On The Road – Winter Wren – Newfoundland – Bauline and Signal Hill

Bauline is a small (non-tourist!) fishing village of about 20 houses with a man-made harbor. This is the view from our rental’s balcony of the busy harbor. Every day, we saw lobster boats going out or returning, as well as minke whales and gannets passing by going up and down the coast. We quickly found that the easiest way to spot whales is to look for circling or following gannets in the sky above and watch to see if a whale would surface.

I liked the composition of the lupines in front of this abandoned boat looking across Conception Bay. This view is from the quarry which was used to build the breakwater of the town harbor. Far across on the other side of the bay is an enormous grounded iceberg, barely visible as a white speck above the stern of the boat.

The rest of the family caught summer colds just as we arrived, so I did a solo hike one day on the East Coast Trail to the hill overlooking Bauline harbor. On sunny days, the water near the rocky shore is crystal clear.

A spotted sandpiper pretended to have a broken wing in a small meadow on the hike. Presumably, there were young or a nest nearby, but I was unable to see them.

View from the top of the hike looking back down on Bauline harbor. You can see a few of the houses (our rental was the yellow house), the quarry and the boat near the quarry. Bell Island is in the distance on the right behind some tree branches.

Every day, when we didn’t have a day-long side trip planned, we went to Signal Hill at the entrance to the St. John’s harbor to enjoy the vistas and to watch a pod of resident humpbacks and their attendant gannets. Opposite Signal Hill, active duty Fort Amherst here continues to guard the excellent deep water harbor.

We took too many pictures to count of the humpback pod. Here one is diving to feed while another is resting on the surface. You can see the paler looking fins through the clear water.

Spectators on the hill were enjoying the humpback show and the gannets flying about. In addition to being able to drive to the top of Signal Hill, there is also a path from a city neighborhood along the bottom of the harbor entrance cliff which we took on our last day. Excellent views without being too scary.

Looking down the coast toward the headlands of Cape Spear – claiming to be the most easterly point of North America. Further down the coast is Witless Bay and its famous seabird nesting colonies (featured in part 2). Bonus whale tail in the foreground.