rock, or deep bog, and buffeted by so much cold and wet, that there’s been comparably little harvesting of the bush for timber or pulp, and even less contemplation of doing anything with an agricultural bent.
Just putting in power poles can be something of a mission. The ground is so rocky or spongy, and the wind is so strong, that Newfoundland Hydro has to build mini-corals out of logs around the base of the poles, and fill them with rocks, so that the poles will remain up-right.
The bush is mostly conifers, but stunted, thin and spindly, and so dense that sometimes there will be as many as 50 per square metre. With that sort of vegetation, nothing of any size (man nor beast) could walk through the forest for any sort of distance.
There are a few pockets of farmland, in some protected valleys with half-decent soils, and a couple of massive complexes that are industrialised dairy farms. But don’t expect to see beef cattle, or any other farm animal apart from the odd sheep or horse.
There’s precious little forage, and the winters are long and severe. It’s the least agricultural province in Canada. Fifty-seven percent of Newfoundland is forest, and another 30 percent is bog. Only half of one percent (11,000 hectares) is capable of being used for agriculture.
The bush isn’t just tough on humans, however. You also hardly see any wildlife, dead or alive. In fact, in almost a month on the island I saw less road-kill than any non-urban area I’ve ever driven in, anywhere in the world.
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The great exception to Newfoundland’s lack of wild, land-based creatures is the moose. You’ll find this strange-looking animal, of course, almost everywhere across the 5000 mile spread of Canada.
You know they’re present not generally because you see them, but because the highways people have thoughtfully put up yellow warning signs all along the roads.
I really enjoyed comparing the depictions of these beasties on the signs as I made my way across the continent. In B.C. they look a bit magisterial, with their heads held high.
On the prairies, where you wouldn’t actually expect to find any, given the wheat and canola all around, they look a bit more timid.
And in Quebec, if French isn’t quite your language (I put my hand up on that one), you can be forgiven for thinking they’ve given all their moose a cute, feminine name.
Below the yellow diamond warning signs they’ve added a little rectangle that says “Prudence”. And it does seem to fit, since they depict their moose as something akin to a “prancing pony”, with one front leg held jauntily up on tippy-toe.
It’s when you get to Newfoundland, however, that things get really serious. It turns out that moose aren’t native to the island. They were introduced in a shades-of-New Zealand “acclimatisation” experiment at the turn of last century.
And these animals, at least, haven’t found the challenging climate and topography all that daunting. In fact, they are now so prevalent that they’re a major cause of traffic accidents in the province (almost 700 last year, according to statistics).
Because of their size, and the fact that they stand up high on long legs, the crunch can prove fatal, always for the moose, as it bounces along the bonnet and through the windscreen, and unfortunately sometimes also for the human occupants inside.
So in places where there are a high populations of moose, the roads people have added a unique new sign. To me the moose just looks a bit confused. But there’s no doubt what’s happened to the car.
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While the interior of the island of Newfoundland may not be very fit for long-term human habitation, that doesn’t mean that it isn’t beautiful, sometimes even hauntingly so.
As we mentioned, the conifers are everywhere. The rougher the conditions, especially when exposed to the wind, the more miniaturised they become (and you’d hardly believe they’re the same species found in much larger form throughout much of the rest of Canada). In Newfoundland, they can actually grow into each other, creating what locals call “tuckamore”.
In early summer, you also see spots of blue amongst the spindly joint grass, and on closer inspection you find blue flag iris (Iris versicolor), as perfect as in any garden at home. And when they put their frankly less attractive flower heads above the fray, you see Newfoundland’s provincial plant, that carnivorous wonder the pitcher plant (Sarracenis purpurea), with its clumps of burgundy-coloured leaves-cum-containers holding its deadly bug-consuming liquid deep inside. The liquid isn’t actually poisonous; it’s the mosquito larvae that live in the “pitcher” that do the dirty work.
There is also another carnivorous plant in the Newfoundland bog, however, one that isn’t so apparent, mostly because it doesn’t send up a flower flag to announce its presence. It’s the sundew (Drosera spp.), a delicate set of thin yellow threads, each tipped with a rather more gruesome drop capable of attracting insects and digesting them whole.
Finally, while Newfoundland may not be able to sustain much agriculture, the rocks and bogs are full of seasonal treats that draw everyone into the hinterland (or if they’re lucky, just down the road). Berries are part of the wilderness of much of Canada, but nowhere do they grow in such profusion, and in so many varieties, as in Newfoundland.
They start out in early summer with bake apples (Rubus chamaemorus, known outside the province as cloudberries), a member of the rose family, and a fruit that everyone here cans and preserves.
Then come the blueberries, but not those massive, high-bush things we buy at the supermarket. These are small, and firm, and so filled with taste you have to wonder why we even eat the other kind.
Blueberries are everywhere, when you stop to look, and often so profuse on the little, squat bushes that two people can pick a couple of litres (and eat almost as many) in a little over a quarter of an hour.
The berry Newfoundlanders all hold out for, however, comes in the autumn. It’s the partridgeberry (Vaccinium vitis-idaea), a relative of the cranberry, but with a different flavour to go along with the tartness.
These make the best pies, if you have a slice together with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. As a life-long admirer of wild blueberries (which I used to pick as a kid), I have to confess that partridgeberry pie has now knocked the blueberry equivalent off its perch.
As you drive the roads of Newfoundland in summer, quite often many miles away from the nearest human habitation, you’ll find a car pulled up along the gravel verge. Anywhere else you’d think the driver was having a car problem and needed help.
But here you soon realise you don’t need to stop. You start seeing cars everywhere, and although there’s never anyone inside they aren’t abandoned. The occupants are just off in the bogs taking part in a great Newfoundland pastime, stocking up on wild berry treats.
(Part one of a four-part series)
~first composed in August, 2012~