August 9, 2004

Where the wild things are

There are barely words for the place I'm in. St. John's is a beautiful town with candy coloured houses up and down the coast, and streets that slope down to the harbour in a way that is harrowing to a girl from Toronto. "Hill 'o' Chips" road, (I swear to you that I am not making that up) for example, if you were to misjudge things just a little bit in the winter, would surely slide you straight into the drink. Everytime I think I'm going take a turn driving the car I see a lane ahead that goes up at a 45 degree angle and think better of it.
We are staying in a little house on The Battery, looking right over the harbour. Somebody with a better arm than me could throw rocks in it, that's how close it is. You can walk from there up Signal hill, and look down over The Narrows, the entrance to the harbour. The Dublin Bay sock and the family went up this "hill" (you wouldn't believe what a Newfoundlander calls a hill). It was a very long hike, breathtakingly beautiful, but scary...the trail goes along the side of the rocky "hill", and at one point the path is so narrow that there is a chain to clutch bolted to the rock face. The hike culminates with a flight of a hundred steps that takes you to the base of Cabot tower. (I have pictures of all this...expecially one of the sock overlooking the Narrows, but it turns out that Ken wildly overestimated my technical skills, and I'm unwilling to spend hours of prime Maritime knitting time beating my head off of a borrowed computer.)

Today we hiked to the point of Bay Bulls, following the East Coast Trail. (This again, though it takes hours and is breathtaking, and even though it has real "plunge to your death over a cliff and then have your body battered to bits by the waves" potential, is a "walk"). I can't even begin to tell you how cool it all is.

I love Newfoundlanders, who have in recent hours, described my hair (which is bigger than it has ever been before, mostly due to something that I keep calling "water in the air". It's not rain, since it's not falling and the sun is shining. It's just water hanging there in the air. Joe says it's "mist". Weird.) as "a birch broom wi' the fits". It is a true measure of what a good time I am having that I felt that this was charming. Absolutely charming.

I'm on my way to "Wool Tyme", if I can find it before it's too late, and to wander NONIA. I may never come home. The Dublin Bay sock sends his love.

(PS. No sheep yet)

Posted by Stephanie at August 9, 2004 2:38 PM