The second stop on my CapeRace tour was the little cove town of Heart's Delight, not to be confused with Heart's Desire and down the road Heart's Content. The origin of the names is up for debate (name of ships that entered the coves, shape of the coves, someone enjoying the scenery?). Regardless of the name these quiet outposts were really, well, quiet and so friendly.
The few hour drive from St. John's was spectacular in scenery in itself. After being just in the city and surrounding area the landscape was something completely different. At times the trees all disappeared and there was just the waving grass to look at then all of a sudden after a big hill to climb everything changed. Really nice. The Transcanada is not busy at all and that made it easy just to do the speed limit and look around.
It is easy to see how many folks coming "across the pond" found a lovely cove, dropped anchor then dropped onto the land to start a life not knowing that there might be a community of similar folk just a few kilometres away as the crow flies. These coves are so isolated from each other it's easy to imagine years going by before anyone discovered they had neighbours. I thought of the folks that started the first road system in Newfoundland, must have been quite adventurous as the terrain is varied with hills, ponds, marshes and lots and lots of rock.
The house in Heart's Delight, the E.J. Sooley house is a lovely one storey, 3 bedroom home with everything in it from 1950. It's like the clock just stopped. I was so enamoured with the linoleum on the floor (exactly like what I had in my room at our old family cottage) and the cook stove (with a built in steamer on top). The books were from the 40's and for my bedtime reading I found and enchanting book written in 1947 introducing the beau of Princess Elizabeth, Philip Mountbatten. Oh it was so lovely to read that listening to the sound of the waves of Trinity Bay waft through the open window at night (no screens, no bugs!).
From Heart's Delight I travelled the whole Avalon Peninsula to Grates Cove where ancient rock walls still exist to protect fields from roaming livestock and to Cape St. Mary's Ecological Preserve where 70,000 nesting pairs of gannets, kittiwakes and murres cling to the highrise cliffs to raise their young. I saw 3 iceburgs in Harbour Grace which was so exciting! I even heard one of them cleave off part of itself and the thunderous roar it makes when that happens. I stood at the place where Amelia Earhart took off to begin her global flight. I toured the site of the transatlantic cable station and wandered the shore where the cable is still situated. This is where history is. You can see it, touch it and truly appreciate it.
Elizabeth, my contact for the E.J Sooley house, presented me with a lovely lemon meringue pie and 2 pounds of crab legs for my dinners when I arrived. This was such hospitality. It was mindblowing how friendly everyone was and how much they wanted to make sure my time in NF was the best ever.
Enough print, picture time!
This is the E J Sooley house in Heart's Delight, my home for 3 days. Note the open outside door, this meant that someone was home.
Ahhh, Iceberg beer (yup, made with water from icebergs) a little history of the house and area and Heart's Delight cove and Trinity Bay beyond.
Dining area with Kitchen through door on right, note the taps way above the sink, which was enameled cast iron.
The cook stove with warming oven on left and steamer unit on back left. Worked like a charm.
Beside my bed on the wall. Doesn't Her Majesty look just thrilled to be a mommy? This was from a newspaper after Prince Charles was born. Cute. House had everything any monarchist would love.
The same linoleum that was in my cottage bedroom growing up. Wow, what memories!
Beautiful sunset over Trinity Bay. I sat on the top of the bank each night enjoying this.
YUM! Crab legs for dinner, note the tools on the bottom left. I got better as the legs went down.
The white is not snow. It's BIRDS. Thousands and thousands of birds. There was a 2 km walk from the interpretation centre to the nesting site. The cliffs are about 100 metres high.
A gannet egg (no one home) and the cliffs of Cape St. Mary's. The interpretation centre is the building you see on the top of the cliff.
These gannets have a 6 foot wing span. How they end up on the cliff side's I'll never know but yes they do fall off sometimes. This picture is really the tip of the iceberg, there are 1,000's more on the other side.
Really?? Yes, this road is only this wide, goes for 15 km and is the only way to Cape St. Mary's. You'll note there are no trees, not one. Not anything higher than 2 feet or so. Oh yeah, and no shoulder for the road. Meeting and oncoming car was and adventure. Thankfully I didn't meet any motor homes!
Nope, not horses. MOOSE! 2 young males out for a dine and stroll on the highway. They weren't in a hurry to move and I wasn't about to push the subject. They eventually got bored and walked into the field to the right. Note the trees, such as they are, are bent to the left. The wind is always blowing here.
EEEEEEKKKK!! An iceberg! The very thing I was so hoping I'd see on this trip. This is the one that broke apart a bit while I was there. The little ones in front of it are piece that have broken off earlier. So breathtaking!
Aren't they neat? Okay, I love icebergs, especially seeing them with my own eyes. The camera doesn't do them justice for the colour, the blue was really outstanding.
Grates Cove. The lobster/crab boats all safely moored from the sea swells. Really a beautiful picture. Again, note the lack of vegetation.
This is were the Transatlantic cable enters the ground at Heart's Content. These cables are just left, not recreated, not shored up, just left for us history hunters to enjoy. You'll note there are 5 of them. The first 3 attempts failed but finally one did in 1866 then others followed. Heart's Content was chosen because of the deep harbour which allowed the ship that was bringing the cable across to enter (yeah it's one continuous cable) so it must have been a big ship to carry it all.
That's it folks. The cable that brought nearly instant messaging from the Old World to the new. But it wasn't phone conversations. It was a very faint light (electrical signal) that danced back and forth on a horizontal screen. It took 3 people to take the message, one to look at the light and say left or right. This was translated into a dot or dash on paper by someone else. Then someone to translate the Morse Code into words to be sent to the receiver. As time passed the signals were heard through a headset but still needed to be translated. The Cable station was a major employer, especially of women! The station closed in 1965 when faster means of communication were developed. The museum is exactly as it was in 1965. Again, NF history, just left for the future and opened up again with no re-creation or rebuild. Amazing.
This lovely lighthouse aids mariners entering Heart's Content. I loved this spot and the lighthouse.
A sunny day in Newfoundland! Oh there is that pouff of fog behind the flags. Such a lovely time here!
Next stop, Bonavista!
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